Kelly Sundberg chronicles how her marriage devolved from a love story into a shocking tale of abuse—examining the tenderness and violence entwined in the relationship, why she endured years of physical and emotional pain, and how she eventually broke free.
Goodbye, Sweet Girl is heartbreaking, breathtaking in its scope, and urgently truthful in its harrowing and tender examination of when empathy fails—and when it wins ... [Sundberg] reveals the poignancy of contemporary self-actualization, that this experience doesn’t define her, but moreover, it doesn’t shame her. She’s as full as ever. This book is her deliverance.
[Goodbye, Sweet Girl] is a... picture of the pain and confusion ... Lyrical and taut, her memoir provides readers with an honest and critical account of partner violence.
I was stunned by Sundberg’s writing again, this time by how beautifully she paints the complexity of her marriage to an abusive man. One of Sundberg’s accomplishments in the book is her ability to illustrate all of the moments that led her to fall in love with Caleb and to rationalize away the red flags ... I read her book so voraciously to better understand each of our nuances and complexities, how any of us rationalizes our decisions, and how we find the courage to take care of ourselves and to speak our truths.
