A Quarterly of Criticism and Review i^^^^^^^^fcEjfc $15

never know precisely what happened orwho exactly they were.Although I find Strangers Among Us lessgripping than Woodman's first Franklinbook, it is nonetheless fascinating. It isanother example of the northern tale thatAtwood extolls—a mystery story withghostly presences that cannot be confirmedor explained away. Certainly, whatever theInuit saw and heard over one hundredyears ago provided them with the stuff oflegend and myth, and these tales continueto haunt our imaginations, our literature,and our arts. As Woodman reminds us inhis final remarks: "the Inuit knew [that] thebest stories are those that survive on theirown merit, and bear endless repetition."BibliotherapyBeckylaneWhere the Rivers Join: A Personal Account ofHealing from Ritual Abuse. Press Gang $16.95Nancy Owen Nelson, ed.Private Voices, Public Lives: Women Speak on theLiterary Life. U North Texas P US$16.95Reviewed by Barbara PellBoth of these books explore the realm ofliterature as therapy. The first, a personaljournal of horrific revelations, finds solacethrough writing. The second, an academicanthology of intellectual intertextualities,records the life-impact of reading. Bothbelong in the categories of autobiography/women's studies rather than in the traditionalgenres of literature/literary criticism,but their feminist voices proclaim that theyare no less valuable and that they will nolonger be silenced by patriarchal structures.Beckylane is a pseudonym for a writerfrom Turtle Island who, as the afterwordindicates, cannot use her real name becauseshe is vulnerable to lawsuits for the revelationsof ritual, sexual abuse she makes in thisbook. It is a personal journal from March1991 to June 1992 that records her recoveryof the memories of her childhood: herprostitution, until age seven, to a cult thatpractised physical and sexual abuse of children,bestiality, murder, and cannibalism;and, between the ages of seven and eleven,her sexual abuse by her father after he nolonger offered her to the cult. The journalentries reveal the essence of her story withintwenty pages, then detail, repeat, and psychoanalysethe events as her counsellortherapistenables her to relive her repressedmemories. As Lee Maracle says in the Forewordto the book, the nightmarish fragmentsare horrific and challenging; they arenot sensationalized or self-indulgent.What weakens the autobiographicalimpact of this courageous book are the selfconsciousliterary interpolations of the selfconfessedwriter and grad student: ironicfortune-cookie sayings; numerous quotationsfrom authorities on child abuse;dialogue from "Readers" who instruct herto make the text more "feminist"; even"A Scholar" who praises her courage andwrites the book review—"the interweavingof quotations from other accounts of abusesurvival, diary entries, images welling upfrom repressed memories, fortune cookieproclamations etc. is very effective." Thisreader feels manipulated. The cover blurbclaims that this "record of a woman's healingfrom ritual abuse does not pander toskeptics and does not apologize." The problemis that it does both. The author is soobsessed with the accusation of FalseMemory Syndrome that she constantlyforegrounds a critique of her own materialthat compels the sympathetic reader tobecome a skeptical judge. Ultimately, as sheinsists, this brave book is primarily a therapyfor herself and other abuse survivors.Private Voices, Public Lives is an anthologyof twenty-four essays by Americanwomen scholars who attempt to liberate literarycriticism from an adversarial "masculinist"mode by foregrounding an113