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A sweet and sad story, told carefully and sensitively, with a message at its core that is grimly realistic and at the same time, somewhat hopeful.

When Shelley Woodhouse comes to in a UK hospital, very few things are clear. For Shelley has suffered a significant brain injury, has been in a coma, and is afflicted with catastrophic memory loss. As Shelley painstaking sorts through her flickering memories, working her way back to what she hope will be a version of “now” she fully remembers, the reader is invited to unpack her life with her (or at least, the bits she finds herself remembering).

As piece by piece is uncovered, the author’s elegant and gently-paced surfacing memory timeline introduces a bit of a mystery element, as we come to know Shelley, the horrors she’s suffered, and the friends and family who have suffered along with her. Without giving the plot away (no spoilers here), Shelley has faced the terrors of domestic abuse, both with an intimate partner and in her childhood. And it has left scars, as we come to learn, as the cycle, poignantly, continues, with escape and safety a much more difficult outcome than can be easily imagined.

Raising awareness of what we, as a society, need to know if there is to be any possibility of change, this thoughtful book is both a quick and absorbing read, and a lovely heartfelt homage to the women who suffer, tragically, at the very hands of those who were intended to love them.

A great big thank you to Netgalley, the author and the publisher for an ARC of this book. All thoughts presented are my own.