Through the Break by Pearlie McNeill; Marie McShea; Pratibha Parmar, eds.

Twenty-three women, many of whom are lesbian, write about periods in their lives when they were at breaking point, because of alcoholism, incest, rape, serious illness, physical disability, or nervous breakdown. There are harrowing accounts of experiences of children’s homes, of mental hospitals, of racial prejudice and male violence. Pratibha Parmar quotes Audre Lorde writing, “I don’t feel like being strong but do I have a choice” (p. 188), and these women’s experiences are impressive in the courage and determination displayed. Men so often had control—as violent husbands, doctors and psychiatrists—but the women managed to take positive steps, so often with the help of other women, to take charge of their own lives. The editors decided, “to avoid tokenism, to have as many Black women writing as white, if not more”; every experience is different, but few of us will fail to find a part of ourselves reflected in these pages.