Imaginary Me

By: Desmond Shepherd

Narrated by: Michel Young

Length: 5 hrs and 12 mins

Publisher's summary

The lines between reality and imagination blur as you see the world of Samantha Pruitt as told by her imaginary friend.

Samantha has a very active imagination. It takes her to far away places and on exciting adventures. But, more importantly, it protects her from seeing the horrible life she lives with her stepmother, masking the reality around her and making it a happier place.

Samantha's imaginary friend is by her side at all times during her adventures. Eventually, they discover a way to permanently change her life for the better. It'll take hard work, imagination, and courage to reach that goal, but they're determined to make her imagined happiness a reality.

Desmond Shepherd's most emotional and gripping story yet comes to life through the narration of Michel Young. Filled with smiles, tears, and triumph, take a journey unlike any other and one you’ll never forget in Imaginary Me.

©2013 Benjamin C Young (P)2020 Benjamin C Young

POWERFUL, INTENSE, AND HEARTWRENCHING

Imaginary Me is a story of a little girl, Sammy, who uses her imagination personified as a friend capable of being anything she wants to protect her mind and innocence from the terrible living conditions she lives in and her abusive stepmother and loving but drunk father.

It's an intense narrative that, even if you've never dealt with abuse, shakes you to your core. The coping mechanisms she employs by means of imaginary friends, enemies, and scenarios that has her searching caves for treasure while avoiding an ice breathing dragon, battling pirates, and acting as a top secret spy, are incredibly descriptive and make you imagine it clearly.

I couldn't help but thinking of Inside Out with "Bing Bong the imaginary friend". The story and concepts are far too graphic to ever be adapted into a Pixar-type film, but Inside Out's art direction was for sure how I pictured the scenes playing out.

As scenery and landscapes changed depending on the girls mindset and external stimuli, I pictured the transitions happening like the title credits of Game of Thrones, where castles and trees and mountains rise up from nothing, or the landscapes warping and changing and buildings appearing or disappearing in the movie Inception.

The stepmothers transition from Evil Queen to Ice Breathing Dragon and back to human depending on whatever went on in the girls mind, whether she was in a reverie or was strikingly presented with the reality of her situation, really showed that in the girls mind the stepmother was all of those.

At times I did feel the descriptions of scenarios the child dreamed up for herself amongst her and her imaginary friend or friends distracted from the main narrative, but much of the groundwork laid in them comes full circle toward the end.

***SPOILERS*****

I realized Mathilda was likely an imaginary friend when the description said she looked like Sammy, but with clean clothes, straightened hair, and a beret. it was confirmed in little things throughout. It was who Sammy wishes she was and the life she wished she had.

I'd have to give it a relisten, and I may be wrong, but my thinking was that Gil on first meeting was a real kid who got into trouble regularly because of being a foster kid having a tough time adjusting to being adopted, and him mentioning the "Sosa Servers" was the planting of the idea in Sammy's mind to get help. I'm not sure how else she would have heard it, other than the crumpled up paper in the stepmother Stacys room. Every meeting with Gil from there on out however was in her imagination. It did seem he was a manifestation of both her rebellion and fear.

As she gains more confidence, she reabsorbed these aspects of herself, she no longer needed Gil as she was determined to do something about her situation and get rid of the fear, and she no longer needed Mathilda as she was becoming the person she wanted to be.

*****SPOILERS END******

Ultimately the audiobook is fantastically narrated, and convincingly portrayed by the voice of Michel Young. The voices gave to all the characters were distinct, even when it was the same character portraying various imagined characters.

This audiobook is not for the faint of heart. You empathize with Sammy and struggle to get through certain parts, however the situations described, with variations depending on circumstances, is a very real situation for children throughout the world, many of whom dont form healthy coping mechanisms and who often have their spirit truly broken over time by their abusers and living conditions.

To shed light on abuse from the eyes of a child really makes you have an inner dialogue about yourself and makes you look openly towards everyone around you. There are adults who may have similar childhoods and have never properly coped with it, and it often explains destructive behavior these ones have throughout their lives.

I know I will have more empathy, care, and concern for everyone I meet, for you never know what went on or what goes on behind closed doors.