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I've been a writer since I was a child, but I didn't begin my writing career until I was seventy-three.
I've been a writer since I was a child, but I didn't begin my writing career until I was seventy-three.
A charmed life.
That is what strangers thought when they looked at little Karen, a beautiful child from a loving family, growing up without a care in the world.
They did not see the pressure to be perfect. The instability of a family dealing with alcoholism and the euphemistically termed "melancholy." The risks a growing child, a young lady, would take to feel that she was something more.
The raw honesty of The Glass Castle meets the glamour of 1950s Hollywood in Karen's journey to break free of PRETTY.
By 1939, the year this photo was taken of one-year-old Karen, American women had been allowed the vote for only eighteen years. Except for marriage, little girls like her had few expectations for their futures.
Girls were lucky if they were pretty — everybody thought so. That's Aunt Mary showing Karen how to powder her nose.
"I loved the realness of the emotions, doubt, and angst that came clearly through every page. This is a well-written and easy to read memoir of just a small part of Williams’ life, but such a vital part of it that formed her character for the rest of her years. My biggest take from this story is that when we put labels on children, whether the labels are positive or negative, we have a profound effect on the way that child thinks about themselves. For Williams, the label that defined her in so many ways was “pretty” and it came to influence her decisions and her beliefs about herself in all aspects of her life, not all of them useful or positive. This is an excellent read and one I can highly recommend.
— Grant Leishman for Readers’ Favorite
"Author Karen Vorbeck Williams glances back into her own past with an intelligent clarity that is refreshing to read amid the current climate of feminist movements and modern views on the old ways of doing. The narration is strong but also emotionally open, inviting other readers to come into Karen’s world with lifelike depictions of the realities of living in a society where men’s views were still dominant and a woman’s place in society was firmly formed from the moment she was born. I would certainly recommend Pretty as a read for women who remember the era and its pressures, but also for those who wish to learn the true struggles and triumphs of women of the recent past."
— K.C. Finn for Readers' Favorite
"This is an honest and vivid memoir, and Williams portrays life in the 1950s as realistically and faithfully as she can. One can imagine the smiling faces with “cigarettes and their iced bourbons,” hiding deep traumas and stigmas of the times. Here, Williams confidently discusses painful truths about happiness and how we achieve it. It is a commentary on the afflictions of childhood and how we attain dreams and learn from mistakes. It is an assured read from an Eric Hoffer Award-winning author and one that readers won't forget."
RECOMMENDED by the US Review
— Dylan Ward
There was a little girl,
Who had a little curl,
Right in the middle of her forehead.
When she was good,
She was very good indeed,
But when she was bad she was horrid.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow