Riding Fury Home

Starred review from March 12, 2012
From the horrors of her childhood in 1950s New Jersey to the liberating discovering of her sexual identity decades later, psychotherapist Wilson's memoir is as heartbreaking as it is uplifting. During Wilson's childhood, her motherâafter attempting suicide (the gun jammed)âwas shuttled in and out of mental institutions, subjected to electroshock treatments, and addicted to various pills that severely impaired her ability to parent. When Wilson's father leaves the family for England, young Wilson is forced to watch over her mother, making sure she does not overdose or attempt to kill herself again. From a young age, Wilson repeats a mantra: "I am so strong. I can get through anything;" her resilience pays off and, as an adult, Wilson's therapist comments on her "limitless ability for suffering." Exhausted by having to care for her mother, Wilson eventually flees home for college in Iowa. Now with the freedom to explore her own identityâthrough anti-Vietnam protests and 1960s countercultureâWilson embarks on a journey that ultimately brings her closer to her mother. After coming out as a lesbian, Wilson learns her mother is also gay, and that her depression was fueled by her love affair with a woman that was "forbidden and punished" by the repressive society of the 1950s. Through sharing her personal tale of forgiveness and unconditional love, Wilson breaks the silence on the trauma of oppression and the ecstasy of self-acceptance.

March 15, 2012
In her debut memoir, Wilson portrays our culture's intolerance of homosexuality through a mother-daughter story of dysfunction, loss and empowerment. The author chronicles her childhood in the 1950s and '60s, her coming of age in the '70s and the reestablishment of her relationship with her mother as an adult. The first part of the narrative relates how Gloria, Wilson's mother, attempted suicide at least three times before Wilson was 12. Gloria spent extensive time in mental hospitals and was subjected to heavy medication and shock therapy. Partly because of her mother's lack of parenting, Wilson tried to make herself nearly invisible to please those around her. She fled to college at Grinnell in Iowa and then to San Francisco to find herself. There she became active in both the gay-rights and women's-liberation movements and came out to her friends and family as a lesbian. As Gloria healed and found her voice, Wilson discovered that her mother was also a lesbian and that her depression was fueled by intolerance for her lifestyle choice. Eventually the author and her mother reconnected, and the final part of the book outlines her mother's death from cancer and the resolution and boundary setting that occurred before she died. While the book takes place during a dynamic time for lesbians and society as a whole, Wilson offers very little reflection and synthesis. As a practicing psychotherapist, the author has the tools to dig deeper, but the story unfolds as a straightforward, chronological series of events. A decent cultural study, but many readers may desire more analysis and wisdom.

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April 1, 2012
In this unusual memoira remembrance of mental illness and sexual identityWilson, a writer and psychotherapist, begins with a devastating incident from her childhood, one of her mother's numerous suicide attempts which finally sent her to a mental institution. Wilson recalls her pent-up rage and shame, and her father telling her never to express anger toward her mother; her condition, he reminded her, was not her fault. It took many years for Wilson to learn the cause of her mother's anguish: trapped in an unhappy marriage, she embarked on a relationship with a married woman. The subsequent electroshock treatmentthe only cure at the time for her condition and doctor-prescribed psychiatric pills took such a toll on her body that she was barely recognizable when she returned home. The tables were turned as Wilson learned to adopt the role of protector. Riding Fury Home describes the complicated relationship between a mother and daughter set against the backdrop of a changing America, as Wilson comes to accept her own lesbian identity and learns to forge a new relationship with her mother. A compelling read.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)