Madwoman: Nellie Bly

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Feeling she has gone insane herself, Nellie really starts to question her assignment and agreement to do this. Madwoman by Louisa Treger is a historical fiction novel, set in the late 19th century America, and it’s based on a true story. Imagine pretending to be insane and so you get committed to such a place, only then have to act ‘ mad’ so you can go undercover in plain sight and reveal the truth about this place and others like it? The setting of the asylum will haunt me for some time to come and it was so vivid and fascinating that I had chills down my spine as she uncovered layers of wrongdoing, claustrophobia, ill treatment and so much worse. D. in English at University College London, where she focused on early-twentieth-century women's writing and was awarded the West Scholarship and the Rosa Morison Scholarship "for distinguished work in the study of English Language and Literature".

While Nellie is a woman to admire, nothing about this book caused it to stand out and the ending definitely felt too abrupt. The story is based on a true one of Nellie Bly who was an amazing figure in her time,breaking boundaries and faking insanity to expose the harrowing lives of women ( and men ) who were incarcerated in horrific conditions accused of being insane. This fictional account of her exposé of Blackwell's asylum in 1880s New York stays faithful to the biographical detail, harrowing and emotive without ever getting too sensationalist. Treger’s vivid descriptions of Nellie’s time in the asylum and her portrait of a truly extraordinary woman make for a compelling read.And the subtext regarding women's lack of autonomy is sledgehammered home with a complete lack of artistry. Treger shows the same care for the stories of these silenced women that Bly did all those years ago. Though all of the information presented was informative, and I love historical fiction, I didn’t discover anything that made this stand out. She grew up in Pennsylvania in 1870s and had a father who was strong and encouraged her to read, follow politics and be educated. Eventually, she became a journalist and wanted to enter what was, and often still is, a man’s world.

Treger provides a moving story, particularly powerful in its depiction of Bly's desperate efforts to retain her sanity in the midst of institutional madness. A place where those charged with looking after the patients either give inadequate care or delight in doling out the most cruel and inhumane treatments they can think of.

First, this book takes fifty pages to even get to the start of Nellie's journalism career, and with a brisk 282 pages that's too long for me. Characters speak in a way no real people would have, with educated and noneducated, native speakers and emigrants all sounding the same.

My only dislike was the romantic part of the novel which I found hard to believe, but it was not that important to the overall story and its message. A HISTORICAL FICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE TIMES AND THE SUNDAY TIMES**___________________________'A moving story' SUNDAY TIMES, Best historical fiction books of 2022'A must read! It made me angry, it made me sad, it made me proud… Nellie Bly was an exceptional woman and it makes me happy to know that she fought for those women who didn’t have a voice. We're reminded that, in piecing together Bly's history, Treger's first resource will have been her printed articles: this is a woman who found her voice and her freedom through a modern medium, the crusading newspaper, one of the first to do so.New York turns out to be a much tougher place, where despite the obstacles, she still dreams about working for Joseph Pulitzer at his newspaper – the World.

I fairly leapt at the chance to read Louise Treger’s fictionalised narrative of Elizabeth Cochran who wrote under the pseudonym of Nellie Bly, having always been fascinated by her remarkable story. If you are someone who does not mind being explicitly told what the message is, give this book a go! It was not easy to read about the horrible living conditions, torture and emotional trauma the women faced. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice. The headstrong protagonist and paced speed in which she navigates New York in the 1880’s felt very refreshing to read.Madwoman captures a unique piece of history when Nellie Bly, born Elizabeth Cochran, spent 10 days posing as a madwoman to uncover the atrocities in a New York City asylum. She brings the characters and places to life so clearly that you’d believe they were right in front of you. In the process, revealing deplorable conditions, the mistreatment of patients by staff, the mental abuse that could drive sane person into insanity, hunger and cold causing distress. It's a fascinating story which resists any temptation to sensationalise, treating all the inmates of Blackwell's Island with sympathy and humanity and bringing these people - who really lived, a century and half ago, and, many of them, died, in that place - back to life to speak to us. This is the kind of novel that reminds me of why I love historical fiction so much, the kind of novel that makes me wonder why I don’t read more in this genre, the kind of novel that stays with me for days or even weeks, raging at the injustices and the knowledge that, not so long ago when you really think about it, the voice of one young woman brought about change as she made her mark in a man’s world.