A Stolen Life
Ratings25
Average rating3.9
15
Ratings25
Average rating3.9
In the summer of 1991 I was a normal kid. I did normal things. I had friends and a mother who loved me. I was just like you. Until the day my life was stolen.
For eighteen years I was a prisoner. I was an object for someone to use and abuse.
For eighteen years I was not allowed to speak my own name. I became a mother and was forced to be a sister. For eighteen years I survived an impossible situation.
On August 26, 2009, I took my name back. My name is Jaycee Lee Dugard. I don’t think of myself as a victim. I survived.
A Stolen Life is my story—in my own words, in my own way, exactly as I remember it.
Reviews with the most likes.
Very interesting to hear her side of the story. An intense read that effected me more than I expected.
I'm rating this book a 5 not because it's particularly “good” or enjoyable to read but because how do you rate someone telling their own story in their own words? Is there anyone who could have told that story in a more “correct” way?
The first part of the book retells Jaycee's captivity, sometimes in painfully explicit details that were truly stomach turning and made all the worst by her naïve childlike storytelling. The second part is about her life after. I found the part of the book that focuses on Jaycee's life after more interesting than her account of what was done to her, in that part you can see her coming alive gaining her voice and agency and blossom into a seemingly pretty amazing person.
It was a little difficult to read. But i felt so bad for her, I'm glad she was able to get back home in the end. It was a really good account on how she felt and her confusion.
This was a painful and disturbing listen (read by the author)
I very much admire her strength after hearing what she's been through. Somewhat unexpectedly, I was really able to relate to many of her thoughts and feelings described later on in the book.
