Dancing with the Octopus

A Memoir of a Crime

De: Debora Harding

Narrado por: Debora Harding

Bloomsbury presents Dancing with the Octopus written and read by Debora Harding.

For listeners of Educated and The Glass Castle, a harrowing, redemptive and profoundly inspiring memoir of childhood trauma and its long reach into adulthood, named one of the Best True Crime Books by Marie Claire.

One Omaha winter day in November 1978, when Debora Harding was just fourteen, she was abducted at knifepoint from a church parking lot. She was thrown into a van, assaulted, held for ransom, and then left to die as an ice storm descended over the city.

Debora survived. She identified her attacker to the police and then returned to her teenage life in a dysfunctional home where she was expected to simply move on. Denial became the family coping strategy offered by her fun-loving, conflicted father and her cruelly resentful mother.

It wasn’t until decades later — when beset by the symptoms of PTSD— that Debora undertook a radical project: she met her childhood attacker face-to-face in prison and began to reconsider and reimagine his complex story. This was a quest for the truth that would threaten the lie at the heart of her family and with it the sacred bond that once saved her.

Dexterously shifting between the past and present, Debora Harding untangles the incident of her kidnapping and escape from unexpected angles, offering a vivid, intimate portrait of one family’s disintegration in the 1970s Midwest.
Written with dark humor and the pacing of a thriller, Dancing with the Octopus is a literary tour de force and a groundbreaking narrative of reckoning, recovery, and the inexhaustible strength it takes to survive.

©2020 Debora Harding (P)2020 Hachette Audio

Reseñas de la Crítica

"A gripping memoir, Dancing With the Octopus is both a heartbreaking reconstruction of a crime and a powerful account of healing from trauma." (Electric Lit, Most Anticipated Debuts of the Second Half of 2020)

Sterling work of non fiction

The Nancy Clutter reference will stay with me all my days
She took the 4 central characters and turned them into planets to review and absorb and ruminate on the concept of violence and empathy Stellar read

Stilted and hard to follow

The first half of this book was so confusing and difficult to understand. The authors performance was stilted and, frankly, annoying to listen to. I actually kind of liked the last 4 1/2 hours or so... once it stopped jumping all over the place. Maybe if it were only 2 timelines and not several.

A unique story structure and unction retailing of sudden violence and its aftermath

I love the straightforward narrative voice and the multi layered perspective that she was able to create in writing this memoir. The structure is also interesting and fits perfectly with the story’s voice. The portrait of her mother set off alarm bells in my head of my own childhood and caused me to remember that, yes, my memories are true. I did grow up in a home of terror.

More than I expected

The narrator seems a little unenthusiastic and the chapters all started with” In” so I mistakenly thought this is not going to go in much detail or depth. I was wrong a fascinating in depth look at how a dysfunctional family can make a bad situation worst. Really enjoyed the different viewpoints given in the book and even if you try to change things or put them out to be discussed denial and anger can be the results. The motto for her parents as for many families “Let sleeping dogs lie.”

A look at trauma

I don't know how anyone could rate this book anything but 5 stars. It's honest, introspective and simply breathtaking. This is not a book solely about a violent crime, as it is much deeper than that, exploring trauma that takes place slowly, over time, from an abusive parent as well. Debora Harding has faced abuse, and done a lot of work to find her way through it. One thing she did not touch on was that she also experienced the unexpected death of her young son! This woman has gone through hell and back. The fact she could muster the strength to write this book says a lot. Although hard to listen to, I enjoyed every chapter. Anyone who has experienced a violent crime and/or the mental and physical abuse of a parent will definitely be able to relate. Excellent.

Please read this book

A must read for anyone who has a difficult parental relationship. Great structure to the book

Love when the author gets to read their own work

Especially when it’s a story this personal, and with a story so profound and touching and humorous as Dancing With the Octopus. Bravo

Would not recommend

Can I get my credit back on this one? The narration alone was unbearable. Did not finish.

Narrator Dull

Could not get interested in thils book because I just didn't like how the narrators voice.....not a good voice for audio books.

Avoid at all cost

Listening to the author channel her inner William Shatner manner of speaking “in which” to for us to listen to her very ordinary biography “in which” the actual story we purchased the book for was sparsely scattered between the yo-yoing time sectors of her very average life. Just awful.