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    In the Dream House: A Memoir
    In the Dream House: A Memoir
    In the Dream House: A Memoir
    Audiobook5 hours

    In the Dream House: A Memoir

    Written by Carmen Maria Machado

    Narrated by Carmen Maria Machado

    4.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    In the Dream House is Carmen Maria Machado's engrossing and wildly innovative account of a relationship gone bad, and a bold dissection of the mechanisms and cultural representations of psychological abuse. Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming.

    And it's that struggle that gives the book its original structure: each chapter is driven by its own narrative trope-the haunted house, erotica, the bildungsroman-through which Machado holds the events up to the light and examines them from different angles. She looks back at her religious adolescence, unpacks the stereotype of lesbian relationships as safe and utopian, and widens the view with essayistic explorations of the history and reality of abuse in queer relationships.

    Machado's dire narrative is leavened with her characteristic wit, playfulness, and openness to inquiry. She casts a critical eye over legal proceedings, fairy tales, Star Trek, and Disney villains, as well as iconic works of film and fiction. The result is a wrenching, riveting book that explodes our ideas about what a memoir can do and be.

    Editor's Note

    Lambda Award winner…

    Masterfully weaving together dozens of genres, from gothic and folktales, to lesbian pulp and road trips, Carmen Maria Machado tells the frightening story of a past relationship with an abusive girlfriend in this memoir that breaks open a new way of nonfiction storytelling. It won the Lammy for best LGBTQ+ nonfiction.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHighbridge Company
    Release dateDec 19, 2019
    ISBN9781684572793

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    Reviews for In the Dream House

    4.5/5

    622 ratings16 reviews

    What did you think?

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    • 5/5
      Singlehandedly the best book I've ever read, and I read over 100 books a year. Everyone, no matter what you identify as, should read this book. I've bought this for every single one of my friends for them to read

      2 people found this helpful

    • 3/5
      The second half was more engaging than the first half. Not sure I would’ve finished a paper back book.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      I really wanted to give the author a big hug after reading this.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Beautifully written prose. She reads it like a poet. A wonderful resource for those who have been in emotionally abusive relationships and to everyone as this needs to be talked about more.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      Extremely powerful and absolutely harrowing. Machado brings her striking, electrifying writing style to bear on the complex, taboo, and often deliberately obscured topic of domestic abuse within queer relationships.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      I’m speechless as to what to write. Machado’s memoir is most necessary as we look forward to learn from relationships gone wrong that start off so right and how it’s tough to move away when you feel so trapped... I’m glad Machado was the one to narrate her tale and she does it so well! Loved following along with the book by my side so as to follow up on the footnotes on the page too!

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      A heart-wrenching confessional of a shared experience. I could not put the book down finished in a evening.
    • 5/5
      Heartbreaking, but not without hope. It’s impossible to adequately put language to such a traumatic experience and all the complexities surrounding it, but the way that Machado approaches this memoir comes as close as a person probably can. Her use of different tropes, genres, and storytelling devices is so brilliantly done. Listening to this memoir in the author’s own voice was lovely. Well. As lovely as a memoir about abuse can be.
    • 5/5
      Oh, shit. What a memoir. Beautiful and horrible and gutting.
    • 5/5
      Absolutely amazing, heartbreaking, and well written. Could not stop listening and I love how it was written. 10/10
    • 5/5
      Haunting, personal and brilliant at every single phrase.
      Thabk you so much for this.
    • 5/5
      So so good. I’m interested in getting a physical version of this but the audiobook was very immersive and made for a great experience.
    • 5/5
      Touching, chilling, poetic & beautiful. Deeply personal & universally relatable. A work of art.
    • 5/5
      Wow. This is a wonderfully written piece of art. It took me a minute to get used to her writing/reading style, but the content is raw and relatable and addresses important social issues. I also thought her way of storytelling was unique and refreshing.
    • 5/5
      Great depiction of psychological abuse and how damaging it can be. Well written.
    • 5/5
      Absolutely breathtaking. The writing will stun you as the story will rearrange you.