While They Slept
By Christine Jacques, Special to the Rocky
Published June 19, 2008 at 7 p.m.
* Nonfiction. By Kathryn Harrison. Random House, $25. Grade: B+
Book in a nutshell: This book begins with a horrific end: the 1998 beating deaths of Bill and Linda Gilley and daughter Becky, by their son Billy. Billy had his reasons: Bill senior, with Linda's tacit approval, routinely tied his son to a tractor wheel and bludgeoned him to a pulp. He likely molested daughter Jody. Billy thought Jody would welcome their bloody exit, but Jody called the police.
At his trial, on her attorney's advice, Jody omitted details of their abuse that might have presented Billy more sympathetically, omissions that she eventually tried to correct in an affidavit.
Ten years later, Harrison connects her own incestuous experience with her father, documented in The Kiss, with the surviving Gilleys' varying memories of their lives. The siblings' different personalities and genders account for some discrepancies, but it's striking how two children raised in the same home take divergent paths: Billy was a petty thief, runaway and unsuccessful drug dealer. Jody buried herself in books and went on to a successful career in writing and government.
Best tidbit: Reading a police report, Harrison ponders how writing "just the facts" doesn't truly capture the fear and desperation of Billy's act: "Apparently the tone missing from the spoken language of murder, incest, and other unspeakable acts is absent from the written as well. And the lack can't be remedied. To create that tone, that special script, would be to imply that in some small measure we condone abominations, we accept their existence enough to give them a mode of reference."
Pros: Harrison offers careful research and obvious concern for both Billy and Jody.
Cons: It's a stretch for Harrison to tie her experience to Jody Gilley's. As a conflicted 20-year-old, reluctantly but still pursuing her relationship with her father, her choices were radically different from those of a 16-year-old still dependent on her abusers. To her credit, Harrison acknowledges this, but While They Slept could do with less of her agony.
Final word: While They Slept's real horror is in how many potential helpers were aware of the abuse and were unable to help. This is a heartbreaking read.
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