My Dark Vanessa

I only picked this up after I heard Oprah dropped it from her book club. after the fiasco of American Dirt, she said she wasn't going to shy away from controversy per say, but she wouldn't actively court it either. so yeah, of course I had to see what the potential backlash would have been. in a nutshell, it's a 15 yo girl who was groomed by her high school teacher, fell in love with him and had sex with him. but the interesting parts are the details that are inconvenient: they keep this relationship for 7+ years, and even though the leechy teacher tries to initiate the same process with other young girls, Vanessa can be correct when she sees their relationship as singular and special. this is her interpretation that allows her to reconcile the damage and abuse she has suffered. the book ends with her confronting some of that damage, but it's not a linear path; the reader feels that she will always be conflicted about this huge chunk of her life, and maybe that's where Oprah did not want to tread: an abuse victim that doesn't fit into our narratives. I mean, if we are supposed to allow women the autonomy to choose sex work, why do we shut down her interpretation of her own life? either 'society' knows best in all, or individuals do. you can't have it both ways.
This book is a challenge for anyone because it doesn't finish with a tidy ending, ie Vanessa doesn't fully capitulated to the reader's (or the critics) understanding of Vanessa's life