Black and Blue: A Novel
By Anna Quindlen
Oprah Book Club® Selection #17, April 1998
Editorial Review:
“The first time my husband hit me I was nineteen years old,” begins Fran Benedetto, the broken heroine of Anna Quindlen’s Black and Blue. With one sweeping sentence, the door to an abused and tortured world is swung wide open and the psyche of a crushed and tattered self-image exposed. “Frannie, Frannie, Fran”–as Bobby Benedetto liked to call her before smashing her into kitchen appliances–was a young, energetic nursing student when she met her husband-to-be at a local Brooklyn bar. She was instantly captivated by his dark, brooding looks and magnetic personality, but her fascination soon solidified into a marital prison sentence of incessant abuse and the destruction of her own identity. After an especially horrific beating and rape, Fran realizes that the next attack could be the last. Fearing her son would be left alone with Bobby, she escapes one morning with her child.
Fran’s salvation comes in the form of Patty Bancroft and Co., a relocation agency for abused women that touts better service than the witness protection program. Armed only with a phone number, a few hundred dollars, and the help of several anonymous volunteers, Fran begins a new life. The agency relocates her to Florida, where she becomes Beth Crenshaw, a recently divorced home-care assistant from Delaware. Fran and her son adapt, meeting challenges with unexpected resilience and resolve until their past returns to haunt them. Quindlen renders the intricacies of spousal abuse with eerie accuracy, taking the reader deep within the realm of dysfunctional human ties. However, her vivid descriptions of abuse, emotional disintegration, and acute loneliness at times numb the reader with their realism.
Read first chapter FREE – Click right and left arrows or scroll mouse.
Related Posts
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy – Oprah’s Book Club Selection #53
She’s Come Undone by Wally Lamb – Oprah’s Book Club Selection #4
Back Roads by Tawni O’Dell – Oprah’s Book Club Selection #34
I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb – Oprah’s Book Club Selection #19
Sula by Toni Morrison – Oprah’s Book Club Selection #48
Latest posts by Susan (see all)
- My Second 5-Gallon Bucket Garden – Tomatoes, Red Bells, Green Beans and Herbs - June 25, 2016
- Roasted Eggplant Parmesan – Plus a couple of simple low carb recipes with Eggplant! - September 16, 2015
- Cauliflower Mac & Cheese - August 21, 2015