Avail Yourself The Electric Woman: A Memoir In Death-Defying Acts Articulated By Tessa Fontaine Shared As Paperback

just finished the best memoir I've read in years TheElectric Woman by Tessa Fontaine, Its about a young woman who literally leaves the difficulties of her life behind to join the circus as a performer, She works as a snake charmer, fire eater, and ultimately as the woman who withstands the electricity in the electric chair, Half the book is her adventures with the circus and the people she meets, The other half is her reflections back on her mother who had a massive stroke and the seemingly impossible road to any meaningful recovery, Its at once funny, jaw dropping, and poignant, Shes an amazing storyteller, and read her own audiobook, which was fabulous! This was one of the most life affirming books Ive read in years, Totally riveting and engaging. This is coming from someone who is typically not enthusiastic about nonfiction, Tessa Fontaine has a very good writing style and really makes the two story lines of her moms illness and her summer with the traveling sideshow come alive, I dont quite agree with how she laid out the timeline of the book there are a few places where it seems she jumps back and forth unnecessarily in time but it is really interesting.
Usually I find memoirs by white women exhausting, Their fishoutofwater stories strike me as exploitative, both of the reader and the people they encounter on their journeys to insert eyeroll here selfdiscovery,

Tessa wasn't born into the sideshow world, and while she only lives in it formonths, she writes about it with honesty, humor, and heart, She wants you to believe all of it toothe sweat, tears, and snot that go into making the magic, And the way she intertwines scenes from the fairgrounds with those from her mother's hospital room Mesmerizing, I received an advance reader copy from publisher Farrar, Straus and Giroux via NetGalley,

Tessa Fontaine waswhen she was invited for amonth stint with America's last traveling sideshow, the World of Wonders, She started as a bally girl someone that lures people to buy tickets for the show, then progressed to snake handling, handcuff escape, and fire eating, But her education in the sideshow arts did not end there, She performed the illusion of alegged lady and what she considered her ultimate triumph, . . as the Electric Lady. For this she sat in an electric chair and lit up light bulbs with her tongue! She also practiced sword swallowing using a twisted up hanger, but this challenge proved insurmountable.


This unique and allconsuming experience sideshow artists get very little sleep was a parallel story to that of her mother Teresa recovering from a hemorrhagic stroke, Tessa's parents were divorced when she was a toddler, but her mother remarried a man named Davy who loved her absolutely, While others essentially gave up hope for Teresa's recovery, Davy could not fathom life without her, Not only did he nurture his ailing wife in every way possible, but against all rationale took her on a dream trip to Italy, Tessa struggles with guilt from once telling her Mom she didn't love her, and not being around for her rehabilitation as much as she could be, Signing on with the traveling sideshow was a thrill, a challenge, and a means of escapism,

I do enjoy reading about carnivals and sideshows, They are mysterious, magical and yes, . . a form of escapism. I think of the colorful striped circus tents, flashing bulbs and various oddities to be found there, It was interesting to read about how these traveling performers withstand extreme weather conditions, sleeping arrangements, ability to shower/toilet, and set up and break down their shows, In fact, inside the big trailer where they bunk at night and basically live, if someone cannot withstand the life, their name is immortalized on the wall with the moniker " couldn't hack it.
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While I enjoyed the peek inside the inner workings of a traveling sideshow, I wasn't as interested when Tessa waxed poetic about her mother's illness in tandem.
I also felt she could have edited the book down a bit more, Sometimes less is more! I received a copy of this from NetGalley in exchange for my review, Two years after her mother experiences a devastating stroke and is still severely disabled, the authors parents decide to take a trip to Italy, The author decides to spend a season with a traveling sideshow to take her mind off her grief and worry, The work is grueling and she has to be fearless to learn the acts, Fascinating look behind the scenes and at the lives of the people who work the shows, Stellar writing. Tessa Fontaine's MFAproject valentine to the last traveling carnival sideshow covers herdays on the road with the show as a bona fide fireeating geek,

Read the book for Fontaine's many candid conversations with the sideshow's veterans, If you've ever wondered what happens at the carnival after the Ferris wheel shuts down, this is your book, One of my many favorite quotations:

You want to meet a bunch of carnies Head to Wally World after midnight when the carnival is in town.
Hope theyre a little high, jovial, Hope theyre not squaring off in their rivalries, that food jocks stay in cereal while the ride jocks are in canned soups,

Walmart is an American carnie mecca, Its cheap, familiar, and the only thing open after the fair closes late at night when we have the opportunity to restock food,

Fascinating. Tessa Fontaine, a young woman with an MFA in literature joins World of Wonders, the last traveling sideshow, for theirseasondays of long hours, hard work, and performing as a bally girl outside the show, helping lure customers inside with fire eating and such, a talker providing a running commentary on some of the inside acts, and a performer the headless woman, the fourlegged woman, and ultimately as the electric woman.
This story is interwoven with the story of her mother's stroke several months before World of Wonders and the long, slow, recovery punctuated by many crises, The backstage stuff living in a trailer, midnight trips to Walmart, interactions between the show people like her and the carnies who run the games, food, and rides is nearly as interesting as her quest to learn everything possible in her time with the show.
Her portraits of her fellow performers are sharp and sympathetic, I don't want to say more, because much of the fun is in following Tessa's journey even if that drove me to searching YouTube to see some of the folks she worked with.

I received this book through NetGalley in return for writing a review of an uncorrected digital galley, The publication date is Mayst, This is a beautifully written personal story about facing one's fear while going through parent's illness and

joining a traveling sideshow, You may think both stories don't intertwine but they do, Ms. Fontaine goes back and back forth with her story by sharing how both worlds struggle with not just finding acceptance but how to go through their world without being "a sideshow" by other people's perception.
In all this, Ms. Fontaine goes back forth with her own feelings of not being there for her mom and her constant worry of doing her job right and finding acceptance from her peers.


I received this book from NetGalley and the publisher for an honest review, NetGalley TheElectricWoman This is a memoir told in alternative chapters, telling the story about the author joining the last American sideshow, the World of Wonders, and also sharing her feelings about her mother having a major stroke.


I always findstar reviews to be the most difficult of all, I liked it, but I didn't love it, The carnival element was interesting, but I was more intrigued by the author's relationship with her mother,

What will stay with me is her mom and her stepdad's relationship, as well as the guts they showed in choosing to live life to the fullest after her stroke.
Very inspiring.

A book about not taking the expected path,



This debut memoir was an interesting read, I once knew a young, retired carnie couple and ever since hearing their stories Ive been super interested in circus/carnival life, I remember at the DE State Fair they used to have freak shows yep, thats what they were called but I was always too afraid to go in, I figured I might encounter an unexpected sight that would be forever etched in my memory,

What makes this book special is the way the author artfully connected two very different stories, Her mother, the one who always said yes, suffered a series of debilitating strokes, Tessa turned her fear of losing her mother and their imperfect relationship into an opportunity to say yes, She could not control her moms progress or her stepdads decision to take her on a medically risky trip to Italy, but she could control her next move,

She joined the last traveling side show, World of Wonders, Interestingly, she lied about her skills in order to join which takes a lot of nerve, “Oh sure, I can handle snakes and swallow fire, ” Who says that Tessa, and she figures out how to get jump into the action, The scene when the boa got tangled in her hair was scary yet amusing, Sword swallowing was not her strength but she earned her keep as a bally girl and performer of increasingly difficult acts,
I had no idea that old side shows sometimes housed premature babies in experimental incubators, Side show patrons paid their expenses by buying tickets to see these tiny babies, Many babies lives were saved this way,

She occasionally beat us over the head with her redundant descriptions, She needed to trust that we could smell the gross latrines and picture how tough the setups and teardowns were, She embraced the carnie life, made friends and frenenemies, and sought out as many varied experiences as possible during herday season, During this adventure, she kept us updated on her mothers health and her fears of losing her,

Bravery was a recurring theme as they both repeatedly did things they were afraid of, Davy, her stepdad, seemed like a great guy who knew how to turn extreme pain into expressions of love, When her mother showed her uncharacteristic tenderness, Tessa wrote, “It has been many years since I have felt this much tenderness, and I dont have a place for it anymore.
Thats the awful price of coping, ” So true.
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