Sometimes when you catch her looking at you, you feel like the luckiest person in the whole world."ĭespite the auspicious start, darkness is hiding in every well-lit corner of their house, and it comes out constantly to remind Machado of a devastating truth: "Fantasy is, I think, the defining cliché of female queerness." Sometimes when you look at your phone, she has sent you something stunningly filthy, and there is a kick of want between your legs. You are the only one for her in all the world. She sees your subtle, ineffable qualities. This is Machado's story of suffering and survival, but you are in there, and that makes the house your house, the girlfriend your girlfriend, the pain your pain, and the abuse Machado endured something you must digest and process yourself. Machado's writes about it all with devastating honesty and vulnerability, both of which are magnified by using second person. She can be dreadfully cruel and physically destructive, sometimes without provocation. Sadly, the idyllic atmosphere quickly shatters because Machado's girlfriend is prone to violent outbursts and often engages in emotional, verbal, and psychological abuse. The place is pretty, cozy, and they are in it together. Most of the story takes place in a beautiful small house in Bloomington, Indiana, where Machado and her nameless girlfriend start living together shortly after they meet.
The first element that makes In the Dream House so inventive is that most of it is written in the second person. That said, the total is more than the sum of its parts and In the Dream House is the kind of book that burrows under the reader's skin while simultaneously forcing her to inhabit the body of the writer. However, just below the surface, the narrative continually shapeshifts and at times becomes a play, an academic look at female queerness in mainstream media, a choose your own adventure book, and a sharp deconstruction of the mechanisms of psychological abuse.
On its surface, the book recounts a psychologically abusive relationship that marked Machado's life in many ways. How?Ĭarmen Maria Machado's In the Dream House is the most innovative memoir I've ever read.
Your purchase helps support NPR programming. Close overlay Buy Featured Book Title In the Dream House Subtitle A Memoir Author Carmen Maria Machado
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