When you write a memoir, you never really know if your story will reach someone’s heart. This review of Dumb Girl did—and it took my breath away.
Reading Dumb Girl felt like sitting beside someone who’s survived the fire and is brave enough to walk you through the ashes. Heidi Yewman’s memoir is not just a book—it’s a reckoning. A raw, unflinching journey through childhood trauma, sibling sexual trauma and abuse (SSTA), paternal violence and alcoholism, and the haunting specter of gun violence in America.
As a fellow survivor of sibling sexual trauma & abuse (SSTA), I found myself holding my breath through many of her pages—not because they were hard to read, but because they were so achingly familiar.
What struck me most was Heidi’s narrative structure: the way she moved between timelines, memories, and emotional landscapes with such clarity and grace. It mirrored the way trauma lives in us—not linear, but in fragments, echoes, and flashbacks. Her storytelling is masterful, not because it’s polished, but because it’s honest. She doesn’t flinch. She doesn’t sugarcoat. And yet, she never loses sight of her own humanity.
I want to say to Heidi what I wish someone had said to me: You are not a dumb girl. You are not tainted and should not be ashamed. You are a warrior. A truth-teller. A healer. And your book is a gift to every survivor who’s been told to stay quiet, to forget, to move on.
Thank you, Heidi, for your vulnerability. For your voice. For showing us that survival is not just possible—it’s powerful.
–Darlene Lekowski
