I am a Red Dress
Incantations on a Grandmother, a Mother, and a Daughter
Description
In I Am a Red Dress, acclaimed writer and performer Anna Camilleri confronts the ghosts of her past as she seeks to find her rightful place in the world. Part memoir, part storytelling, Anna writes with passion and conviction about family and identity, and how the wounds of personal history can be healed through the imagination.
These eloquent stories and narratives speak to the heart of three generations of women--Anna, her mother, and her grandmother--as they dealt with a cycle of family abuse; in them, the red dress appears as a symbol of defiance and empowerment. Throughout the book, Anna unravels memory that is inextricably tied to culture, class, and tradition, in a strong and beautiful voice that bravely asserts its right to be heard.
Reviews
...a work of some emotional power.
- Monday Magazine
-Monday Magazine
I Am a Red Dress is exceptionally strong in will, humanity, and bravery.
- Broken Pencil
-Broken Pencil Magazine.
...lyrical, intimate and honest.
- Xtra!
-Xtra! Magazine
A celebration of the perennial state of becoming, within and through fracture, In I Am a Red Dress is a poignant testimony. Evocatively written through the lushly rouged and split lip of poetry, Camilleri deftly "remakes language, profane, and delicate," and writes herself loudly and vividly from the gaps cloaked by and within the red dress.
- Herizons
-Herizons Magazine
I am a Red Dress is a very intimate telling. ...
- Georgia Straight
-The Georgia Straight
Pointed and powerful. . . . Camilleri's a terrific writer, in control of some emotionally charged prose.
- NOW
-Now
I Am a Red Dress is a book that stares into eyes that mutter "whore" to pre-pubescent girls and wears a red dress in defiance. It is indeed a necessary book.
- T. Brent Schauss
-T. Brent Schauss
...letting her controlled prose and evocative metaphors take you right there to see for yourself.
- Vancouver RainReview
-Vancouver Rain Review of Books