Behind Closed Doors

By Susan R. Sloan

Washington author Susan R. Sloan gives a blow-by-blow account of how a woman comes to marry an abuser, how a man turns into an abuser, and how both manage to keep the violence a secret for some 40 years.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 480 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.47 x 9.42 x 6.36
• Publisher: Warner Books; (August 25, 2004)
• ISBN: 0446530298

Book Description

My fourth novel is now on the bookshelves. Again, my perspective is to tell a story about people, their actions, and the consequences of those actions. Again, I have chosen a controversial subject, and hope to plumb the depths of it. This time, my issue is domestic abuse, and I have named the book Behind Closed Doors.

The story follows a family through three generations, and explores the impact of abuse, both physically and psychologically, on the members of that family. It begins in the 1950's, when the safe, secure, and temperate Eisenhower years are coming to a close and America is about to rip herself apart. Ahead are political assassinations, flower children, Vietnam, abortion, drugs, ERA, and the disintegration of respect for authority, for the law, and for one another. The youth culture is about to explode, and the shock waves will reverberate down every road in the country – from conservative byways to liberal freeways.

Valerie O'Connor comes from a large, close-knit, working class family in Vermont. At the age of eighteen, she marries twenty-five-year-old Jack Marsh. He is a handsome, dashing Korean War veteran, but he is also a damaged man who cannot keep himself from taking his fears and insecurities out on his wife and hischildren.

To make matters worse, Jack takes Valerie away from her family, and all the way across the country, isolating her from the very people who know her and care about her the most. Too proud to ask for help or admit her failure as a wife and mother, Valerie is unable to protect either herself or her children. One by one, pushed to the extreme, the children escape, in one fashion or another, until they are all gone, even Ricky, the youngest and perhaps the most damaged, and there is only Jack left, and Valerie must face the reality of her marriage and her life.

And then, as if out of the ashes, another generation begins. Will history repeat itself? The answer is a message for us all.