Finley’s narrative is as raw and uncensored as she is. Her work always focuses on that which is, and those who are, repressed and silenced. In the early ‘80's, her work centered on the abuse of women, and then it developed into a broadcast of the way AIDS was devastating individuals and communities. Her later work focuses on the experience of being female and having a female body, not just from the point of view of being a victim, but of being subject to certain joys and pains.
The book reads almost as a coming of age tale. You can see how Finley and her work matures as she grows older, and how she gains a sense of humor about the world and herself. But unlike other autobiographies or essay collections, Finley does no neat summing up, offers no pat insights about herself or her youth. As one of America's most potent symbols of the destructive power of censorship, she does not censor herself. She lets us see the seams, the mistakes, the process. And we are better for it.
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