The Second Woman - Louise Mey, Translated from French by Louise Rogers Lalaurie

Cover design by Louise Cand

This book digs in under the skin and lodges itself in the gut – tying knots and clawing at the lungs, zapping the breath out of you. This is why I’m not sure ‘recommend’ is the right word, but it is undoubtedly a powerful read. The Second Woman is an uncomfortable book to sit with because it gives a face and tone to something generally rendered invisible—hidden behind closed doors or in the yellowing of a mark on a cheek—domestic abuse. The story is told from inside Sandrine’s mind. There’s chaos in there, thoughts that disobey and climb their way aggressively to the front of the queue as she goes about her day-to-day ‘stupid, fat, ugly, bitch’ interjects like a car horn as she silently performs the most mundane rituals like making the morning coffee or doing washing. It’s almost as though the action of having these thoughts has become as much of a part of the ritual as her daily tasks. It is quickly clear that she is someone who does not like herself. Someone who has been told for some time now that she’s not worth it — she is the Second Woman.

The story starts in the present day when Sandrine’s partner is watching TV. His face is drained and gaunt because a woman, who has completely lost her memory, has appeared on the news, someone he thought had ‘disappeared’. The First Woman. As the story unfolds, we find out, detecting alongside police, what has happened to the First Woman. But Mey also delves into Sandrine’s life and history through her thought patterns, demonstrating how we can be held captive to thoughts that others planted in us, even from childhood. These thoughts give an impression of her life with her parents and the way freedom can also feel like despairing loneliness. When someone is abused at home in adulthood and isn’t being shackled physically, often people wonder why they don’t ‘just leave’. Mey unpicks why. The book layers emotional circumstances that cumulatively make leaving difficult. It shows how easily a mind can be moulded and how much it will sacrifice when it craves intimacy, love and security.

While this is fictional, Mey notes at the end of the novel that alarmingly ‘in the UK almost one in three women aged 16-59 will experience domestic abuse in her lifetime’. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare data from 2016 states that 20% of the population reported ‘experiencing physical and/or sexual family and domestic violence since the age of 15.’ The figures for women are higher, and this statistic only reflects those who have reported it. Although there are significant doses of angst and cruelty throughout the book, and it does make you grateful for the little freedoms one might take for granted, this is also a story of resilience that shows just as you can fall easily into the hands of the wrong people, serendipitously it’s entirely possible to rebuild a life, albeit with scars, with good people. Trust isn’t a completely fruitless exercise; it’s just about having had the luck to establish self-confidence and self-love, before working out who is worthy of your trust.