Susan Grebe answers “What was missing in Vanessa's childhood...”

A Goodreads user asked this question about My Dark Vanessa:

What was missing in Vanessa's childhood that made her such easy pickings? I kept waiting for some psychological explanation from her therapist. Vanessa was an only child and, except for a mother who was annoyingly intrusive and sometimes critical, there was no abuse, nothing to make her crave such intense "adoration," no explanation for her being so easily manipulated.

Susan Grebe I don’t think it was Vanessa’s childhood that caused her to be vulnerable to Strane. I think Strane was a predator and that there were certain things …moreI don’t think it was Vanessa’s childhood that caused her to be vulnerable to Strane. I think Strane was a predator and that there were certain things about Vanessa that made her his “ideal prey”. #1: She was an outsider at the school because she was a scholarship student. Her freshman roommate, Jenny, on the other hand, had a father who was on the Board of the school, so it's unlikely he would have gone after her.
#2. She didn’t have any friends that she could talk to about what was going on with Strane. #3 She was not, in teenage terms, considered conventionally pretty and she didn’t think of herself as attractive, so she was particularly vulnerable to a man who said she was beautiful . (less)

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