A review by beanith
My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell

challenging dark emotional sad tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

Before I get into anything else, please heed the content warnings for this book. The depictions of rape, grooming, and abuse are extremely graphic and upsetting. I think it can be hard to gauge or quantify how triggering something is because everyone has very different experiences and tolerances, but - as a person who can generally handle frank discussions or accounts of rape - the first rape scene in this book made me feel genuine terror and fear. Please proceed with caution.

I was suspicious of this book for a long time because I had seen readers interpret the work as a 'dark romance'. Now having read the book, I can confirm that there is absolutely nothing romantic here, and suggesting that the author is romanticizing abuse is just wrong.

This book is arduous - that's the first word that came to mind when I completed the first quarter of the story (which is just before
the first rape scene
). It is hard work reading from Vanessa's point of view because she is filled with contradictions that only make sense when you understand the mental landscape of someone who was groomed and abused. Every page, until
Strane's death
, filled me with the heaviest dread. The story has a dual timeline, but it doesn't matter if Strane is physically in a scene or not, if it's the past or the present - the all consuming power he has over Vanessa tints every single event of the novel.

Kate Elizabeth Russell writes so skillfully - there are moments from Vanessa's narration where she is disassociating that are profoundly tragic but the language is beautifully crafted.
"Now I fly out of the house, into the night, through the pines and across the frozen lake where the water moves and moans beneath the ice. He asks me to again say the words. I see myself in earmuffs and white skates, gliding across the surface, followed by a shadow underneath the foot-thick ice -- Strane, swimming along the murky bottom, his screams muted to groans."

I think this book is also very strategically written, especially when it comes to not romanticizing Strane. I have three main points I want to discuss regarding this. Spoilers below!
1.
Strane is never described as attractive in the beginning of the book when he could possibly be interpreted as the object of an innocent crush. Her crush has more to do with the attention he gives her that makes her feel special. And then as he escalates and becomes intimate with her, Vanessa actually notices the opposite; he is old, fat, pathetic, boring, homely. She's repulsed by him at times.

2.
Strane's escalating behavior has him coming across hungrier, more demanding, more off-putting, more bizarre with each encounter. He throws so many things at Vanessa, coerces her into his fantasies without any warning - it is beyond clear how he is using her.

3.
There are times where he is given horror genre treatment - most prominently when Vanessa is spending the night at his house for the first time and she wakes up to find him naked it is a genuine jumpscare. His body is pale and covered in hair. Or, when Strane comes to Vanessa's family home to see her while her parents are at work. He hikes through the woods to get to her house and she screams when she sees him, like he's Michael Myers.

 
I think the author could have ended the book a little bit after the halfway point and it would have been it's own very powerful novella, but the inclusion of the subsequent events show just how huge Strane's impact is on Vanessa's whole life. The 2006/07 chapters are odd, especially as Strane's interest in Vanessa shrinks with each passing day - this should be, and is, a kind of relief, but it creates a vacuum. Not only does it cause her to question herself and her understanding of the world, but when they are together it's like two people on the brink of divorce, just going through the motions and tolerating each other (except, of course, when Strane inevitably gaslights and manipulates her more). It's a very disorienting experience as a reader after baring witness to so much brutal intensity.

Notes on Symbolism/Motifs
1. Dogs: Vanessa says she's "devoted as a dog", Strane is afraid of dogs, Strane has a St. Christopher pendant in his desk (St. Christopher is sometimes depicted with a dog head), the word grooming makes Vanessa think about Strane 'stroking her hair' (like petting a dog)
2. There are times, especially in the beginning, where Strane is literally being obscured and Vanessa can't see him clearly. At class orientation when the glare hides his eyes behind his glasses, at the dance when he's hidden by the shadow of the tree, at his house when he's backlit by the lights from inside.
3. Jacob is a biblical name, but Jacob in the bible is known for being cunning and deceitful. Strane as a last name originates from 'stream', but I took it to be more like strain - "force to make a strenuous or unusually great effort". 

Ultimately I'm glad I read My Dark Vanessa, it's given me so much to analyze and journal about. I'm amazed by how real Vanessa feels and I appreciate the time and dedication that Russel devoted to creating a person I truly recognize. However, I never want to read it again.
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