TWIST

A veteran musician recalls her rough coming-of-age experiences in Cleveland in the 1960s and ’70s.

Bertei’s memoir, she writes, “is narrated by Maddie Twist. Maddie Twist is a Trojan horse. Like Ulysses, I needed protection while taking the journey back through the war zones of my youth.” It's an apt moniker. Maddie—“white, working-class, poor, queer, abandoned, and hungry for belonging”—would give Oliver Twist a run for his money, as she is tossed from one living situation to the next, sometimes thriving, sometimes barely surviving, but making her way through childhood and adolescence until she lands on her feet as an almost functioning adult in a supportive community. The author’s mother was a paranoid schizophrenic, and her father deserted the family except to spy on his wife and two troubled younger brothers. When her mother was confined to an institution, she landed in the foster-care system and, eventually, a juvenile detention center. Along the way, she discovered her attraction to other young women, and she was often punished for acting on it. This is a picaresque tale, full of vivid characters who appear and then vanish. The author also delivers a harrowing story about a Vietnam vet who offered to take her to a commune but who assaulted her and locked her in his room for three days. Maddie narrates with a zest and objectivity probably only possible from a long temporal remove, and she excels at bringing readers deep into the difficult circumstances of her life. She exults in going to church at the detention center with “a messy, glorious swell of mischievous angels hollering their ecstasy,” and by the end of her tale, she delights in becoming, “finally, more Artful Dodger than Oliver.” Throughout the book, Maddie comes across as curious, impulsive, and observant, fond of losing herself in books and brought to life by the music she hears—and creates.

A powerful look at survival and redemption despite extremely challenging obstacles.