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True Things About Me

2.97 of 5 stars 2.97 · rating details · 238 ratings · 63 reviews

One ordinary afternoon in a nameless town, a nameless young woman is at work in a benefits office. Ten minutes later, she is in an underground parking lot, slammed up against a wall, having sex with a stranger.What made her do this? How can she forget him? These are questions the young woman asks herself as she charts her deepening erotic obsession with painful, sometimes...more

Hardcover, 215 pages

Published by Canongate Books (first published January 1st 2011)

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Oct 04, 2011 Alan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: novels, read-in-2011

This book sweeps you away much like the main character, a woman working in a benefits office, is carried off into another state (or states) by her sexual contact and subsequent obsession with a claimant at the dole office. On first meeting they have sex in the car park, and from then on her ‘normal’ life falls to pieces as she pursues the purely sexual relationship with the ex-criminal (we’re not told what crime he has committed but he is violent to her, steals her car). We feel sometimes like h...more This book sweeps you away much like the main character, a woman working in a benefits office, is carried off into another state (or states) by her sexual contact and subsequent obsession with a claimant at the dole office. On first meeting they have sex in the car park, and from then on her ‘normal’ life falls to pieces as she pursues the purely sexual relationship with the ex-criminal (we’re not told what crime he has committed but he is violent to her, steals her car). We feel sometimes like her friend Alison who tries to make her ‘see sense’ – what the fuck are you doing, going back to him when he’s humiliated you, bruised and subjugated you to his will – and sometimes get caught up in her hallucinatory world where normality seems silly:

As I trailed up the stairs I could hear my mum asking where the kettle was. I wanted to rush back down and shout at them to leave my kettle alone. To get out of my house, and take their stupid string bags, fucking bifocals and dreary matching fleeces with them.

She’s gone beyond tea - she stops eating for a while - and work and politeness, she’s lost her sense of self, she’s someone different now:

I felt as if some wet substance filled my cavities. It could have been water, it might have been blood; some sort of disgusting broth anyway. I was surprised my colleagues couldn’t hear it lapping around as I stalked up and down the corridors. For all I knew I was leaving liquid splodges on the office floors.

As a reader the hook is so strong you want to just sit and read straight through and I would have but for things like work and family stuff getting in the way. Short chapters with ironic headings, true things about her: I talk to the animals (where she visits her gran in hospital, who threw her head back and started crowing like a cockerel. She had little claws that plucked the bedclothes), I get tied up once in a while, I eat colour coordinated snacks. There’s a lot of topical humour too: Why can’t I have a good old British sandwich? She asked. Why must it be ciabatta and wraps and stuff like that? Who is Panini anyway?

I suspect some will wince at the very strong nature of the sex, violence, drugs depicted here, but this is a ‘descent’ story of considerable power. Fucking brilliant. Surrender.

I should add that she is another writer who is appearing at the Great Short Fiction day @ Lancaster Litfest, although this is a novel (I'll get on to her stories after, as they've just arrived). I am so glad she is because I might not have picked up this book otherwise.
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Apr 22, 2013 Yorkshiresoul rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I bought this because of the blurb "The Bell Jar for the 21st century".

It does not really live up to that expectation. The story told in first person shows a young woman struggling with self confidence and direction in life, perhaps suffering undiagnosed mental illness, who is sucked in to a one sided sexual affair with a man she knows almost nothing about.
The man seems abusive and secretive, and as the story carries on his behaviour deteriorates.

Davies shows amply how a person lacking in empat...more

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Jan 11, 2012 Bill Krieger rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It's appropriate that this book has "Me" in the title. It's primarily a first-person introspective of a young woman going through an existential crisis of confidence. It was interesting, almost like reading a personal journal.

This is true girlie stuff: insecurity, hating your appearance, self-loathing, consumed by the opinions of others. The author did a great job of putting you in the shoes of a girl going through these difficult emotions. You feel the lead character buckling because of her lac...more

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May 17, 2011 Katarina rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. One of the memorable debuts of 2010 comes from Welsh writer Deborah Davies. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this relatively short novel, though it also chilled me to the bone.

Davies doesn't make it easy for the reader to get to know her characters. Both her narrator and the man she loves and loathes stay unnamed throughout the book. This reminds me vaguely of reading "Fight Club" by Chuck Palahniuk. Just as Palahniuk does, Davies leads the reader down a flight of stairs, into a dark area and to the...more One of the memorable debuts of 2010 comes from Welsh writer Deborah Davies. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this relatively short novel, though it also chilled me to the bone.

Davies doesn't make it easy for the reader to get to know her characters. Both her narrator and the man she loves and loathes stay unnamed throughout the book. This reminds me vaguely of reading "Fight Club" by Chuck Palahniuk. Just as Palahniuk does, Davies leads the reader down a flight of stairs, into a dark area and to the edge of the abyss. An abyss her main character willingly jumps into head-first.

And just as in Palahniuk's works the reader is taken on the narrator's dark journey towards self-distruction. A journey that will end in a vivid description of murder that no doubt only a few people would consider desirable prose.

This is an intense story, of love, loneliness, submission and maybe even masochism of the mind - the willingness to surrender the very core of your being to another person. And so it ought to be read with due care. Only the reader that can take the descent, shall take this journey.

A journey without a beginning or an end. Leaving the reader to dwell in the momentum between, as Davies never lets up on why the narrator might crave to destroy herself or whether the horrifying end of the novel has any consequence for her.

The novels climax is also the end to the reader's short acquintance with Davies' characters. An end that she slowly works up to. An end that the reader can almost feel coming but dares not to believe in or hope for. An end that the reader had no way of guessing would come true on the first page of the novel.

My Recommendation:
I can only give a restricted recommendation. This novel is too extreme, to raw to recommend it to any and everyone.
But if you are looking for something that is out of the ordinary. If you are looking for a novel that will change you. If you, like me, want something new and fresh and aren't afraid of the dark side of the human mind. This is the perfect book to read and never forget.

So do read it but at your own risk... (less)

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May 09, 2011 Georgina rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Apr 01, 2011 Jane rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: borrowed

I am a little disorientated.

You see, Deborah Kay Davies picked me up and pulled me into the mind of another woman. I couldn't quite understand her, her circumstances, her emotions, her actions, but I cared, and I wished that I could.

And now I am back. Moved, puzzled, disturbed, still asking questions, and not quite able to let go.

She worked for the DWP. Dealing with the public. A soul-destroying job. She must the worst side of human nature rather more often than the best.

She saw a man. An ex con...more

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Feb 19, 2012 Sheli rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012, contemporary, kindle

I came across this book on my creative writing course as the writer had also attended the same course. An excerpt was given as an example of an unusual writing style. From that excerpt I wanted to read more.

I liked the way that the book was written as it was an unusual style and leant itself to making me feel in tune with the character and feel her panic and how things were running away with her.

The story itself is about a woman who is getting involved with a man who she really shouldn't be. Eve...more

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Mar 12, 2011 Melanie Garrett rated it 5 of 5 stars

I heard about this on John Mullan's Culture Show special for World Book Night and was intrigued by what they had to say. In particular, I was interested in the way they all seemed hugely impressed with it, and yet also that there was something not quite right about it.

This novel has been called 'The Bell Jar' for the 21st century. I know the 'Bell Jar' apostles out there are having trouble with this comparison but, personally, I think this is a really apt and useful comparison.

The narrative is...more

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Apr 30, 2011 Katie Hill rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

To me, this is the story of a young woman who has two conflicting desires fighting to the death inside her. At times, it is uncomfortable. Others, it is infuriating. And still, at times, sympathy invoking. You will find humor, idiosyncrasies, and twisted imagery on most of its pages.

This book is full of abuse. Emotional, physical, self-abuse, substance-abuse...you name it, it's got it. Which brings me to what I did not like about it. I found myself wanting to shake this girl by the shoulders and...more

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Jul 08, 2010 Boof rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: arc-and-review-copies, british-authors, read-in-2010, uk

When I first finished this book I wanted to collect my thoughts together as I felt that I had been left with a multitude of feelings about it and I was having trouble gathering them all together. I wrote down everything that came into my head and revisisted it few days later. Here is what I wrote:

disturbing, humorous, obsession, abuse, non-functioning, care, love, worry, friendship, concern, free-falling, depression, nervous breakdown.

I found this book to be a fast-paced page-turner about a ver...more When I first finished this book I wanted to collect my thoughts together as I felt that I had been left with a multitude of feelings about it and I was having trouble gathering them all together. I wrote down everything that came into my head and revisisted it few days later. Here is what I wrote:

disturbing, humorous, obsession, abuse, non-functioning, care, love, worry, friendship, concern, free-falling, depression, nervous breakdown.

I found this book to be a fast-paced page-turner about a very disturning subject. Although it was disturbing, it is injected with dashes of humour which is why I think it allows the reader to follow the protagonists free-fall into depression and obsession without it teetering on the edge of being too much. The way I interpreted the book was that how it was written meant that it was about the subject of breaking down and spiralling out of control itself, rather than about a paticular person. We don’t get to see too much of the narrators background (we only really know that she works in some sort of claims office and that her parents are middle class and tight-knit). It left me thinking that it could be me or it could be you.

The narrative starts at work in a benefits office where our narrator serves a good looking, tall, blonde man who has just been released from prison. He is waiting for her after work and within minutes he has her up against a wall in an underground carpark. From this point on: the no showing at work, the disgust felt, the tracking him down, the control he has over her is shocking in the sense that you become so concerned about how the hell she ended up in this state. Her friend Alison and her parents are at a loss of what to do to help her and as a reader you are looking to these charaters to bring the protagonist to her senses.

I have thought a lot about this book since reading it (I like it when a book has the power to make you think and deliberate). I can’t say that I liked the subject matter in terms of the book being about abuse and control and depression etc but it is very powreful and very well written and I have to say that I did enjoy reading it. The humour certainly helps lighten the tone and without this it would have been a very different book.
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Sep 06, 2010 Annie rated it 2 of 5 stars

Still not sure what I thought about this one - the cover says "The Bell Jar for the twenty-first century" but it's more Nine and a Half Weeks really! The un-named protagonist works in a benefit office and is attracted by a customer in the waiting room: they have rough sex in the underground car park (my days at the office were never like this!) and her destructive obsession with him starts. This is a real car crash of a read - the lower she goes, the more she alienates friends and family, the mo...more

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Jan 01, 2013 Abby rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Whilst I think that Davies is clearly a gifted writer, I personally didn't enjoy this. I think that no matter how great a writer's articulation skills are, if there is no substance to a story- it isn't going to be something worth reading. I felt like I was being told a story, not shown it.

Spoiler below:

(view spoiler)...more

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Jan 13, 2013 Sandra rated it 3 of 5 stars

One of the reviews on the back of the book says 'Like nothing I've ever read' and up to a point I agree.
It is also something I would have been enthralled by at, say, fouteen, desperate to read about such experiences, seeing them as somehow romantic in spite of the sordidness. The touch is light, no explanation as to why she gets caught up, plenty of suggestion as to her instablity, which was probably there before the man came into her life and although part of me wanted to scream 'don't be such...more

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Aug 21, 2011 Nancy Sirvent rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: SueR

Shelves: read-in-2011, ebook

I picked this up after reading John Cotter's review at Open Letters Monthly where he compares it with Thomas Berger's Meeting Evil: A Novel, which I intend to read next. Both novels are about sociopaths appearing in the lives of the main character. So far, this one is great but not for everyone. It's pretty disturbing. BUT, if you've got a yen for sociopaths, I recommend.

EDIT" Oh, I meant to include a link to that review: http://www.openlettersmonthly.com/the...

Finished it. I can't give it any s...more

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Jul 07, 2012 Helen McClory rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Although it is an extreme example, this book is a kind of progression of those submissive woman/dominant man stories we've been seeing so much of. It centres less on soft-focus sex, more madness and eroding boundaries of the self and horrific rape. The man is a monster without distinguishing qualities (there is, deliberately, little insight into him) and the woman spirals into degradation. Whenever there is rape in a novel I feel deeply uncomfortable, asking, why does the author want to make us...more

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Oct 13, 2011 Haley Spangler rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I give this book five stars for the quality in writing but two stars for the absolutely terrible character development. Sure, yes, it was beautifully written, the descriptions were great, the idea was good but I just couldn't see past the characters. Or lack there of for that matter.

I feel like I never got to actually know anything about Deborah Davies' unnamed heroin. There was no character development, there was no growth, there was almost no backstory... so I felt like I wasn't able to connec...more

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Nov 28, 2010 Jim rated it 3 of 5 stars

The book is well written with an effective use of imagery. What isn’t said is what Davis has chosen not to say. It’s not sloppy writing. Chick lit it is not. Yes, good girl meets bad boy but there’s no reforming the bad boy in this book. This is an uncomfortable and frighteningly plausible read despite my having some reservations about the lack of backstory. If this book is a train wreck then what we get to watch is someone clawing their way through the wreckage and we can’t do a damn thing but...more

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May 05, 2011 Booksdingle rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: borrowed-library

This book is disturbing but engrossing - It charts the descent of a seemingly normal woman into an obsession with a very unsuitable man whom she meets by chance but whom over the course of a few (often abusive) meetings manages to suck her in and destroy all the good things in her life - her reputation, her friendships, her job and ultimately her self-worth. It is an uncomfortable read in as much as it shows in some ways how easy it is to sit on a very fine line between sanity and insanity and h...more

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Jun 16, 2012 Kristina rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, nook-book, psychological-thriller

This is a compulsively readable book. I hadn't meant to read the whole damn thing on my phone this morning, but I did. At 161 pages, it's a fast read and like a horrible highway accident, I couldn't look away. The narrator is never named, in fact no one in this book is named except Alison and Tom, her co-worker and friend and her husband. The narrator of this book works at some sort of government welfare/benefits office (this is a British book) and meets a man newly released from prison when she...more

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Sep 24, 2011 S. Annelise Adams rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: readingbroadlyismyjob

Sexual obsession as an awakening can be life-affirming.
Or not.
This would be an example of "Or Not".
It was disturbing with just enough "f*ck-you-Bridget-Jones" humor to keep me turning the pages, despite the nausea-inducing, -here we go again!- Single Gal Goes Crazy Plot.

I'll seek out more work by this author because her talent is promising and the tale was told in a gripping fashion that left me woozy after I finished it. 'Twas one of those books about craziness that makes you feel warped and...more

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May 24, 2011 Steph rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011, reviewed

There is nothing I love more in a novel than well developed characters; unfortunately there were none here. The man was a stereotype. The woman wasn't given any redeeming qualities that would allow me to at least pity her. I wish I'd been given the opportunity to know her because I'd have spent the book connected and sobbing instead of detached and uncomfortable.

I also found several parts of the novel unrealistic. This guy who doesn't know anything about her randomly showing up at her grandmoth...more

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Nov 16, 2011 Angel Quinn rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book was quirky and a bit dark, but I couldn't put it down. It was fascinating to peek inside the mind of a woman who is addicted to self-destruction and compulsive sex. I was anxiously anticipating just how far she would go. The author purposefully doesn't delve into the characters' backstories, which was part of the story's appeal. You were forced to draw your own conclusions instead of having them spelled out for you.

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Apr 13, 2013 Lucy Blunden rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Strong, compelling book that draws you into the emotional life of a young woman falling apart after an encounter with a man. It it honest and rather brutal, showing how it shakes up the commonplace when personal deterioration takes place.
Difficult to read but well worth it.
I agree with one of the other reviewers that the ending was disappointing but I could see that for the narrator, this had become her only choice.

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Jul 26, 2011 Sally Whitehead rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-read-in-2011

The sort of book I wish I could write. Utterly compelling and darkly disturbing. A more than ample glimpse into the shattering and fragmenting of an otherwise seemingly ordinary life. The narrator's "lover" is a frighteningly shadowy figure who despite barely being fully realized seeps into and permeates the entire narrative. The more solid characters, her parents and closest friend, Alison, are unable to claw her back to the reality they inhabit and both they, and the reader, can do nothing but...more

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Nov 17, 2012 Jenn rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012, never-again-thankyou

This book was like watching a slow train wreck...
It was bad and then more BAD!
I stopped reading it on the 6th chapter and then jumped to the last chapter to see if this Brit gal ever snaps out of it.
Hmmmmmmmmmmm... what a waste of 45 minutes I spent.
1 star!

P.S. I liked the bacony kisses reference on pg. 48!
I want to experience bacony kisses. :x

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Nov 06, 2011 Ian rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: modern-novel, a-kindle

This is a pretty basic story. Ordinary woman working in a benefit office interviews a new claimant for a few minutes. Such is his rogueish charm, she is smitten and subsequently meets him that evening for a bout of rough sex in an underground car park. As the novel progresses, he subjects her to worsening bouts of physical, sexual and emotioanl abuse and she just laps it up.

It is often hard to like a novel where the main characters have no redeeming features at all, but these people are drawn wi...more

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Mar 17, 2012 Bachyboy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Disturbing and so well written. I read this with my heart in my mouth all the way through and the ending was superb. The small chapters make it impossible to put down. A young woman forms a relationship with the wrong man and he is seriously wrong. She does her best to get out if it but it is not that easy. A psychological drama.

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Aug 17, 2011 Lorri Steinbacher rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I'll file this under another one of those weird books that I like despite myself. I'm not sure I bought into the main charater's obsession, though. She seemed to fall apart so quickly. I expected to see more of a disintegration, especially since the ending would have felt more organic to me if her collapse had seemed more gradual.

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Oct 07, 2011 Jonee rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I found this portrait of a woman's descent into a nightmare to be a compelling read. She lived an average life and was being smoothered by it. She longed for adventure and excitement, and a human connection that was outside of her humdrum existence. Of course, she chose unwisely and found herself in an untenable situation.

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Aug 13, 2011 Judi rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: read-in-2011

I read this in one sitting... just wanted to see if it was worth sending to Guy Savage to review it. Normally, I don't need to read the whole book to decide whether I should or not, but in this case I did. I was trying to figure out why amazon reviewer Dr. Nicholas Graves said the following:

"This is an odd book. It is well written and well presented. But at the end of it I am still none the wiser about why the book was ever written, or who it was written for, or what point it is making."

For much...more

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About Deborah Kay Davies

Deborah Kay Davies started writing and publishing when she was a mature student and taught Creative Writing at Cardiff University. Her first collection of stories, Grace, Tamar and Laszlo the Beautiful, won the 2009 Wales Book of the Year Award. She has also published a collection of poems, Things You Think I Don’t Know. She lives in Wales.

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“I tried to whip some feelings up but the inside of my chest was as hollow as an empty rubbish bin; totally, absolutely dried up, with my poor, tiny heart lying at the bottom like a crushed coke can.” — 3 people liked it

“I had a fierce headache and (my parents’) soft conversation was like a light rain falling on the hot roof of my head.” — 2 people liked it

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