The Price of Silence

How does it feel when, in the middle of your life, you come to the shattering realisation that you and your younger sister were sexually abused as young girls?

How, having endured years of tragedy as a consequence, do you come to terms with uncovering a trauma that had confused and disempowered you?

And what is the effect on a woman trying to make her way in the world when so much of what it means to be a woman has been taken away?

One writer’s unflinching struggle to make sense of her life, The Price of Silence answers these and many more searching questions in a courageous and heartfelt attempt to dissect what took place and bring the crimes to light.

Sometimes a book can put into words the feelings that have haunted people’s lives. For anyone who has suffered the physical and emotional pain of child abuse and experienced a lifetime of flashbacks, this is invaluable reading.

Author Biography

Helene Pascal-Thomas was born in provincial France, later studying journalism in Bordeaux. After working as a journalist in Paris, she moved to London to marry, but became a teacher while yearning to write. Some of her poems were published in Magma, Envoi, etc. She also wrote two plays: The Deal, and Now and Then, as well as a few stories for children.

Her first memoir, TWO’S COMPANY, published in 2011, a sensitive and often merry journey relating her attempts to find love in her sixties, was a welcome diversion from the painful pilgrimage recalled in her second book.

Writing THE PRICE OF SILENCE became urgent in 2003 following her mother’s death, leaving her free to face up to a hidden past. Its publication comes at a time when the sins of the fathers are being exposed and the rights of children continue to be ignored, prompting the author to call for a universal campaign for each of us to make a Promise to respect and protect every child, which concludes the book.