Transcript
Speaker: We are recording this podcast on the lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation.
Speaker: We wish to pay our respects to elders past, present and emerging and extend our respects to any Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people who may be listening.
Speaker: Hello and welcome to Noful Feelings, where two psychologists take a deep dive into your favourite books.
Speaker: I'm Priscilla.
Speaker: And I'm Elise.
Speaker: And welcome to episode six, the last episode of season three.
Speaker: Today we are really excited to be reviewing Girl in Pieces by Kathleen Klesko.
Speaker: But before we get to the book, in case you are new to the podcast, as usual, we'll be posting our book club discussion questions to our website, novelfeelings.com.
Speaker: The website is also where all of our detailed show notes live.
Speaker: To keep up to date with us, remember to follow us on social media.
Speaker: We are at novel underscore feelings everywhere.
Speaker: And also we are towards the end of the year.
Speaker: We're recording this in November, 2023.
Speaker: And our reading challenge is still up on the story graph and on Instagram.
Speaker: So not long now to get your challenge completed by the end of the year.
Speaker: Tag us if you are completing the reading challenge or find the link in our bio or in our website.
Speaker: That might be the only reading challenge I'm completing this year.
Speaker: I was too ambitious at the start of this year and said, I will do like three, but yeah, no.
Speaker: Yeah, look, I'm going to have to do some strategic reading over the next seven to eight weeks to tick off the final boxes.
Speaker: But I think I'm going to get through it.
Speaker: I've set the bar low, though.
Speaker: It is the only reading challenge I've put upon myself.
Speaker: You can do it.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then last but not least, please write and review us.
Speaker: If you leave us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts, we will give you a shout out on the pod.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: Also just a bit of an announcement.
Speaker: So like we said at the start, this is the final episode of season three, but we are hoping to do season four next year in 2024.
Speaker: But we are probably going to take a little bit of a break rather than roll on immediately to doing the next season of the podcast.
Speaker: Although I think it has worked really well doing the sort of two monthly episodes, in my opinion.
Speaker: Agreed.
Speaker: It's not that that amount of work is unsustainable for us normally.
Speaker: It's just that we both have a lot going on in the first six months of 2024.
Speaker: So we're going to take a bit of a break.
Speaker: Just little things like you finishing your PhD and weddings.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, international trips.
Speaker: Yeah, there's just a few like non-podcast things that need to take priority.
Speaker: So we'll take a break.
Speaker: We might still pop up for some author interviews if the opportunities come across our inbox.
Speaker: But yeah, you won't hear any reviews from us in a regular audio format for a few months.
Speaker: In the meantime, though, we have opened a feedback survey.
Speaker: If you are interested in helping us improve, I guess, or letting us know how awesome we've been doing, please leave your thoughts at novelfeelings.com feedback.
Speaker: It's a short survey.
Speaker: It is anonymous.
Speaker: It should only take a couple of minutes to complete and really valuable.
Speaker: Anything you can provide.
Speaker: We really appreciate.
Speaker: I mean, don't send us hateful comments.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: That's the only thing we won't appreciate.
Speaker: Constructive criticism is welcome.
Speaker: Anyway, but first, Priscilla, how would you rate your week on a five-point scale?
Speaker: I would rate it three out of three work days because that's what my week is.
Speaker: It's a three-day, three-workday week, which is nice.
Speaker: Public holidays this week for us in Victoria, Australia this week.
Speaker: That's right.
Speaker: I don't support the Melbourne Cup, but I do support a four-day long weekend.
Speaker: What did you do over the long weekend?
Speaker: Oh, what did I do?
Speaker: Just caught up with some people, cleaned the house a little bit, did some wedding planning.
Speaker: Very good.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: What about you, Elise?
Speaker: How would you rate your week on a five-point scale?
Speaker: Let's say three induction training sessions out of five.
Speaker: I started a new job this week, which was really exciting.
Speaker: The next chapter for me and something that's going to lead to some more work once I finish my PhD and thesis is handed in, which is really cool.
Speaker: It takes a bit of pressure off next year having to look for work.
Speaker: And on a, you know, another positive side of things, I also finished the first full draft of my thesis this week.
Speaker: Like the final chapter, the final paragraph, that kind of thing.
Speaker: I've still got a lot of work to do on it.
Speaker: Don't get me wrong, but it was good to have all that content just blah, blah.
Speaker: It's on the page.
Speaker: But on the flip side, I've been very sick the past week.
Speaker: So I've been feeling like absolute trash and, you
Speaker: It has not COVID, but it's worse than a cold.
Speaker: So I think I have had the flu.
Speaker: Wouldn't recommend.
Speaker: I'm getting better.
Speaker: I'm going to mute if I need to cough, but if you hear any awkward coughing in the background, that's me.
Speaker: So you're welcome, listeners.
Speaker: Well, fingers crossed you will be fully better very soon.
Speaker: Hopefully.
Speaker: But before we get started on our review, a couple of quick disclaimers as usual.
Speaker: So every episode has two parts, non-spoilers first, then spoilers.
Speaker: We'll flag when we're about to go into the spoilery bits.
Speaker: Remember, of course, this podcast should never be taken as therapeutic advice.
Speaker: And finally, we're speaking today as psychologists and book lovers, not necessarily from lived experience of the topics that are covered in this book.
Speaker: If you have any lived experiences covered in this book, please do let us know what you think.
Speaker: Although we will note that we know that the author of this book does have lived experience as well.
Speaker: Yeah, so she has spoken about her experiences with self-harm, depression, and substance abuse in multiple interviews.
Speaker: In an interview with Pine Reed's review, she said, Charlie isn't me.
Speaker: We share scars, but the story of how and why and where are fictional.
Speaker: So that is, of course, Kathleen Glasgow, who is the number one New York Times bestselling author of Girl in Pieces, as well as You'd Be Home Now and How to Make Friends with the Duck.
Speaker: She's also the co-author of the bestselling mystery series, The Agathas and The Night in Question.
Speaker: Her books have been published in more than 30 countries.
Speaker: A little bit about Girl in Pieces.
Speaker: Charlotte Davis is in Pieces.
Speaker: At 17, she's already lost more than most people do in a lifetime, but she's learned how to forget.
Speaker: The broken glass washes away the sorrow until there is nothing but calm.
Speaker: You don't have to think about your father and the river, your best friend who's gone forever, or your mother who has nothing left to give you.
Speaker: A deeply moving portrait of a girl in a world that owes her nothing and has taken so much, and the journey she undergoes to put herself back together.
Speaker: So why did we choose this book?
Speaker: Well, neither of us have read it yet, but I know th is is something that has come across your radar.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: So I have heard some recommendations from teenage girls I've worked with and they've talked about it being quite validating or they found it valuable.
Speaker: And these are teenagers who have some experience with self-harm as well.
Speaker: So I was curious about the book at
Speaker: you know glad that they found it validating but also slightly wary as well in case it actually sensationalized or glamorized self-harm.
Speaker: So yeah I guess we're really curious about the depiction of self-harm in this book and if it's done so in a responsible way.
Speaker: So of course we're going to be talking a little bit about self-harm today specifically non-suicidal self-injury more on that later but
Speaker: This overlaps with a lot of other content and some quite heavy topics.
Speaker: So we're also going to be talking about PTSD and the impact of trauma, homelessness and poverty, alcohol and drug use, unhealthy relationships and suicide.
Speaker: And we'll have a bit of a discussion about some unethical mental health professionals as well, including things like stigmatising language and inappropriate relationships.
Speaker: So a lot of heavy content today.
Speaker: If this book does bring up any challenging feelings for you, please reach out and look after yourself.
Speaker: If you're in Australia, you can always call Lifeline on 13 11 14.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: And now we will start part one, which is our non-spoilery discussion and review.
Speaker: So let's talk about the first half of the book in this section, which is the setup for the novel, our main characters, and the opening of the novel.
Speaker: In this book, we follow our protagonist, Charlie, age 17, across two main settings for the novel.
Speaker: So we start at a hospital for about the first 25% of the book,
Speaker: And then we follow her as she travels to live and work in Tucson, Arizona, which takes the last three quarters of the book.
Speaker: Some of the main characters we don't meet until Arizona, but we will keep this spoiler free for now.
Speaker: This book I found, it didn't really have a clear sort of spoiler, non-spoiler delineation.
Speaker: So I guess in this part, we're talking a lot about the hospital and a little bit about the first part of Arizona, but...
Speaker: but we're not quite getting to the climax of the novel.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Let's talk about Charlie, who's our protagonist, AKA Charlotte Davis, and her experience with non-suicidal self-injury.
Speaker: So,
Speaker: In this episode, I wouldn't be surprised if we end up flicking between a couple of different types of terminology here.
Speaker: So non-suicidal self-injury, aka NSSI, is intentional self-inflicted damage to the body, such as cutting, burning, hitting, done without suicidal intent.
Speaker: A lot of people refer to this as self-harm.
Speaker: Technically, self-harm is a bit of a broader umbrella term, which can include injurious behaviors that does have suicidal intent.
Speaker: But it's really hard to say NSSI all the time on non-suicidal self-injury.
Speaker: So we're probably going to default back to saying self-harm a few times.
Speaker: So just so you know, when we say self-harm, we probably mean without suicidal intent.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And Charlie has a lot of strong negative emotions because she's been through a lot.
Speaker: As I was reading this book, I was wondering if she might actually have complex PTSD.
Speaker: So she's only 17, but as it says in the description, she's had enough trauma for a lifetime.
Speaker: Rock bottom is just like, we just keep digging and digging into the center of the earth at this stage.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: We're not going to cover all of the trauma that Charlie has been through prior to this novel, but well...
Speaker: What are some of the main things that she's been through?
Speaker: So the death of her father is a big one.
Speaker: And then her mother becomes quite physically abusive.
Speaker: And then... Yeah, and very distant as well.
Speaker: There's no sort of loving relationship there.
Speaker: Her best friend... Where do we even start with her best friend?
Speaker: But essentially her best friend...
Speaker: also engage in self-harm, but that ended quite poorly.
Speaker: Her friend Alice had a suicide attempt, but she survived, but I believe had brain damage and acquired brain injury as a result of that.
Speaker: And so Charlie's sadly lost her best friend as well.
Speaker: And it's feeling very alone in the world.
Speaker: Recently experienced homelessness as well and really unsafe.
Speaker: living circumstances um including living in some kind of horrible house where girls are being submitted to sex work i think um like a kind of almost a human trafficking kind of situation um which charlie herself didn't go through but there were definitely instances of um threatened sexual assault that she's been through too yeah horrible horrible horrible stuff the poor thing yeah so no wonder if she if she has complex ptsd it is no wonder
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And self-harm in this novel is definitely conceptualised from a trauma lens, which is quite accurate because there is a very strong link between experiences of trauma and self-harm.
Speaker: People who've been through really traumatic experiences are
Speaker: they experience emotions and moods in a very different way to people who haven't been through trauma.
Speaker: And what people who haven't been through trauma do to cope with emotions might not be sufficient or enough to cope with the strong negative emotions that people who have been through trauma are experiencing.
Speaker: So that's why a lot of people engage in unhealthy or maladaptive coping behaviours like self-harm.
Speaker: The other side of that is that
Speaker: Charlie especially, I suppose, but most people who have gone through such traumatic childhood
Speaker: didn't get the opportunity to develop adaptive coping strategies so they don't have that kind of toolkit that other people develop.
Speaker: Yes, that's right.
Speaker: Yeah, so I think the book handles the self-harm conversations quite well.
Speaker: There are a few educational moments in the book where Charlie talks about what she's gone through or we get...
Speaker: bits and pieces from her therapy sessions where there are some, wait, actually I can't remember much of the therapy sessions, but I get my overall impression was that they were pretty okay.
Speaker: There's at least one quite explicit educational scene where one character tells another and uses the term non-suicidal self-injury too.
Speaker: So I can see why this book might educate some audiences and maybe challenge some myths or stereotypes around self-harm as well.
Speaker: Yeah, and there are moments where Charlie sort of stigmatised for her scars that is maybe not directly called out by other people, other characters in the book, but those moments are always framed as quite poor responses from other people to her scars.
Speaker: I wouldn't be surprised if Kathleen Glasgow is drawing from some of her own experiences with how others might have reacted to her self-harm or her scars too.
Speaker: But yeah, it's, it's definitely this sort of journey of healing that we see and it's very nonlinear.
Speaker: So Charlie throughout the book, um, you know, she struggles a lot with urges to self-harm.
Speaker: She struggles to throw away the things that were a comfort for her when it came to self-harming behavior.
Speaker: Like she had a kit that she used, um, um,
Speaker: But we do see her starting to learn some healthier ways of coping in the moment, like breathing exercises or artistic expression, like through art and drawing.
Speaker: But she still keeps her cutting kit with her for much of the novel.
Speaker: What I found interesting was that non-suicidal self-injury wasn't the only, how do you put it, expression of difficulty that Charlie was experiencing.
Speaker: So she also engaged in selective mutism.
Speaker: Is that what it's still called these days or are we calling it situational mutism?
Speaker: You're the Ed and Dev psych.
Speaker: I'm sure.
Speaker: I was taught selective mutism, and that's a term that I think is used in this book, which I think is set in the early 2010s.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, not sure.
Speaker: I think there are some movements towards saying, you know, the mutism is not something people elect or, you know, choose to do.
Speaker: So that's what...
Speaker: some of the conversation is about that name and maybe changing it to situational mutism.
Speaker: But we'll call it selective mutism just to make it easy for ourselves.
Speaker: So we see her lapse into the silence in the hospital, especially at the start.
Speaker: And then later as well, after a moment that I cannot say right now.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But I think especially after intense moments of very difficult emotions and self-harm.
Speaker: And plus we also see Charlie struggling with a few other different things in this book, more of which we'll go into in the spoiler section, but things like her relationships and her sense of self or her sort of identity about who she is and what her values are and what she wants to do for her career or in the longer term.
Speaker: and some issues with impulsivity as well.
Speaker: Just as one final note that we haven't mentioned yet for the self-harm depiction.
Speaker: Ah, yes.
Speaker: It's very graphic.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So just, I think if you're going to take anything away from this review,
Speaker: Just note that the depictions or descriptions, I guess, technically of self-harm in this book are very graphic and detailed and not just in terms of what she does to her body, but what other characters do to hurt themselves and the thought processes and emotional states that are behind them.
Speaker: So...
Speaker: it could be triggering to readers or distressing.
Speaker: So just, you know, we'll talk a little bit more about whether this is a responsible depiction of self-harm or not in the latter half of this episode, but just be mindful if you do decide to pick this up, that make sure you're in the right emotional state to be reading about something like that.
Speaker: It can be quite confronting.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, like I said before, some of my clients find this quite validating, so it might not be triggering or confronting to everyone, but just approach with caution.
Speaker: You know your headspace best.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: Let's talk about the hospital.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Okay, so the book starts in an inpatient ward of a hospital slash group home slash hospital.
Speaker: Feels like a warehouse.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it's called Crilly Center.
Speaker: It seems to be a private hospital or private ward for girls and women who have similar experiences to Charlie.
Speaker: There's a therapist called, well, her name's not actually Casper, but I can't remember her actual name.
Speaker: Referred to as Casper throughout the book.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: I think she does.
Speaker: So Casper facilitates group sessions as well as individual sessions, I believe.
Speaker: Yeah, I'm not sure.
Speaker: I can't remember that detail, but she definitely has individual therapy with Charlie.
Speaker: It's quite a positive relationship there.
Speaker: I didn't really have a lot to sort of say about Casper's therapeutic style or anything like that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And she observes boundaries very well, I would say.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Which is good.
Speaker: Yeah, because we're going to talk a little bit about all the negative tropes that the book engages in around mental health care.
Speaker: But I think Casper is a good example of knowing where the boundaries are and sticking to them, even when...
Speaker: she probably wants to help.
Speaker: But yeah, she knows when to pull back when she has to.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Trusting relationship maybe balances out some of the tropes that we are going to touch on shortly.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: Let's talk about some negative therapy tropes though, because they're, unfortunately there are a lot of them that go on in this hospital.
Speaker: So yeah,
Speaker: There's three main ones.
Speaker: There's probably more, but there were three ones that stood out to me when I was writing notes for this.
Speaker: So within the first 20 minutes of the audio book, so however many pages that is, the first chapter or two, a mental health nurse called Charlie crazy, dumbass, and later freak.
Speaker: Really lovely and appropriate language there coming from a mental health professional, of course.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: And then we've got a doctor who is caught having sex with a patient who may or may not be underage.
Speaker: I can't remember.
Speaker: Yeah, I can't remember which character it was or their details, but it's bad either way and extremely inappropriate.
Speaker: And there are consequences for that doctor, I believe.
Speaker: I believe so.
Speaker: But it's still bad that it happens in the first place.
Speaker: But there are also consequences for the patient.
Speaker: I think she was in a way... Right?
Speaker: I think... Yeah.
Speaker: Anyway.
Speaker: I think she was discharged.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Which is like...
Speaker: We can argue that the doctor is the one at fault here because he's the one abusing his power.
Speaker: And then we also have confidentiality violations too.
Speaker: So, yeah.
Speaker: So I think another character named Blue managed to track Charlie down by getting one of the nurses to give her Charlie's mom's phone number.
Speaker: And Charlie's mom said, oh, no, you know, call this person.
Speaker: And then she called that person.
Speaker: And then she found out where Charlie worked at.
Speaker: She's like, you should not be able to get Charlie's mom's phone number in the first place.
Speaker: No, no.
Speaker: So yeah, that's not, not great.
Speaker: We've had a couple of episodes in the past where we've talked about bad therapy tropes and why they are concerning.
Speaker: So yeah,
Speaker: I guess the bottom line here is that we don't love saying badge therapy or such unethical practices being depicted.
Speaker: Look, we acknowledge that this stuff does happen sometimes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'm never going to pretend our profession is perfect.
Speaker: But, you know, we do undergo pretty significant ethical training and this sort of stuff is not okay.
Speaker: And that's drilled into us from day one.
Speaker: So these reasonably rare things,
Speaker: circumstances, like they're not the sort of thing that happen every day.
Speaker: And we don't want people to read this and think that this is normal.
Speaker: And this is going to be your experience if you do go into the setting like this.
Speaker: So if it does happen, it's bad, but it's not an everyday thing.
Speaker: Anyway, moving on.
Speaker: Charlie's progress is cut short when she is discharged due to financial issues.
Speaker: Which happens, unfortunately.
Speaker: Even in Australia under Medicare, mental health care is not unlimited.
Speaker: It might be better than in the US, I'm guessing.
Speaker: My understanding is yes, it's definitely better in Australia than it is in the US.
Speaker: We definitely have accessibility issues too.
Speaker: But yeah, Charlie cannot continue to access therapy for financial reasons.
Speaker: And she is discharged to her mother because she's a minor, 17 at the time.
Speaker: And this, I guess, is what sort of prompts the latter 75% of the novel.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I guess like the rest of the plot sort of falls into place after her discharge from career leave.
Speaker: So she reaches out to her friend Mikey who intervenes.
Speaker: Charlie ends up with a bus ticket to go to Arizona where Mikey attends college and eventually begins working as a dishwasher, struggling to make ends meet and meets a lot of other characters that are important to the rest of the novel.
Speaker: I do know that based on some of the interviews we read with Kathleen Glasgow, that she also did want to highlight the financial barriers to mental health treatments.
Speaker: The fact that Charlie is in poverty and her mum and both of her parents couldn't afford mental health care for themselves probably was a predisposing factor.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I think that's important because I think for a lot of people,
Speaker: I think CBT often assumes that it's the way someone looks at the world and the way you think, and that's what affects how you feel.
Speaker: But we know that big structural factors do contribute to someone's mental health condition.
Speaker: It's very tricky for Charli to focus on her recovery when she has other things going on.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: Well, I think that's all of the non-spoilery section that we can talk about.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All right, well, let's talk about our overall reviews and star ratings.
Speaker: So I gave Girl in Pieces three out of five stars.
Speaker: I have pretty mixed thoughts on it.
Speaker: I thought it was pretty well written.
Speaker: It's very poetic and it has some important themes, but I guess overall it was a pretty depressing read.
Speaker: And I don't know.
Speaker: I mean, I hope young readers do take away the intended messages and I know there are going to be young people who do find validation.
Speaker: in this book.
Speaker: And I'll never dismiss the experiences of people who find validation in books like this or who help, you know, if this book is going to help you through your own mental health concerns or own lived experience, then
Speaker: you know, all the power to you.
Speaker: And I hope you find some comfort in it.
Speaker: But I hope that readers will also look at this book with a critical eye and don't take its messaging around mental health care at face value.
Speaker: I guess it was the tropes, the negative tropes that really bothered me in this.
Speaker: All mental health systems have their flaws, but her negative experiences were pretty extreme.
Speaker: And
Speaker: I have mixed thoughts around the graphic depictions as well, which we'll go into in the second half of the book.
Speaker: But I don't know, just very mixed thoughts.
Speaker: How about you?
Speaker: I feel the same.
Speaker: It's a three out of five stars for me as well.
Speaker: And I think the more I think about this, the more it feels like 13 Reasons Why to me.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: in terms of if I was in high school reading this, I would have loved it as well.
Speaker: It's the same vibe of 13 Reasons Why around
Speaker: that teenage experience and the sort of extreme, well, I guess 13 reasons why I might not be as extreme as this, but that whole like bad thing after bad thing after bad thing.
Speaker: And there's no responsible adults around, or there's barely any.
Speaker: And you're kind of grappling with this, with these dark emotions on your own sort of thing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I don't know, something about, I don't know what this says about teenage me, but something about that would have appealed to me back then.
Speaker: It probably would have appealed to me as well.
Speaker: Yeah, whereas now I guess reading it as an adult and as a mental health professional, yeah, it doesn't have that same appeal for me.
Speaker: As you said, I think it's wonderful if young people find hope in this book or feel less alone.
Speaker: Yeah, but I don't.
Speaker: As a reader, I find the graphic nature of the self-harm descriptions really confronting and difficult to get through.
Speaker: And I think as a psych, I worry about, you know, the people reading this.
Speaker: Again, like we talked about before, I think some people will find it really validating.
Speaker: But you never know who it might also distress.
Speaker: I'm also in two minds about the central romantic relationship in this book.
Speaker: Which we haven't talked about at all, but we will be talking about soon.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: It's just like this plays into my big feelings about this book.
Speaker: It's like, I like that the red flags were acknowledged, but I don't love some parts of the male characters redemption arc.
Speaker: I also have conflicting feelings about the level of trauma.
Speaker: that Charlie experiences in this book.
Speaker: Like, I think it's absolutely important to depict a traumatic experience or a traumatic life in a young adult book, as I have no doubt that some teenagers are caught in very difficult situations, very difficult lives.
Speaker: But everything that can go wrong in Charlie's life absolutely did in the most horrifying fashion.
Speaker: it wasn't enough that it was a bad thing.
Speaker: It had to be absolutely traumatizing.
Speaker: And again, as a reader, that's just really relentless to me.
Speaker: And on the other hand, it's almost like the emotions that drive people to self-harm are valid, regardless of what the problems are, I suppose.
Speaker: So the emotions are valid even when the problems look small on the outside.
Speaker: So I wondered why
Speaker: the plot had to be so intensely traumatic.
Speaker: I think, you know, maybe... Actually, no, I won't speculate, but I know that there was that review that you put in our document that felt, you know, if Charlie can get through it, then so can I kind of situation, which is good.
Speaker: But I also wonder if it can accidentally dismiss some people's experiences.
Speaker: Like, I don't have it as bad as Charlie, so...
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Why am I doing this or what's wrong with me?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I don't want people to be thinking that way.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: Which is definitely happening.
Speaker: So, all right.
Speaker: So three, three is out of fives all around.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: So firmly in the middle ground.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Well, let's move on to our detailed discussion with spoilers.
Speaker: So we can talk a little bit more about why we had such mixed thoughts about this book.
Speaker: All right, let's talk about this central romantic relationship.
Speaker: I'm really tempted to put romantic in quotation marks every time I say it.
Speaker: Yeah, I was going to say, is there really a romantic relationship?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So who is Riley?
Speaker: So Riley is someone who Charlie meets in Arizona, an older colleague at the same cafe that she starts working in, True Grit.
Speaker: He's older in his late 20s.
Speaker: He is described as being a bit of a musical genius, but he's
Speaker: a failed musical genius who couldn't make it big, a very attractive guy, very problematic as well, a complex character, I guess.
Speaker: He's struggling with his own issues with addiction and recovery and, I guess, motivation to change as well.
Speaker: So he's kind of...
Speaker: sexy damaged guy who comes into Riley who comes into Charlie's life for the homeless yeah see going back to that whole how 16 year old me would have react reacted versus the adult me Riley is a real what's the word illustration of that I think it's like I can fix him yeah I know exactly 16 year old me would have been like this is
Speaker: Well, maybe not fine, but this is doable.
Speaker: He's just troubled, but he actually loves me.
Speaker: Yeah, well, reading this as, you know, adult mental health professionals in our 30s, we just saw the red flags waving in the breeze from day one, pretty much.
Speaker: I think, yeah, I think I'm a mature, right?
Speaker: At the moment Riley came onto the page, I was like, please don't tell me this is the male romantic interest.
Speaker: And I sent you several GIFs of people waving red flags as you were reading.
Speaker: But yes, there is a power imbalance in their relationship.
Speaker: So Riley's 27 and Charlie's only 17 at the start of their relationship.
Speaker: So yeah, not great.
Speaker: And they have a sexual relationship as well.
Speaker: The narrative doesn't present this as being okay to... So we hear someone say that to Riley, you know, they say, are you sure she's 18 because this is such jury rape?
Speaker: But no one actually separates them before that.
Speaker: Like, it seems like everyone can see something's going on, but no one actually does anything until... Well, until they had sex in the office.
Speaker: Which is also gross because, you know, she clearly didn't want to do it.
Speaker: He pressured her into it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And we can tell that Charlie struggles with it.
Speaker: Like she actually acknowledged in her internal dialogue that this is not okay.
Speaker: And she knows it's wrong, but she can't.
Speaker: She's so...
Speaker: alone and she's so starved for love, I suppose, that she takes what passes as love in this situation.
Speaker: Well, she just struggles to, she struggles with confrontation or recognizing boundaries and standing up for herself.
Speaker: And Riley takes advantage of her.
Speaker: He sends her off on drug runs, for example, to collect drugs from the dealer, which is a terrible thing to do to anybody, let alone your 17-year-old girlfriend.
Speaker: And just, like, the way he treats her is not great.
Speaker: It's very dismissive and invalidating.
Speaker: And Charlie just doesn't, I guess, have the capacity...
Speaker: to, you know, we shouldn't blame, I'm not blaming Charlie for this, but, you know, she is not able to sort of put boundaries in place and to confront him on behaviors that she knows are not appropriate or are taking advantage of her.
Speaker: Yeah, again, which is understandable given her background.
Speaker: And also she's not the adult in the relationship.
Speaker: What is this adult doing with a teenager who's clearly struggling as well?
Speaker: So Kathleen Glasgow actually acknowledges in an interview that Riley is a predator.
Speaker: That's her word.
Speaker: And also an addict and a liar.
Speaker: But he sees Charlie.
Speaker: And like I mentioned before, Charlie has been so alone that she takes the Chinese crumb of affection.
Speaker: It's that whole you accept the love you think you deserve situation.
Speaker: Interestingly, Kathleen Glasgow also notes that Riley is an example of how the perception of addiction and depression can be gendered.
Speaker: So Riley's addiction is seen as romantic because he's an artist.
Speaker: But Charlie is treated as a pariah, even though she's also an artist, but I guess not a famous one or a popular one at that stage.
Speaker: Kathleen said, girls get locked up for their problems.
Speaker: Guys get record deals.
Speaker: What do we think about that comment?
Speaker: I think there's definitely some truth to it.
Speaker: You know, I think it's indicative of a broader trend with how society talks about and romanticises alcohol and drug use, particularly in the entertainment industry.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, I just recently watched Daisy Jones and the Six, so this has been kind of on my mind about addiction and how we talk about, you know, casual and more problematic types of alcohol and drug use.
Speaker: um I don't know I mean I get what she was going for there but it feels like quite a broad stroke sort of interpretation to put on their relationship like there's definitely a lot going on but I don't know if that's sort of the main takeaway I have from it yeah I feel the same I think it's probably more nuanced than that um
Speaker: Like if Charlie was a musician or is in the entertainment industry, then she might get treated the same way that alcohol and drug use is part of her creative process or something like that.
Speaker: I also feel like there's a world in which a man like Riley with his addiction and his illegal behaviors would be criminalized, but he's white.
Speaker: So there's that layer to it as well.
Speaker: Yeah, there's definitely different layers of privilege that are attached to this beyond, I think, just gender too.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I also think when somebody has an addiction but they seem to be coping well on the outside,
Speaker: That's, you know, that's considered a lot more socially acceptable than if somebody has, you know, is using drugs and might not be coping.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's not to say that it's good either way, but someone like Riley can be perceived to be
Speaker: highly functioning whereas someone like Charlie wears her scars on her body and people know at a glance that she you know she's not wearing long sleeves they know at a glance that she's been through some pretty tough times so would have would be treating her differently no matter what so I think there's something about perceptions there yeah and before we move on to the next theme that we wanted to touch on I don't love
Speaker: that Riley, like at the end, it's sort of implied that Riley did love her.
Speaker: Yes, he probably did.
Speaker: He probably thinks that he did, but I don't know.
Speaker: It just didn't sit comfortably with me.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So there's a scene towards the end where Riley essentially sings a love song or an apology song to Charlie after
Speaker: the shit goes down that way they're about to talk about um and Charlie I don't know to be honest I wasn't thinking about much about Riley in that moment during that scene I wasn't really putting a lot of thought on what was going through his head um I was more thinking about Charlie and the fact that she was I guess
Speaker: not falling for it, regardless of his intention, that she is able to put some distance between herself and him and sort of recognise it for being an unhealthy relationship.
Speaker: So I don't know, Riley doesn't, I wouldn't, I don't really know if Riley got a redemption arc per se, I think maybe he
Speaker: had taken some steps towards recovery and maybe is still not in the right headspace to, you know, he's maybe not in the healthiest headspace yet.
Speaker: So I don't really know how to interpret that moment, but I know he's probably not quite a hundred percent just yet.
Speaker: No, I think for me, there was a moment in the book where she, when Charlie was very angry, she said, did you ever love me?
Speaker: And she asked a couple of questions and then Riley said,
Speaker: whether that was in a letter or something, he said something like, I did, I do, maybe, or something like that.
Speaker: And I think there's something, I guess, hopeful about the fact that, you know, he did see her for who she was, even though he didn't then treat her very well.
Speaker: And I can see why that moment happened.
Speaker: On the other side of it, I guess this was me
Speaker: feeling for my 16 year old self going no no he's not fixable like do not go there.
Speaker: Look I'm just glad they didn't get together at the end.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: We should probably talk about Charlie's mental health crisis towards the end of the novel as well.
Speaker: So as we've implied something that does go down so basically there's a culmination of a lot of I guess
Speaker: plots coming together and exploding at once.
Speaker: So Riley cheats on Charlie with his dealer, Wendy, and she walks in on them together.
Speaker: And then there are other complications happening around the same time as well.
Speaker: So another patient, a friend from the hospital, very sadly died by suicide, which she learns about.
Speaker: And then...
Speaker: There's also some stuff going on with another character, Blue, who she didn't know from the hospital, who's come and stayed with her, who's recovering from addiction to meth.
Speaker: Blue and Riley have gone on the bender.
Speaker: A lot happens at once.
Speaker: This is what I meant when I said everything has to happen in such a traumatic fashion.
Speaker: It's not just Riley cheated on her.
Speaker: She literally walked in on them banging.
Speaker: and her friend from the... It's just funny to hear you say bangy.
Speaker: I was like, that was the first one that came to mind.
Speaker: Like, literally.
Speaker: There's no polite way to put it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then, you know, after all of this, so her flat that she shares with Blue is completely trashed.
Speaker: know, any possession that has any value to her was torn apart.
Speaker: By Wendy, was it?
Speaker: Yeah, the dealer that Riley cheated on with.
Speaker: So that's what I mean, like any one of those things should be enough to trigger a trauma response.
Speaker: Now we gotta go to like, I don't know, the fiery pits of hell.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And so, of course, Charlie has a terrible time as a result of this.
Speaker: So she has severe episode of self-harm.
Speaker: So thankfully, she is found and supported by two of her colleagues.
Speaker: And then this sort of triggers the ending of
Speaker: of the novel, last few chapters.
Speaker: So her co-workers at Tanner and Linus take her to visit their grandfather, Felix, who's an artist in New Mexico.
Speaker: There's some stuff about the importance of art and healing through this medium, expressing herself.
Speaker: She returns briefly to Arizona where she's reconciled with some of the other characters,
Speaker: Blue is clean.
Speaker: Mike is still in her life as a friend.
Speaker: Riley's began rehabilitation.
Speaker: But eventually she does end up working as Felix's assistant.
Speaker: And then a note of hope towards the end, she also learns that Alice, her friend who had an acquired brain injury, might have some capacity to recognise her as well.
Speaker: So a lot that happens, actually, I was just reading that out and thinking, that's actually quite a lot, covers quite a bit of time in those last couple of chapters.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, I feel like the last 10% was the hopeful part where things actually started to look up.
Speaker: I think it's throughout her cutting kit as well.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Does she, I can't remember, does she engage with regular therapy at any point?
Speaker: Does she get any kind of mental health support?
Speaker: Nope.
Speaker: No, it's all just circumstances become more stable for her.
Speaker: Yes, which, again, if we go back to that whole, you know, environmental and structural factors playing a part in perpetuating mental health difficulty, yeah.
Speaker: You know, the people around her are now clean and are working on addressing their own addictions, even if they're not engaged in formal therapy.
Speaker: She's about to have a stable job.
Speaker: She has actual responsible adults in her life, even if not as a parent figure, but at least people who are present and helpful.
Speaker: So I can see why...
Speaker: You know, she wouldn't have been able to afford mental health care at this stage, but maybe once her life stabilises, she can.
Speaker: I would hope that at some point she is able to re-engage with some kind of helpful therapeutic support in some capacity because, you know, this stuff...
Speaker: it can wax and wane.
Speaker: It's not like you have one breakthrough and suddenly the impacts of trauma are never going to be with you again.
Speaker: So yeah, it does end on a note of hope, but it's not like she makes a miraculous recovery and everything is suddenly fine.
Speaker: which wouldn't be realistic.
Speaker: It's a, I want to say happily for now situation.
Speaker: Let's talk about what we think about the portrayal of trauma and self-harm.
Speaker: I guess this is the big question we've been kind of leading to all this year, isn't it?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So as we discussed earlier, the descriptions of NSSI are very graphic in terms of methods and the harm to the characters.
Speaker: And that was intentional, right?
Speaker: So in the interview that we mentioned earlier, Kathleen Glasgow talks about wanting to be honest about what self-harm feels like and wanting people who have gone through that experience to feel seen.
Speaker: I think she probably does achieve that intention for some readers.
Speaker: You know, I am lucky enough in my life that I've never been through self-harm personally, so I can't speak to what it feels like, but based on my understanding of what other people have told me and what I've read about, you know, all that side of things I think is accurate or as accurate as it can be for one person's experience.
Speaker: It does...
Speaker: challenge some of the myths around self-harm.
Speaker: It does talk about all of the internal, I guess, dialogue and urges and impulses that go along with self-harm or can go along with self-harm and the function of it and the long-term impacts as well.
Speaker: So this idea of, I guess, short-term relief and then longer-term challenges when you are in that kind of cycle of self-harm.
Speaker: But I guess where we're more concerned is with the graphic nature of this book and how far is too far.
Speaker: We've mentioned Mindframe before as a resource.
Speaker: For those who might not be aware, Mindframe is a program of an organization called Every Mind in Australia, and they released a series of guidelines about...
Speaker: responsible depictions and language around mental ill health and suicide in the media.
Speaker: So they work with journalists and producers and both fiction and non-fiction writers when it comes to releasing these guidelines.
Speaker: And I believe that there are some equivalents in other countries as well, but being Australian, these are the ones I'm most familiar with.
Speaker: So I went back and had a look at the guidelines that they have for fictional portrayals.
Speaker: Their resource is not specific to books.
Speaker: It's for a stage of the screen, basically, so visual portrayals.
Speaker: But I think a lot of the content overlaps with books on these.
Speaker: So I guess some of the messages that the guidelines communicate are on-screen self-harm or fictional depictions of self-harm can impact on vulnerable audiences,
Speaker: There are risks of copycat behaviours and increased rates of suicide.
Speaker: So there have been studies that have found clusters of suicide and self-harming behaviour after certain high-profile instances or fictional portrayals.
Speaker: Like we talked about this in our 13 Reasons Why episode as well about some of it.
Speaker: sadly seeing increases that happen around men and ideally you know we don't want a depiction to present self-harm as being acceptable as a solution to a problem something that glorifies or romanticizes self-harm and they also mention ideally not providing visual details or references to exact methods
Speaker: I guess I don't think the book presents self-harm as being acceptable or a solution to a problem.
Speaker: I think it's fairly realistic in terms of that side of things.
Speaker: And I don't necessarily think it romanticises self-harm, though there are probably a few paragraphs that are written really
Speaker: beautifully like they're poetic when they talk about the self-harm and its impacts on the thought processes it kind of reminded me of like being on tumblr in 2012 or something like that yeah you sort of reach this dark corner of the internet and you find a lot of people writing about their expressions of um mental health and suicidality
Speaker: And I get that's an expression of coping, but I can see some people running with that and seeing it being somewhat romanticised, though I don't think that was intentional.
Speaker: I suppose when you've been with Charlie and going on that arc that she's gone through, the book as a whole explores self-harm more in depth.
Speaker: Like we see what's happened, what's led to her engaging in the self-harm process.
Speaker: and other characters as well engaging in those behaviors.
Speaker: I suppose it doesn't necessarily encourage help seeking explicitly.
Speaker: I think it, again, like we talked about, I don't think Charlie can even think about mental health care considering the Maslow's hierarchy and where she sits in that triangle.
Speaker: But yeah, I
Speaker: I think like it's pretty clear cut that if we're thinking about this as a checklist, it does provide visual details, visual as in written descriptive instances of self-harm and references to exact methods a lot.
Speaker: If you think about it as a checklist, it definitely fails that.
Speaker: I'd say it's borderline romanticizing.
Speaker: It definitely doesn't encourage help-seeking.
Speaker: but it does provide a nuanced portrayal of self-arms.
Speaker: If our question is, is this portrayal responsible?
Speaker: I don't think it's a yes or a no.
Speaker: I think it's somewhere in the middle.
Speaker: It's murky.
Speaker: Fiction is a place where you can explore these things.
Speaker: But it is trickier in many ways because I don't know if this book would have worked or it would have impacted people so much if it had just skipped over all of the self-harm scenes, if it had just not provided that level of detail, if it had just sort of implied or it happened off screen or maybe it wouldn't have been as engaging or arresting for readers and might not have impacted people.
Speaker: So I don't know, like does the risk of harm for a minority...
Speaker: Does that mean that we shouldn't do that at all?
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Yeah, I would say it's not yes or no in terms of yes, there's risk or no, there's risk.
Speaker: I think there's a spectrum.
Speaker: You know, this is the acceptable amount of
Speaker: Well, that sounds bad, but you know, there's an acceptable amount of exposure or risk, I guess, with this sort of portrayal, but you want to make sure that it's not, I don't know, if we're thinking about a movie, for example, you want to make sure that the scene is not going to be made into a 10 second TikTok videos.
Speaker: That's just, you know, taking it completely out of context.
Speaker: I think within the context of this book and the story,
Speaker: the portrayals make sense and you know I feel like the risk of romanticization goes goes down when we have the contextual information if you only show me you know a quote of Charlie's most intense moment of self-harm I would be a lot more worried absolutely
Speaker: Maybe it would have been better if, I don't know, maybe if they can dial it back like 40% or something.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I suppose this is also why I wanted to read this book because now if someone else says to me that they've read it, I'd be able to say, well, what did you think?
Speaker: How did you feel?
Speaker: What did you get out of it?
Speaker: It's one of those books where you want teenagers to be able to talk about, I think.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Have a conversation about it.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: So shall we talk about our favorite moments?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: This was so hard for me to pick just because it's like a depressing book for about 90%.
Speaker: So I would say my favorite moments are mostly towards the end.
Speaker: I really like the recovery journey that she went through in New Mexico.
Speaker: But I also, we haven't spoken a lot about Mikey before.
Speaker: But I really like his role in Charlie's life.
Speaker: It's not exactly the most present, but he's committed to being her friend in whatever capacity he can.
Speaker: And he never steps over that boundary, which there were not many people in Charlie's life who could name a boundary.
Speaker: Name a boundary.
Speaker: Any boundary.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What about you, Elise?
Speaker: Similar.
Speaker: I also struggled to think about standout moments.
Speaker: I did enjoy Charlie coming to the realization that her relationship with Riley was unhealthy.
Speaker: And there was one quote I noted, which was, I'm tired and angry at me for letting myself get smaller and smaller in the hopes that he would notice me more.
Speaker: But how can someone notice you if you keep getting smaller?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So there are probably some other quotes, but that one definitely stood out to me as being a good moment of finalisation.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Can I also say, this is an illustration of how English is dumb, because it's Charlotte, but it's Charlie.
Speaker: Well, I think Charlotte's one of those names that has like eight different nicknames associated with it.
Speaker: Yeah, but it's also that C sound.
Speaker: It's just not the same.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Anyway, I know, I know Charlotte's a go by Char, but no one goes by Charlie.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Anyway, now we've finished our review.
Speaker: We have some questions for our listeners or any book lovers.
Speaker: We'll also have a quick chat about resources and recommended reading.
Speaker: Let's chat about the book club questions.
Speaker: We're going to post these questions to our website over the next few weeks.
Speaker: If you've read the book, please join in the discussion by leaving a comment on our blog or Instagram.
Speaker: Question one.
Speaker: Did this book challenge any ideas you had about self-harm, suicide, or addiction?
Speaker: Question two.
Speaker: How do you personally feel about graphic depictions of self-harm or suicide in books?
Speaker: When might they go a step too far?
Speaker: Question three, what are your thoughts around Riley and Charlie's relationship?
Speaker: Question four, mental health struggles such as self-harm, addiction and depression are portrayed in various ways through the different characters in the book, like Linus and Blue.
Speaker: Is there a minor character whose story you were curious about or particularly enjoyed?
Speaker: And our final question, question five, what are some other books that capture the emotional intensity of being a teenager?
Speaker: that wraps us up for today thank you so much for listening and for joining us through season three we hope that you can join us again in season four whenever that might be we will we will post announcements when that's coming up at which point you can call this doctor release we can hope but in a realistic sense why we don't know how long it'll take them to mark the thesis oh yeah
Speaker: If you like us, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker: You can also find us on novelfeelings.com or on Instagram, Twitter, slash X, The Story Graph, and Goodreads at novel underscore feelings.
Speaker: You can also find my bookstagram at paved with books with an extra S. Thank you so much for listening, everyone.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: See ya.
Speaker: Bye.
