There are many roles and reasons Allison tells stories in this novel. She tells stories as a way to remember her mother and her memories, to help her heal from being raped and abused as a child, to tell the story of other women and to help give a voice to other individuals who were sexually abused . She tells stories about her memories of her mother and her family to remind her of those times, especially since her mother died. Her stories were also a form of therapy for her. A way for her to express her anger and pain about the sexual abuse, and make sense of it. “That’s the lie I told myself for years, and not until I began to fashion stories on the page did I sort it all out, see where the line ended and a broken life remained (38-9)”. Story telling helped Allison makse sense of her life by writing it all out so she could figure it out.
Allison tells stories to speak for women, specifically the women she grew up with. “Of all the stories I know, the meanest are the stories the women I loved told themselves in secret-the stories thar sutained and broke them (69)”. She told stories about the lives the women lived. Their struggles and pain with dealing with life in their society and with men. She wrote stories to be a voice for those who can’t or won’t speak out loud. To try to make a difference in other people’s lives so that they can survive and deal with their pain by knowing they are not alone. “My theory is that talking about it makes a difference-being a woman who can stand up anywhere and say, I was five and the man was big. So let me say it (44)”. Even though she is making a difference by telling her story, being so candid and open, it does mater if her stories are true, because it affects her credibility from a reader’s perspective;since she is tryng to help others. However, from a writer and therapeutic perspective, her storeis doesn’t need to be true because it is her method of coping and surving. help others.
