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Replacement Child - A Memoir (2011)

by Judy L. Mandel(Favorite Author)

3.47 of 5 Votes: 1

languge

English

genre

Memoir & Autobiography

publisher

Schlesinger Books

review 1: THREE AND A HALF STARS. This is a moving memoir about a girl growing up in the shadow of tragedy as a "replacement child" for her 6 year old sister, who perished in a terrible accident. As a mental health professional, this book to me was about a family severely affected by trauma. A plane crashed into their home, starting a fast moving blaze that killed their six year old daughter and left their 2 year old with devastating and permanently disfiguring injuries. The mother was home at the time and experienced the fire first hand, watching it burn her children and forcing decisions that would haunt her for the rest of her life. Their home and all of their possessions were destroyed. Unfortunately, this occurred at a time when there was not as much of an understanding ... moreof the lasting effects of trauma and how to treat it that we are developing in the mental health profession nowadays. Many of the actions of these parents I interpreted as being the effects of this extreme trauma. It is interesting how this impact spread to the child who joined the family several years after the actual tragedy and to subsequent generations through the choices that Judy and her sister made as adults that effected their own children. The issue that I had with this book and the reason I did not give it 4 stars was the way it was structured. It jumped around in time way too much for me, from the day of the tragedy to the author's childhood, to the present day to the author's early adulthood and back again. This took away from the story for me and at times was very confusing. I understand what the author was trying to do, but I did not feel like she pulled it off. I think it would have been a much more coherent book if she had focused on the day of the tragedy and her child hood, rather than adding some of the distracting and superfluous present day information I was disappointed about this, as this is an interesting story. You would probably enjoy it anyway if you like memoirs and/or are a mental health professional who, for some reason, enjoys reading about trauma in their spare time.
review 2: I downloaded this on a whim to my Nook because it was only $1.99 on the Barnes & Noble site. I'm glad it didn't cost more--I would have been horribly disappointed. As it was, I managed to finish it, but just barely. The writing was perfectly fine, but the disjointed way that the author jumped back and forth between time periods of her life was distracting. Now it's 1952...now it's 2005...now it's 1967...now it's 1980...now it's 1954...the transitions were jarring. less

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