By Lisa Boss, Grand Rapids Public Library, Main Branch

There are many different varieties of stolen childhood: through war, deprivation, poverty, drugs, abuse. There’s something of a subtler, terrible sadness when the loss is from an experienced sexual predator of young girls.

Margaux writes about her 15-year relationship with a man whom she felt she came to love, wanted to marry, and defended against all attackers who tried to keep them apart. The man was 51 when they met, and she was only 7. The event that finally broke them apart was his suicide at 66.

Fragoso writes so eloquently that we see him through her young non-judgmental eyes at the same time as we experience the disgust of what his “love” is doing to her. Sexually graphic, and yet, not at all titillating, Fragoso’s book is a reminder of the pathologies of the spirit that are often hidden in plain sight.