Romantic tension with an asylum doctor and suspense as to Nellie’s release combine with Treger’s use of the real-life Bly’s famous 'stunt journalism' to highlight the horrific plight of endangered women—many perfectly sane but inconvenient wives, prostitutes, and immigrants were deemed insane—and the appalling state of nineteenth-century mental health care...YAs will be drawn to the plucky protagonist of Treger’s biographical novel and her fight to right injustices and effect social change.
Madwoman, the third novel by Louisa Treger, is a compelling portrait of 19th-century journalist Nellie Bly...It re-creates in intense detail one of her greatest stunts: feigning mental illness to gain entry to the infamous asylum on New York City's Blackwell's Island.
Treger’s middling latest chronicles the early life and career of pioneering female journalist Nellie Bly...While Bly’s time at the madhouse is too well-documented (not least by Bly herself) to offer much in the way of surprise, Treger’s evocation of the reporter’s formative years is illuminating...It’s decently done, but the straightforward treatment doesn’t do enough to animate or reevaluate some rather well-known terrain.
