Being Lolita: A Memoir
Written by Alisson Wood
Narrated by Alisson Wood
4.5/5
()
About this audiobook
This program is read by the author.
A dark romance evolves between a high schooler and her English teacher in this breathtakingly powerful memoir about a young woman who must learn to rewrite her own story.
“Have you ever read Lolita?”
So begins seventeen-year-old Alisson’s metamorphosis from student to lover and then victim. A lonely and vulnerable high school senior, Alisson finds solace only in her writing—and in a young, charismatic English teacher, Mr. North.
Mr. North gives Alisson a copy of Lolita to read, telling her it is a beautiful story about love. The book soon becomes the backdrop to a connection that blooms from a simple crush into a forbidden romance. But as Mr. North’s hold on her tightens, Alisson is forced to evaluate how much of their narrative is actually a disturbing fiction.
In the wake of what becomes a deeply abusive relationship, Alisson is faced again and again with the story of her past, from rereading Lolita in college to working with teenage girls to becoming a professor of creative writing. It is only with that distance and perspective that she understands the ultimate power language has had on her—and how to harness that power to tell her own true story.
Being Lolita is a stunning coming-of-age memoir that shines a bright light on our shifting perceptions of consent, vulnerability, and power. This is the story of what happens when a young woman realizes her entire narrative must be rewritten—and then takes back the pen to rewrite it.
A Macmillan Audio production from Flatiron Books
"Being Lolita is an unflinching depiction of grooming and a searing indictment of exploitative teachers, but most of all it’s an act of redemption—a powerful realization of Wood’s vow 'to do the little I can to make sure what happened to me doesn’t happen again.'"— Susan Choi, author of the National Book Award-winning Trust Exercise
"Wood reminds us that stories still have the power to change the world. This is a fascinating story of survival and purpose, yet it is also a story of interpretation. How we read the world changes how we live in it. A fantastic debut." — Garrard Conley, author of Boy Erased
Alisson Wood
Alisson Wood is an award-winning writer whose essays have been published in the New York Times, Catapult, and Epiphany. She holds an M.F.A. in fiction from New York University. Alisson teaches creative writing at her alma mater and at Sackett Street Writers’ Workshop. She is the founder and editor in chief of Pigeon Pages, a New York City literary journal and reading series. Alisson was a winner of the inaugural Breakout 8 Award from the Author’s Guild and Epiphany. Being Lolita is her first book.
Related to Being Lolita
Related audiobooks
Estranged: Leaving Family and Finding Home Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Opposite of Loneliness: Essays and Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Girl: A Life Lived in the Shadow of Roman Polanski Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Putney: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5You All Grow Up and Leave Me: A Memoir of Teenage Obsession Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Consent: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Three Women Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Things We Didn't Talk About When I Was a Girl: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Real Lolita: The Kidnapping of Sally Horner and the Novel that Scandalized the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5All of Us Strangers [Movie Tie-in]: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSex Cult Nun: Breaking Away from the Children of God, a Wild, Radical Religious Cult Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tiger, Tiger: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Oola: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5My Friend Anna: The True Story of a Fake Heiress Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hollywood Park: A Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5My Body Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5My Mad Fat Diary: A Memoir Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5His Favorites Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This Is Not A Pity Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Waiting to be Heard: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How to Murder Your Life: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Reckonings: Essays Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5We Need to Talk About Kevin movie tie-in: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nothing Will Be Different: A Memoir Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Glass Eye: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Places I Stopped on the Way Home: A Memoir of Chaos and Grace Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Finding Me: A Decade of Darkness, a Life Reclaimed: A Memoir of the Cleveland Kidnappings Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Asking For It Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Everything I Know About Love: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5She Matters: A Life in Friendships Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5
Personal Memoirs For You
Enough Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Woman in Me Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Becoming Free Indeed: My Story of Disentangling Faith from Fear Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I'm Glad My Mom Died Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5On Writing: A Memoir Of The Craft Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Counting the Cost Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5How Y'all Doing?: Misadventures and Mischief from a Life Well Lived Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Making It So: A Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing: A Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Wishful Drinking Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology and My Harrowing Escape Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Love, Lucy Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Sure, I'll Join Your Cult: A Memoir of Mental Illness and the Quest to Belong Anywhere Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Roxane Gay & Everand Originals: My Year of Psychedelics: Lessons on Better Living Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Pageboy: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Night: New translation by Marion Wiesel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Good Girls Don't Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Summer of Fall: Gravity is a bitch, but I'm still standing Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Finding Me: A Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Year of Magical Thinking Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5See You on the Way Down: Catch You on the Way Back Up! Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dad on Pills: Fatherhood and Mental Illness Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bad Mormon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Glass Castle: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Writing into the Wound: Understanding trauma, truth, and language Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Taste: My Life Through Food Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5While Time Remains: A North Korean Girl's Search for Freedom in America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Roxane Gay & Everand Originals: Built for This: The Quiet Strength of Powerlifting Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
Reviews for Being Lolita
90 ratings4 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5WTAF? As a target of narcissistic grooming myself, I believe Being Lolita is a must read for every high school girl, so that she knows the red flags. I wish I’d known.
Alisson Wood is a beautiful example of personal growth and reflection, setting boundaries and bouncing back from the pain.
Well done!1 person found this helpful
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A painful and beautiful work about a woman reclaiming her own story, teenagehood, growing up, and how passion can disguise abuse.
I can't recommend it enough. - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is a beautiful but terrifying book. It brought me to tears.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Trigger warning:
Sexual abuse and depression.
This book was amazing. Last year I read My Dark Vanessa witch let me in to a Lolita rabbit hole. I started with an audiobook about a true crime story about a similar story like Lolita, then I read the original story by Nabokov and now I read this memoir.
I listen to this book in one sitting while I was working. The writing style really reminded me of My Dark Vanessa. The author wrote it from her perspective and tells the story piece by piece. This was a great way to tell her story. You get to know how her young self thought of what was happening between her teacher. In the second part she explains how she found out that what happened to here was incredibly bad and had nothing to do with wat she did. This part made this book so much more compelling. It was so interesting to see how her teacher manipulated her mind and how she still after a year thought that her relationship with her teacher was a normal one and that Lolita has a different meaning than her teacher told her.
At one point she tells the reader that the word Lolita is used wrong. We see a Lolita as an slut, or a young woman who manipulates men to get what she wants. This is wrong, because a Lolita is an abused girl by a man that had no right to touch her. This part hit right to my soul.
I recommend this book to every person who liked reading My Dark Vanessa or Lolita or is just interested in a true story about abuse.