Read a Girl #26: "In The Dream House", Carmen Maria Machado

Today I bring you a quite difficult book, but one that if you, like me, have gone through something similar, will give you some sort of solace. A sense of being seen, understood. This is also a difficult newsletter to write precisely because of the above. But here we go.

“In The Dream House” by Carmen Maria Machado is a memoir chronicling her relationship with an abusive girlfriend. It explores all the stages of an abusive relationship, how the abuser gets you so into them it feels like a drug. And how it all starts crumbling down, the slow process of how they tear you apart. 

Having survived an abusive relationship myself it was scary to read something that was so similar to my own experience. Even though the circumstances, genders, countries, societies and pretty much everything else were completely different, the modus operandi of Carmen’s abuser and my own felt practically the same. 

One specific part of her book was particularly difficult for me to read, as I went through the same, yet again different, experience. In it, Carmen tells of a time in which her girlfriend complains about her constant singing, undermining her own sense of self. I wrote about something like this in my book too, when my then-boyfriend complained of my constant listening to music, saying the reason why I always had music playing in the background was that I didn’t want to deal with my own thoughts. 

It was only after I read Carmen’s account of what happened to her that I was able to understand my abuser, among many other things, was trying to silence me just how her girlfriend was trying to silence her. I couldn’t help but wonder if other victims of abuse went through something similar. “In The Dream House” feels like a punch to the gut, but, above everything else, this is a book that gives hope and shows that, yes, overcoming the people who broke you is possible.

My first book, “a spectacularly sad ending”, is a collection of poetry and prose about heartbreak, loss and survival. It chronicles experiences of love, loss, abuse and grief, and is for anyone who is or ever had to mend a broken heart. It's available as a paperback and also on Kindle. You can get it here.

🎵 This newsletter was written to the sounds of “Hiding Tonight”, by Alex Turner.

We have a playlist with all of the music featured on our newsletters. You can listen to it on Spotify.

My name is Renata and I am the Founder and Editor of Read a Girl, a platform aimed at promoting the work of women writers. My background is in journalism and I spent most of my career covering foreign affairs and travelling around looking for good stories to tell. Reading is a very big passion of mine and my favourite authors are Elena Ferrante, J.D. Salinger, Julian Barnes and Sylvia Plath.

You can learn more about me here and on my website.

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