<p>Review\n"A shattering story and an essential one, told with consummate honesty and courage." -- Joan Thomas, author of Five Wives\n"Donna Besel’s battle for acknowledgment of the evils that infected her childhood is illumined in The Unravelling by the sheer strength of her lucid, straightforward, voice. Besel carries us along an eye-opening journey, one of healing and remarkable endurance." -- Harriet Richards, author of Waiting for the Piano Tuner to Die\n"Donna Besel is one of the bravest and most honest writers I know. The high quality of her prose provides the reader with safe entry to what is a harrowing but essential read. We owe her much gratitude for having the courage to write it." -- Gerard Beirne, author of In a Time of Drought and Hunger\n"In The Unravelling, Donna Besel tells an important story with an unsentimental, fearless voice, of a family riven as much by the original crime as by the slow-turning wheels of justice." -- Denise Chong, author of The Concubine’s Children\n"This is an astonishing, dramatic, and very brave memoir." -- Catherine Hunter, Department of English, University of Winnipeg\n"With courage and conviction, Donna Besel details the crushing personal, familial, and social effects of justice denied when she and some of her siblings decide, as adults, to confront and expose their father as an abuser. Both conscientious record and cris de coeur, The Unravelling speaks powerfully for all victims of sexual abuse. In its honest acknowledgement of pain, it also offers pathways to healing and hope." -- Susan Olding, author of Big Reader\nIn a family torn apart by sexual violence, a daughter finds clarity and redemption in telling her story\nIt’s the antithesis of why a wedding should be memorable. In 1992, at a sister’s nuptials, Besel family members discovered that their father, Jock Besel, had molested their youngest sister. As more survivors came forward, the family realized that their father had sexually assaulted four of the six sisters in a family of eleven children, and had been doing so for years. Despite there being enough evidence to charge their father, the trial and prosecution rocked the Besel family and deeply divided their small rural community.\nThe Unravelling is a brave, riveting telling of the destruction caused by sexual assault, and the physical, psychological, emotional, financial, and legal tolls survivors often shoulder.\nDonna Besel offers an honest portrayal of the years-long police process from disclosure to prosecution, offering readers greater insight into the challenges victims face and the remarkable strength and survival that makes their fight for justice possible.</p>

The Unravelling: Incest and the Destruction of a Family (The Regina Collection, 18)

Biographies & Memoirs

Besel, Donna

Community & Culture

University of Regina Press

Lessons from a Nude Man, a short-fiction collection by Manitoba writer Donna Besel is the seventh title in the Strike Fire New Authors Series. Besel knows prairie landscape--how the frost looks like on a badly tended garden, how trees change one decade to the next and more importantly she has populated her stories with indelible characters. Lessons from a Nude Man captures both the comedy and absurdity in all levels of human relationships. Besel is a new voice with a strong and profound value, her stories are filled with wit and humor and incredible poignancy, she deftly reveals the everyday patterns that, over time, can swerve a life off course.

Lessons from a Nude Man

Literature & Fiction

Literary

Radiant Press

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Books by Besel, Donna