The novel Awake, by Elizabeth Graver, holds power in its knowledge, its awareness of maternal nature. Graver takes on the trepidatious theme of lost self when absorbed by wifehood and motherhood.
Her prose is brimming with insight about our choices, relationships, and defeat in a tone of moderated confession, neither remorseful nor boastful. "We're just animals with noisy minds," the narrator muses after an intoxicating, escapist, adulturous encounter. "For the first time in years, I wasn't looking or attending, protecting, feeding, prodding or keeping track. Gone. It was my greatest fear, but at that moment it meant nothing to me. I was no longer a mother, scarcely a human. I knew nothing of family or love or sickness or death or the long, hard work it takes to live even the most ordinary life. I knew nothing."
I remain moved by this book, which made me appreciate my insomnia and gave me much to think about and even abashedly relate to.
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