She is not just taken away for her safety her family didnвЂ™t want her. This was the morning of the last day of my childhood.вЂќ A child traumatized by what she knows, by what she has said is taken away from her family. One of her brothers wants to make sure she wonвЂ™t tell and itвЂ™s this physical abuse which leads her to вЂњratвЂќ on them, not intentionally but she just blurted it out when she is being taken care of for injuries at school. Twelve year old Violet Rue Kerrigan hears her brothers talking late one night and watches them bury a bloody baseball bat that they canвЂ™t get clean. The family into which you are born and from which there can be no escape.вЂќ They do horrible things attributed to вЂњboys will be boysвЂќ. A dysfunctional Irish family where the fatherвЂ™s word is law and the sons are more important than the daughters and family loyalty is everything, no matter what and I mean no matter what. Taking place in the 1990вЂ™s in upstate NY, itвЂ™s stunning and sad to think about how relevant the depiction of racism is today. ItвЂ™s about family loyalty, betrayals and itвЂ™s a stark commentary on inexplicable hate and racism. I managed to get through these brutal parts of the book and as difficult as it was, I found it to be a powerful story. A word of warning - there is child abuse and sexual abuse and violence. In a succession of vividly recalled episodes Violet contemplates the circumstances of her life as the initially beloved youngest child of seven Kerrigan children who inadvertently вЂњinformsвЂќ on her brothers, setting into motion their arrests and convictions and her own long estrangement.ДЄrresting and poignant, My Life as a Rat traces a life of banishment from a family-banishment from parents, siblings, and the Church-that forces Violet to discover her own identity, to break the powerful spell of family, and to emerge from her long exile as a вЂњratвЂќ into a transformed life. My Life as a Rat follows Violet Rue Kerrigan, a young woman who looks back upon her life in exile from her family following her testimony, at age twelve, concerning what she knew to be the racist murder of an African-American boy by her older brothers.

Which should prevail: loyalty to family or loyalty to the truth? Is telling the truth ever a mistake and is lying for oneвЂ™s family ever justified? Can one do the right thing, but bitterly regret it?

You think your parents love you but is it you they love, or the child who is theirs?вЂќ -Joyce Carol Oates, My Life as a Rat вЂњA painful truth of family life: the most tender emotions can change in an instant.

Life after life book review guardian