Know My Name
Author: Chanel Miller
Publisher: Viking
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Note: Trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the full review.
Cover Description
She was known to the world as Emily Doe when she stunned millions with a letter. Brock Turner had been sentenced to just six months in county jail after he was found sexually assaulting her on Stanford’s campus. Her victim impact statement was posted on BuzzFeed, where it instantly went viral–viewed by eleven million people within four days, it was translated globally and read on the floor of Congress; it inspired changes in California law and the recall of the judge in the case. Thousands wrote to say that she had given them the courage to share their own experiences of assault for the first time.
Now she reclaims her identity to tell her story of trauma, transcendence, and the power of words. It was the perfect case, in many ways–there were eyewitnesses, Turner ran away, physical evidence was immediately secured. But her struggles with isolation and shame during the aftermath and the trial reveal the oppression victims face in even the best-case scenarios. Her story illuminates a culture biased to protect perpetrators, indicts a criminal justice system designed to fail the most vulnerable, and, ultimately, shines with the courage required to move through suffering and live a full and beautiful life.
Know My Name will forever transform the way we think about sexual assault, challenging our beliefs about what is acceptable and speaking truth to the tumultuous reality of healing. It also introduces readers to an extraordinary writer, one whose words have already changed our world. Entwining pain, resilience, and humor, this memoir will stand as a modern classic.
TL;DR Review
This is probably one of the top five memoirs I’ve ever read (and I read a lot of memoirs). Incredibly well-written and insightful, this book rings with a truth and strength that I have rarely seen.
For you if: You love a powerful memoir by a powerful woman about a powerful topic.
Full Review
“I did not come into existence when he harmed me. She found her voice! I had a voice, he stripped it, left me groping around blind for a bit, but I always had it. I just used it like I never had to use it before. I do not owe him my success, becoming, he did not create me. The only credit Brock can take is for assaulting me, and he could never even admit to that.”
I don’t know what I can possibly say about Know My Name that has not been said before: It’s incredible. It’s powerful. It’s hard to read at times; it will almost certainly bring you to tears. Seeing what she can do with words, the fact that Chanel Miller’s victim impact statement went viral is now completely unsurprising.
Chanel’s memoir begins at the beginning: the evening she decided to go to a party in order to spend time with her sister and her friends — where she was ultimately sexually assaulted by Brock Turner. She walks her readers through everything that followed. She woke up in the hospital the next day with pine needles in her hair and her underwear missing, and no one told her what happened to her, or even what they suspected. She learned about Brock and the two Australian men who cased him off of her in the news, at the same time as everyone else.
She agreed to press charges without having any idea of what that would entail, thinking it was a formality that would be resolved in one court session. She moved across the country several times, looking for occupation and meaning and a chance to heal while the process dragged on and on. She went through the trial and all of the roller coasters that came with it. She was built up again as her victim impact statement went viral. And she learned a lot about support and the act of providing it, a lot about herself and humanity and trauma and the shared experience of women.
I own a copy of this book, but I still decided to wait for the audiobook from the library so that I could hear Chanel read it herself. I am so glad I did. But about a third of the way through, I found myself not avoiding it exactly, but just a bit intimidated to return to it. So I ended up lying on my couch one Saturday afternoon and playing Sudoku while I listened to the rest of it. This was a good decision — the rest was so heartbreaking and powerful, I don’t think I could have done it justice while I commuted or cooked or whatever I would have done otherwise. And to experience her words all at once allowed me to really feel my way through her story.
I am in awe of Chanel Miller. I always will be. Read this book.
“I survived because I remained soft, because I listened, because I wrote. Because I huddled close to my truth, protected it like a tiny flame in a terrible storm. Hold up your head when the tears come, when you are mocked, insulted, questioned, threatened, when they tell you you are nothing, when your body is reduced to openings. The journey will be longer than you imagined, trauma will find you again and again. Do not become the ones who hurt you. Stay tender with your power. Never fight to injure, fight to uplift. Fight because you know that in this life, you deserve safety, joy, and freedom. Fight because it is your life. Not anyone else’s. I did it, I am here. Looking back, all the ones who doubted or hurt or nearly conquered me faded away, and I am the only one standing. So now, the time has come. I dust myself off, and go on.”
Trigger Warnings
Sexual assault / rape
Dating violence
Suicidal thoughts
Body hatred
Mental illness
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