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Ootlin
Brought to you by Penguin.
The government told a story about me before I was born.
Jenni Fagan was property of the state before birth. She drew her first breath in care and by the age of seven, she had lived in fourteen different homes and had her name changed multiple times.
Twenty years after her first attempt to write this powerful memoir, Jenni is finally ready to share her account. Ootlin is a journey through the broken UK care system – it is one of displacement and exclusion, but also of the power of storytelling. It is about the very human act of making meaning from adversity.
'Beautiful, deep, transfixing . . . it will burn a home in your heart' LEMN SISSAY
'Essential reading, life-changing' SAMANTHA MORTON
'An astonishing piece of work' NIALL GRIFFITHS
The government told a story about me before I was born.
Jenni Fagan was property of the state before birth. She drew her first breath in care and by the age of seven, she had lived in fourteen different homes and had her name changed multiple times.
Twenty years after her first attempt to write this powerful memoir, Jenni is finally ready to share her account. Ootlin is a journey through the broken UK care system – it is one of displacement and exclusion, but also of the power of storytelling. It is about the very human act of making meaning from adversity.
'Beautiful, deep, transfixing . . . it will burn a home in your heart' LEMN SISSAY
'Essential reading, life-changing' SAMANTHA MORTON
'An astonishing piece of work' NIALL GRIFFITHS
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First published August 24, 2023
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 139 reviews
February 23, 2025
There are around 40,000 children who are being cared for by The State in Britain. Meaning that their parents are either dead or in jail or in some way incapacitated and unable to be fathers and mothers. Jenni Fagan was one of those kids from birth. Her father was long gone and her mother was severely mentally ill.
First she went to foster homes (a lot of those) and finally she was adopted by a couple at age 5 and her adoptive mother seems to have hated her from the get go. It seems like a strange thing to do, to adopt a child and then hate it. Jenni writes :
not one single second of sympathy for seven years
On occasion, as a punishment, she was given dog food to eat. It's Dickensian. Eventually even the gruesome adoptive mother realised it wasn’t working out and at age 12 Jenni went into a care home until she was 16.
Children in care are not like other children because the only people who care for them do so because they are paid to. The kids in care homes, it seems, from very early ages, get hold of all manner of drugs and booze and the staff turn a blind eye, shrug, give up. So from age 12 to 16 Jenni was a major ingester of lsd, ecstasy, coke and the omnipresent weed, and this led her into the company of several very unsavoury men.
This is a very literary misery memoir. That term sounds dismissive, it isn’t intended to be, but if ever there was a misery memoir this is it. I have read a handful of these and that’s it, no more.
Jenni Fagan is a poet and novelist, so the prose often erupts into passages like this
I came from the underworld but would say nothing of went on there; I had notions of immortality; I was a parasite; a bastard and a leech. I was a dark room and a dress being tugged down.
Or this
I am stoned immaculate. I am high like a wild thing. Savage like sin. Wasted to the hilt. I am stoned like moon bait. I’m a cavewoman. I am scratching out drawings of human history on stone. I got stoned like I mean it.
There are so many terrible places in society that we only ever see, and that fleetingly, from the victim’s point of view. The perpetrators won’t talk and if they did we wouldn’t listen, we would turn away. Some of the lives lived (and the deaths died) are beyond our imagination, maybe we catch a glimpse in a news report, a court case where ghastly people get long sentences. Some of the people Jenni encountered as a young teenager were very ghastly and deserved very long sentences.
It’s remarkable Jenni didn’t die – she once came across two kids in school making a bet over whether she would live till her 16th birthday. But she didn’t die.
Do I recommend this one?
At your own risk.
NOTES
Other comparable memoirs:
Educated by Tara Westover
Violated by Sarah Wilson
Damaged by Cathy Glass
An unflinching book about the UK care system :
Generation F by Winston Smith
And a couple of (brilliant) American perspectives :
The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighborhood by David Simon
Random Family Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bronx by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc
First she went to foster homes (a lot of those) and finally she was adopted by a couple at age 5 and her adoptive mother seems to have hated her from the get go. It seems like a strange thing to do, to adopt a child and then hate it. Jenni writes :
not one single second of sympathy for seven years
On occasion, as a punishment, she was given dog food to eat. It's Dickensian. Eventually even the gruesome adoptive mother realised it wasn’t working out and at age 12 Jenni went into a care home until she was 16.
Children in care are not like other children because the only people who care for them do so because they are paid to. The kids in care homes, it seems, from very early ages, get hold of all manner of drugs and booze and the staff turn a blind eye, shrug, give up. So from age 12 to 16 Jenni was a major ingester of lsd, ecstasy, coke and the omnipresent weed, and this led her into the company of several very unsavoury men.
This is a very literary misery memoir. That term sounds dismissive, it isn’t intended to be, but if ever there was a misery memoir this is it. I have read a handful of these and that’s it, no more.
Jenni Fagan is a poet and novelist, so the prose often erupts into passages like this
I came from the underworld but would say nothing of went on there; I had notions of immortality; I was a parasite; a bastard and a leech. I was a dark room and a dress being tugged down.
Or this
I am stoned immaculate. I am high like a wild thing. Savage like sin. Wasted to the hilt. I am stoned like moon bait. I’m a cavewoman. I am scratching out drawings of human history on stone. I got stoned like I mean it.
There are so many terrible places in society that we only ever see, and that fleetingly, from the victim’s point of view. The perpetrators won’t talk and if they did we wouldn’t listen, we would turn away. Some of the lives lived (and the deaths died) are beyond our imagination, maybe we catch a glimpse in a news report, a court case where ghastly people get long sentences. Some of the people Jenni encountered as a young teenager were very ghastly and deserved very long sentences.
It’s remarkable Jenni didn’t die – she once came across two kids in school making a bet over whether she would live till her 16th birthday. But she didn’t die.
Do I recommend this one?
At your own risk.
NOTES
Other comparable memoirs:
Educated by Tara Westover
Violated by Sarah Wilson
Damaged by Cathy Glass
An unflinching book about the UK care system :
Generation F by Winston Smith
And a couple of (brilliant) American perspectives :
The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighborhood by David Simon
Random Family Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bronx by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc
June 12, 2025
This book is all sharp edges that lance and scar the skin, and a sliver of light that shines bright with hope.
👉 Check out my 2025 Women's Prize reads on BookTube. 📚🐛
"Twenty years ago I began writing this memoir as a suicide note and as I was trying for hours to sum up my life in one small letter all I could think was — is that it?"
Jenni Fagan was born in an old asylum to a mentally ill mother and immediately became property of the state. In Ootlin, she gives a devastating account of her experience growing up in the UK's broken care system.
The book covers her life from birth to age 16, giving account of the years of neglect and abuse she suffered while being shuffled through various homes. Her name was changed multiple times. Her sense of rootedness was nonexistent. And she was often assaulted, isolated, and even given dog food to eat.
Her story is nothing short of heartbreaking. And the revelations she makes about the care system's failings are astounding. It truly is a wonder that she not only survived her childhood but went on to have a successful career as a writer.
There's so much to admire about Ootlin. For starters, Fagan's writing style. She writes in short, sharp bursts, crafting sentences that convey her childhood anguish so acutely as to be painful to read.
Second is the amount of courage and vulnerability required to not only write this story, but also put it out into the world. I'm thrilled that the book was nominated for as significant a literary prize as the Women's Prize for Nonfiction. It deserves to reach a broad audience and will hopefully stir compassion for our youth and spur change in the UK care system.
Finally, I admire Fagan for closing the book with an impassioned plea for a brighter future. She reminds us that we are all writing our story right now and can make it whatever we want (i.e., make it better than the often times scary and hurtful world in which we currently find ourselves).
After all that she's been through, Fagan leads with hope and reminds us that after the dark comes the light.
👉 Check out my 2025 Women's Prize reads on BookTube. 📚🐛
"Twenty years ago I began writing this memoir as a suicide note and as I was trying for hours to sum up my life in one small letter all I could think was — is that it?"
Jenni Fagan was born in an old asylum to a mentally ill mother and immediately became property of the state. In Ootlin, she gives a devastating account of her experience growing up in the UK's broken care system.
The book covers her life from birth to age 16, giving account of the years of neglect and abuse she suffered while being shuffled through various homes. Her name was changed multiple times. Her sense of rootedness was nonexistent. And she was often assaulted, isolated, and even given dog food to eat.
Her story is nothing short of heartbreaking. And the revelations she makes about the care system's failings are astounding. It truly is a wonder that she not only survived her childhood but went on to have a successful career as a writer.
There's so much to admire about Ootlin. For starters, Fagan's writing style. She writes in short, sharp bursts, crafting sentences that convey her childhood anguish so acutely as to be painful to read.
Second is the amount of courage and vulnerability required to not only write this story, but also put it out into the world. I'm thrilled that the book was nominated for as significant a literary prize as the Women's Prize for Nonfiction. It deserves to reach a broad audience and will hopefully stir compassion for our youth and spur change in the UK care system.
Finally, I admire Fagan for closing the book with an impassioned plea for a brighter future. She reminds us that we are all writing our story right now and can make it whatever we want (i.e., make it better than the often times scary and hurtful world in which we currently find ourselves).
After all that she's been through, Fagan leads with hope and reminds us that after the dark comes the light.
October 5, 2023
Ootlin is a memoir that covers Jenni’s life from 0 to 16 in Scotlands care system. All too often the stories of care experienced children are told for & about them and with Ootlin, Jenni reclaims herself and her story.
When I talk to people about why I’m so invested in Scottish literature,I often talk about the need to be seen & to know that people like me exist. People who speak like me, come from the places I come from, and people who share cultural and social experiences with me.
I’ve never felt it so acutely than I did when reading Ootlin. There is something very powerful in the sharing, connection, and understanding of stories.
Although our stories are of course different, I’m also a care experienced person who as a child found solace and a sense of belonging in the escapism, magic and adventure of the worlds I found through books. As an adult I still often read for those reasons - sometimes you just need secret gardens, witches and dragons - but mostly I read to better understand the world, my place in it, and to find meaning and connections.
If you’ve read any of her previous work, you will not be surprised to hear me say that the writing is beautiful, poetic, and at times just breathtaking.
I picked up Ootlin thinking I knew what might come and thought I was prepared. I wasn’t. Nothing can ever prepare you. It’s a story of love, loss and being othered that will shatter your heart, leave you furious about the resilience Jenni had to find as a child and absolutely raging that structures set up to keep her safe, failed so, so badly.
When I talk to people about why I’m so invested in Scottish literature,I often talk about the need to be seen & to know that people like me exist. People who speak like me, come from the places I come from, and people who share cultural and social experiences with me.
I’ve never felt it so acutely than I did when reading Ootlin. There is something very powerful in the sharing, connection, and understanding of stories.
Although our stories are of course different, I’m also a care experienced person who as a child found solace and a sense of belonging in the escapism, magic and adventure of the worlds I found through books. As an adult I still often read for those reasons - sometimes you just need secret gardens, witches and dragons - but mostly I read to better understand the world, my place in it, and to find meaning and connections.
If you’ve read any of her previous work, you will not be surprised to hear me say that the writing is beautiful, poetic, and at times just breathtaking.
I picked up Ootlin thinking I knew what might come and thought I was prepared. I wasn’t. Nothing can ever prepare you. It’s a story of love, loss and being othered that will shatter your heart, leave you furious about the resilience Jenni had to find as a child and absolutely raging that structures set up to keep her safe, failed so, so badly.
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July 6, 2023With punchy prose and a harrowing story of staggering resilience and fortitude, Fagan's memoir should be required reading. Many years in the writing, this memoir details Fagan's time growing up in care in Scotland. It's difficult reading at times, but so worth it.
September 7, 2023
A brave, important and heartbreaking story. I can’t stop thinking about it.
May 30, 2023
Jenni Fagan has written fiction, poetry and plays. And she’s on the Granta list. And she paints. But this post is all about her long-awaited memoir. Jenni premiered Ootlin at my Literary Salon in London May 2023. It was an incredible moment. Incredibly beautiful and painful, just like the book.
I first met Jenni in the pages of her dazzling debut novel The Panopticon, which she adapted for the National Theatre Scotland. I recently featured her witchy novella Hex as a Book of the Week on my Literary Salon podcast. And we tried to get her on Big Scottish Book Club for her novel Luckenbooth, which opens with the daughter of the devil poisoning her father then rowing to the port of Leith in a coffin. As bonkers and brilliant as that! Her memoir offers many breadcrumbs for readers of her past work.
Ootlin - which is Scots for an outsider, a sort of queer person who doesn't belong - is her first memoir. In it she describes how it started life as a suicide note over twenty years ago. She realised, while writing, that she hadn't lived enough--it was tragically short note and life. So, she put it away and resolved to live more to 'shine'. And she has.
Ootlin has been a lifetime in the living and the writing. Jenni was, in her words, property of the state before she was even born. She drew her first breath in care and by the age of five she had lived in over a dozen different homes, her name had been changed many times. It is a stunningly crafted story of love, loss and longing. Above all, it is a story about the stories told about us and by us.
As she writes: ‘We are all of us bound by stories, yet some of us are more directly, impacted than others.’ The stories told about her, by social workers and others warped her sense of self:‘I was morphed into believing I was some kind of monster.’ As she writes: 'I never turned up at stranger’s doors just to be me - the story always arrived before me.’
Which begs the question: why publish this , given how oppressed she has felt by stories about her? She writes: ‘To reclaim myself.’ And she does.
The book is structured by by age. Part One is 0-5 and in a bravura act Jenni narrates from inside her birth mother's womb - the book opens with her birth mother taking an overdose. She writes: ‘I was so very far from wanted.’ Finally gaining access to her vast files of social wrokers and case history, after the Freedom of Information Act, supplemement her own memories and recollections and stories.
This book is incredible--incredibly dark, yes and painful too. Jenni's language is that of a poet, her structuring that of a novelist. Throught it all and on every page her humour, spark and spirit shine forth.
I can't recommend it enough.
I first met Jenni in the pages of her dazzling debut novel The Panopticon, which she adapted for the National Theatre Scotland. I recently featured her witchy novella Hex as a Book of the Week on my Literary Salon podcast. And we tried to get her on Big Scottish Book Club for her novel Luckenbooth, which opens with the daughter of the devil poisoning her father then rowing to the port of Leith in a coffin. As bonkers and brilliant as that! Her memoir offers many breadcrumbs for readers of her past work.
Ootlin - which is Scots for an outsider, a sort of queer person who doesn't belong - is her first memoir. In it she describes how it started life as a suicide note over twenty years ago. She realised, while writing, that she hadn't lived enough--it was tragically short note and life. So, she put it away and resolved to live more to 'shine'. And she has.
Ootlin has been a lifetime in the living and the writing. Jenni was, in her words, property of the state before she was even born. She drew her first breath in care and by the age of five she had lived in over a dozen different homes, her name had been changed many times. It is a stunningly crafted story of love, loss and longing. Above all, it is a story about the stories told about us and by us.
As she writes: ‘We are all of us bound by stories, yet some of us are more directly, impacted than others.’ The stories told about her, by social workers and others warped her sense of self:‘I was morphed into believing I was some kind of monster.’ As she writes: 'I never turned up at stranger’s doors just to be me - the story always arrived before me.’
Which begs the question: why publish this , given how oppressed she has felt by stories about her? She writes: ‘To reclaim myself.’ And she does.
The book is structured by by age. Part One is 0-5 and in a bravura act Jenni narrates from inside her birth mother's womb - the book opens with her birth mother taking an overdose. She writes: ‘I was so very far from wanted.’ Finally gaining access to her vast files of social wrokers and case history, after the Freedom of Information Act, supplemement her own memories and recollections and stories.
This book is incredible--incredibly dark, yes and painful too. Jenni's language is that of a poet, her structuring that of a novelist. Throught it all and on every page her humour, spark and spirit shine forth.
I can't recommend it enough.
January 25, 2025
A very difficult book to read..... the utter failure of the care system to provide any love or stability to the author is truly appalling.
September 10, 2025
When I read Fagan's incredible first novel The Panopticon, I wondered whether her striking depiction of a teenage girl in the care system was in part drawn from personal experience. Ootlin makes clear that it was. In this powerful memoir, Fagan describes her first 16 years of life. She was born to a mother in a psychiatric institution and immediately taken into care, spending her childhood being fostered, adopted, or in a children's home. Her experiences of the foster system and adoption included horrific abuse. She attempted suicide at the age of 12. As a teenager, she sought to escape her trauma via drugs and writing. Ootlin is a tough read, to put it mildly, yet I found it utterly compelling. Fagan's narrative voice is unique and strong. She is a subtle and extraordinary writer; every page is deeply evocative:
In the epilogue to Ootlin, Fagan talks about breaking cycles of abuse and understanding the stories that are told about us, as well as the stories we tell about ourselves. Her writing is wonderful and her story a reminder of how systems can fail and abandon children.
This kitchen smells different to the last house. There is always something. Tea drinkers vs coffee, wine or lager, or boiled rice, veggie pasta, or fry-ups or herbs, or different washing-up liquid, or those who clean vs those who don't, and for a while I smell a bit like whatever house I am in as if there was no smell that actually belongs to me other than the White Musk oil I buy in tiny bottles for four quid at the Body Shop, or that brief phase where I tried wearing hairspray but I fucking hated it. Insette hairspray is the most flammable substance on earth. I use Insette to make flame-throwers now. Spark a lighter and then spray - it gives off a hell of a flame. Some of the people I live with are quiet. Others are not. Some are a tiny bit posher - like this one, who lives in a cottage with a fireplace and wears trousers made of things like hemp. She burns incense. There are pretty flowers in the garden. If I was to live somewhere I was able to choose when I was older (as if) it would be like this cottage. It is a dark low-ceilinged space with a dense and heavy silence and a bookcase and a wood stove. We talk very quietly to each other in the kitchen because her husband is upstairs riddled with cancer.
In the epilogue to Ootlin, Fagan talks about breaking cycles of abuse and understanding the stories that are told about us, as well as the stories we tell about ourselves. Her writing is wonderful and her story a reminder of how systems can fail and abandon children.
February 28, 2025
A hard read about a world on my doorstep that I know nothing about
June 12, 2025
A tough read detailing a life in the UK care system. But do not fool yourself into thinking it is different elsewhere.
What makes this memoir different is its capacity to imagine and to hope. I was drawn in by this passage at the beginning of the book:
“On my files it does not say where I lived for the first few months of my life.
There is no address.
There is no name.
There is no keeper.
I like to think it was goblins. Cave-dwelling, heavy-drinking, knife-wielding, poetry-spouting, foul-mouthed, chain-smoking — outlawed from the human world and not at all maternal but oddly taken by this strange foundling, goblins!”
What makes this memoir different is its capacity to imagine and to hope. I was drawn in by this passage at the beginning of the book:
“On my files it does not say where I lived for the first few months of my life.
There is no address.
There is no name.
There is no keeper.
I like to think it was goblins. Cave-dwelling, heavy-drinking, knife-wielding, poetry-spouting, foul-mouthed, chain-smoking — outlawed from the human world and not at all maternal but oddly taken by this strange foundling, goblins!”
January 19, 2025
Trigger warnings all over this one. I described the events of Ootlin and was asked if I was into Misery Lit, that 90s genre making popular the tales of hard lives lived under extreme duress. Jenni Fagan's corruscating memoir kind of is that, but the great achievement here is in making her experiences relevant and worthy of effecting change. I love JF's writing and hers is a remarkable story.
February 19, 2024
Possibly one of the most courageous voices I've read for a long, long time. Being someone who always escaped into stories myself, I connected with this writer strongly. And whilst I have experienced a degree of trauma myself, I was horrified and deeply saddened to read this woman's life experiences. The level of ignorance, cruelty and abuse she suffered were almost incomprehensible to me. How a system meant to protect defenceless children, itself became part of the cycle of abuse.
Jenni was born into a system that cared little for the vulnerable. That saw children as a commodity, a thing - an inconvenience.
Abused and rejected time and time again, drugs became an escape from the reality of hell. But even at the lowest of lows, Jenni had a seam of determination and courage running through her, and an empathy that blew me away. The world had rarely been kind, yet she was.
We all have our stories but to tell one that is so embedded with trauma was never going to be an easy one to tell. We can and must share our stories, we must be kinder and we must show up for ourselves and others.
Jenni was born into a system that cared little for the vulnerable. That saw children as a commodity, a thing - an inconvenience.
Abused and rejected time and time again, drugs became an escape from the reality of hell. But even at the lowest of lows, Jenni had a seam of determination and courage running through her, and an empathy that blew me away. The world had rarely been kind, yet she was.
We all have our stories but to tell one that is so embedded with trauma was never going to be an easy one to tell. We can and must share our stories, we must be kinder and we must show up for ourselves and others.
January 27, 2025
Devastating, extraordinary in its ultimate hopefulness and so very, very important. I’ll never forget it- at least I hope that I won’t.
March 17, 2025
un témoignage impressionnant et dur sur l’aide sociale à l’enfance et les enfants placés. Jenni multiplie les lieux de vie et les traumatismes, on dirait que ça ne s’arrête jamais. On a envie de crier oour sortir cette petite fille de la merde dans laquelle on l’a forcé à patauger…
L’écriture est vive, mais la traduction tombe malheureusement un peu à côté, certaines phrases punchy en anglais sont ternes voire bizarre en français, c’est dommage. Le fait que ce texte soit l’équivalent d’un mémoire fait froid dans le dos et impressionne, l’autrice a une importante capacité d’observation, elle scanne très bien sa personne et son environnement.
4⭐️ pour la traduction mais sinon c’était vraiment une très bonne lecture
L’écriture est vive, mais la traduction tombe malheureusement un peu à côté, certaines phrases punchy en anglais sont ternes voire bizarre en français, c’est dommage. Le fait que ce texte soit l’équivalent d’un mémoire fait froid dans le dos et impressionne, l’autrice a une importante capacité d’observation, elle scanne très bien sa personne et son environnement.
4⭐️ pour la traduction mais sinon c’était vraiment une très bonne lecture
Read
September 29, 2025Dark, dreary, depressing etc. Probably just one of the few stories, but we as a society should be able to do better. Written from my very safe bubble.
September 1, 2023
To say I got a book hangover from reading this is an understatement. This book will stay with you for a long while after you finish reading it, I cried after reading it and it made me think alot about life and people. It is beautifully written, full of character and heart. No one should have to go through half of the stuff that poor Jenni did but miraculously she come out the other side of it still with some positivity and the good morals. I would love to know more about her now and her adult life as she seems to have turned herself around really well.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for an advanced digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for an advanced digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
August 31, 2024
Another memoir , written by a fellow Scottish woman. Such harrowing , candid accounts of growing up in care layered with such beauty and vulnerability and great moments of strength and survival. Loved it.
‘What can we give to this life- when we choose to act, even when scared, traumatised, ill, or tired, or demoralised, or weary? I am all of those things, and I have never wanted to tell my story but I am choosing to have more courage because that is a choice , it is an action, and the generation coming behind us right now needs every one of us to be braver and more humane and more vulnerable and more determined than ever to challenge the stories we are being told about everything.’
‘What can we give to this life- when we choose to act, even when scared, traumatised, ill, or tired, or demoralised, or weary? I am all of those things, and I have never wanted to tell my story but I am choosing to have more courage because that is a choice , it is an action, and the generation coming behind us right now needs every one of us to be braver and more humane and more vulnerable and more determined than ever to challenge the stories we are being told about everything.’
April 17, 2025
Beautifully written but such a heartbreaking read. Jenni spends her whole life in the care system and writes so poetically about her experiences. I can’t even fathom feeling as untethered as she does going from home to home and never feeling as though she belonged, impacting her identity. This touched on the harm social workers and the care system can have on young people but also shared some little bright sparks of kindness and love she was shown throughout her journey. Obviously loved this as it made me reflect on the work I do and the spaces in which I work. Aspiring to do better and align myself with work that challenges and changes old narratives like these
July 28, 2023
Compulsively readable, original memoir with a curiously creative narrative voice from Fagin (who is super cool and I’d love to smoke a spliff with) as she recounts the childhood she was burdened with by the morally bankrupt UK care system. It made me furious and happy and devastated. Particularly a fan of her fantastical inclinations which subvert from the realism of her writing
September 18, 2025
Extremely heartbreaking. That poor poor little girl. It’s hard to even comprehend the things she (and lots of others) went/go through. The care system is so flawed and fails young people time and time again, we need to do better.
September 18, 2025
Jenni Fagan shares her experiences of growing up in the UK's broken care system. Children living in this system suffer enormously, without the chance of a normal future. Of course, with exceptions. Jenni attempted to end her life at a young age, never receiving support from either her adoptive family, foster family, or social workers. The entire system lacked efficiency, with children being placed in their new homes without any support, seemingly without any special background checks on the new family. It all makes me sick and angry.
Although many years have passed, I sincerely hope that the system has become stronger and more caring since then. It is a difficult but worthwhile read.
Although many years have passed, I sincerely hope that the system has become stronger and more caring since then. It is a difficult but worthwhile read.
May 9, 2025
I listened to this as an audiobook and while it was very well written, I found the level of offensive language challenging. I understand that that was how the author and others spoke to one another at the time in Scotland; however, thought I'd give others a heads-up if this is something that bothers you, too.
Kudos to Jenni Fagan for coming out the other side of a horrendous first 16 years of her life in care - children's homes, foster homes, and even being adopted more than once. I couldn't imagine having to live through what she did, and yet she has used it to her advantage and made a positive life for herself, becoming an award-winning novelist, poet, screenwriter and playwright, VERY impressive!!
Kudos to Jenni Fagan for coming out the other side of a horrendous first 16 years of her life in care - children's homes, foster homes, and even being adopted more than once. I couldn't imagine having to live through what she did, and yet she has used it to her advantage and made a positive life for herself, becoming an award-winning novelist, poet, screenwriter and playwright, VERY impressive!!
October 13, 2024
A brave and important story that needs to be read.Heartbreaking that Jenni tolerated such abuse. In a system that was supposed to protect her,but failed and every level.
She deserves all accolades bestowed on her. To have such ability to record her journey from birth.
I admire and respect her for surviving the trauma of being born into a system that so directed failed her & her mother.
There are so many others out there still being failed by our systems and government policies.
She deserves all accolades bestowed on her. To have such ability to record her journey from birth.
I admire and respect her for surviving the trauma of being born into a system that so directed failed her & her mother.
There are so many others out there still being failed by our systems and government policies.
July 22, 2023
This book is not an easy read. It's Jenni's life and it's very hard to comprehend and understand how adults could treat a child this way. I know it's true and it should never happen again but variations sadly will.
Jenni you are an inspiration to still be here and a functional person after what you have lived through.
Jenni you are an inspiration to still be here and a functional person after what you have lived through.
October 18, 2024
It’s hard to say that I enjoyed this book, given the story it tells, but I am utterly awestruck by it. Fagan’s writing is fearless and unapologetic but it is also breathtakingly beautiful and lyrical. This is a book about survival and pain and also about hope and belief.
November 24, 2024
… Well that was devastating…
April 1, 2025
a very real, expertly-written, and important story about the failures of the care system and an exploration of what truly dictates your life. how can you keep going when you’re so far down?
August 11, 2025
I bought this book when the hardback was first published and whilst I desperately wanted to read it, I needed to wait until I felt the time was right. I thought it would be a tough read. I was right, it was. This memoir is brutal. Utterly heartbreaking, nauseating, tears to the eyes, brutal. But it is also beautiful. Despite the excruciatingly painful experiences Jenni Fagan was forced to endure at the hands of the state, the social services, adoptive “parents” who shouldn’t have been allowed anywhere near a child and disgusting men who terrorised and stole her on several occasions, there is so much hope in this book. This is evident in the stunning writing, the author’s vision and ability to see good in the fleeting moments she felt able to and the tiny slithers of kindness from some individuals that meant so much to a terrified child and teenager. It’s extremely beautiful in all its darkness. This is the story of a child who deserved so much more from people who were supposed to protect her and despite nearly losing her life she reclaimed her body and soul and sought to own her story. It is brave and poignant and for anyone who has endured similar experiences it symbolises a road ahead but not a straightforward one. Escape requires strength and character and despite everything the author found both and she deserves happiness and above all safety. People are cruel and relentless in their drive to create misery and hardship, but not this author. She is kind, despite all. This is a lesson for us all. A must read.
July 28, 2025
4.25⭐️
This one is going to take a while to settle. An intensely moving memoir about the atrocities of the UK care system. There were moments where I felt physically sick and angry at the state of the system, leaving me feeling guilty that I could close the page to make it stop whilst for Jenni these are memories that she has to live with. It is both awe inspiring to see the power of the human body and mind to survive the most horrendous conditions and situations that could happen to one person. Yet it is even more harrowing to deal with the fact that multiple people were able to abuse, ridicule, and unleash hell on an innocent young girl as a consequence of her upringing. Fagan writes about her past so beautifully, capturing the events of her life in such a raw and honest way. She never overly dramatises her memories, and also powerfully represents the blurring effect of trauma as she skips through months of her life in a haze. Fagan rightly acknowledges the importance of reclaiming your story and questioning the stories that underpin our society, rife with injustices, contradictions, and discrimination. I would recommend this book to anyone, but it will stick with you for a long time.
This one is going to take a while to settle. An intensely moving memoir about the atrocities of the UK care system. There were moments where I felt physically sick and angry at the state of the system, leaving me feeling guilty that I could close the page to make it stop whilst for Jenni these are memories that she has to live with. It is both awe inspiring to see the power of the human body and mind to survive the most horrendous conditions and situations that could happen to one person. Yet it is even more harrowing to deal with the fact that multiple people were able to abuse, ridicule, and unleash hell on an innocent young girl as a consequence of her upringing. Fagan writes about her past so beautifully, capturing the events of her life in such a raw and honest way. She never overly dramatises her memories, and also powerfully represents the blurring effect of trauma as she skips through months of her life in a haze. Fagan rightly acknowledges the importance of reclaiming your story and questioning the stories that underpin our society, rife with injustices, contradictions, and discrimination. I would recommend this book to anyone, but it will stick with you for a long time.
February 21, 2025
Zgodba, ki te zlomi.
Ootlin, škotska beseda, ki pomeni nekaj kot outsider (oot je out po škotsko), nekdo, ki ne pripada. Jenni, ki ji je najprej bilo ime Ootlin, je bila v državni skrbi od trenutka, ko je bila še 5 mesečni zarodek v maternici svoje mame, ki je bila psihiatrična pacientka. Od rojstva do 16. leta je Ootlin, ki jo je prva družina, ki jo je posvojila kot predšolsko malčico, preimenovala v Jenni, živela na skoraj 30ih naslovih, večinoma pri rejniških družinah ali domovih za otroke, dvakrat je bila posvojena, ker prvo posvojitev so posvojitelji po kratkem času anulirali. V vseh teh letih je doživela toliko hudega, da je neverjetno, kje je pisateljica danes - to je namreč njena življenjska zgodba. Pisana je v jeziku in razumevanju otroka pri tistih letih, ki jih je dejansko imela. V podporo so ji bili zapiski ustanov in socialne službe ter njeni dnevniki.
Knjiga je tudi kritika škotskega sistema za pomoč otrokom brez staršev ali s starši, ki niso zmožni skrbeti zanje, in žal pokaže, da je sam sistem še slabši.
Žal sem pa prepričana, da ni bilo tako samo na škotskem v 1970ih in 1980ih, pogosto so najbolj šibki deležni največ teptanja oziroma najmočnejši in najglasnejši največ pomoči.
Ootlin, škotska beseda, ki pomeni nekaj kot outsider (oot je out po škotsko), nekdo, ki ne pripada. Jenni, ki ji je najprej bilo ime Ootlin, je bila v državni skrbi od trenutka, ko je bila še 5 mesečni zarodek v maternici svoje mame, ki je bila psihiatrična pacientka. Od rojstva do 16. leta je Ootlin, ki jo je prva družina, ki jo je posvojila kot predšolsko malčico, preimenovala v Jenni, živela na skoraj 30ih naslovih, večinoma pri rejniških družinah ali domovih za otroke, dvakrat je bila posvojena, ker prvo posvojitev so posvojitelji po kratkem času anulirali. V vseh teh letih je doživela toliko hudega, da je neverjetno, kje je pisateljica danes - to je namreč njena življenjska zgodba. Pisana je v jeziku in razumevanju otroka pri tistih letih, ki jih je dejansko imela. V podporo so ji bili zapiski ustanov in socialne službe ter njeni dnevniki.
Knjiga je tudi kritika škotskega sistema za pomoč otrokom brez staršev ali s starši, ki niso zmožni skrbeti zanje, in žal pokaže, da je sam sistem še slabši.
Žal sem pa prepričana, da ni bilo tako samo na škotskem v 1970ih in 1980ih, pogosto so najbolj šibki deležni največ teptanja oziroma najmočnejši in najglasnejši največ pomoči.
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