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Author: Jaycee Dugard
Synopsis: On 10 June 1991, eleven-year-old Jaycee Dugard was abducted from a school bus stop within sight of her home in Tahoe, California. It was the last her family and friends saw of her for over eighteen years. On 26 August 2009, Dugard, her daughters, and Phillip Craig Garrido appeared in the office of her kidnapper's parole officer in California. Their unusual behaviour sparked an investigation that led to the positive identification of Jaycee Lee Dugard, living in a tent behind Garrido's home. During her time in captivity, at the age of fourteen and seventeen, she gave birth to two daughters, both fathered by Garrido.
Dugard's memoir is written by the 30-year-old herself and covers the period from the time of her abduction in 1991 up until the present. In her stark, utterly honest and unflinching narrative, Jaycee opens up about what she experienced, including how she feels now, a year after being found. Garrido and his wife Nancy have since pleaded guilty to their crimes.
***
A Stolen Life took me on the wild ride in what was 18 years of Jaycee Dugards life. There is no other way to say that this book is unlike others. This review may include spoilers, so please read at your own discretion.
The first 2/3 of the book Jaycee tells you about what her life in captivity was like. Her writing portrays that she still vividly remembers most of the events that occurred during that time period. She writes in graphic detail (well as graphic as she can with a fifth grade education level) the torture she endured. She described the "runs" that Phillip Garrido would make her do. For those who want to know what a "run" is without reading the book - they were drug induced sex sprees that Phillip would go on and make Jaycee participate in. She was continuously raped throughout her 18 years in captivity.
These multiple rapes resulted in two daughters. She gave birth to her first one at 14, and the other at 17. She was unable to go to a hospital during birth, so she birthed each daughter at home with the help of Nancy and Phillip Garrido. The only drug she was given was codeine to help with her pain. To be completely honest, I'm surprised each birth went without complication or infection. To give birth in a non-sterile environment, not once, but twice, is just grounds for asking for an infection. Luckily, both her and her daughters were in healthy condition after the birth(s).
Throughout the book Jaycee inserts some photos, some being old photos of her life before the abduction, others are while she was held in captivity. All of the photos that were during her captivity were not of her, but of animals (usually cats) or of her daughters. Phillip was wary that if she were to take photos of herself with a disposable camera that she would be recognized when he got the published. Later in the novel the photos were taken on a digital camera and she was able to print them out at home because they were running a printing business.
I'm not going to go into full detail about everything that happens in the novel, because honestly, there's no way to sum up everything that happened to her, and frankly it's not my story to fully tell.
The end of the novel was about her experience outside of captivity, her life with her daughters, and her rehabilitation into the world. I will say that I did prefer the first 2/3 of the book, but I do think the way she ended the book was necessary for the reader to also get closure.
In the end, Jaycee Dugard went through things that no human should ever have to go through. She was ripped away from her life, and she was not the only victim. Her family also suffered, her friends, and her daughters. There are no excuses that can be made for Phillip and Nancy Girrados actions.
