Böcker av Helen Nickolson

While driving her daughter Katherine to daycare about 28 years ago, Helen began telling her "dreams" about Old Red, the kind convertible with magical powers who lived next to them in the country. He also had some adopted buddies-a Dalmatian called Cutie Pie and a duck named Teepo. These stories were very comforting to Katherine, especially when she didn't want to be separated from her mother.

"How could she wash herself of the blood and the semen? How could she cleanse herself of the betrayal? Would the memories of being raped and sodomized ever leave her mind or would they always be entrapped in her subconscious to present themselves in nightmares? Yes, the physical pain would eventually go away, but the mental anguish would never disappear. She knew that for a fact, and she shuddered at what her life would now become. She knew she was to blame for what had happened because she had been so stupid-so, so stupid to allow herself to trust those who should be trustworthy but weren't. All her life she had trusted so readily, so easily, and consistently she had been hurt and disappointed. She thought that something must be wrong with her to never learn from the painful lessons that had steadily followed her from early childhood, but she was an optimist and her heart went out to others too easily. "