I purchased this as part of a job-lot on eBay because Janet Frame is one of my favourite authors and I had lots of wonderful Janet Frame experiences when I visited Oamaru and Dunedin in February this year. I have already read this book - here is my review from the other copy.
This is an amazing life told by a very gifted writer. I only read this book because of the upcoming NZ convention. I love autobiographies, but this is the first I have read by someone who is actually a writer. Janet Frame's life between leaving school and writing her first novel is very interesting - sad but with a positive ending. I cannot understand her incarceration in a mental institustion (Seacliff) - seemed to be mainly because of her shyness and inablility to assert herself or "rock the boat". She wrote intimately about her family dynamics and I was saddened to read of the incompassionate way the family dealt with death - of her Uncle, her sister Isabel when she drowned, and also when her mother died of a stoke. Her encouragement by writer Frank Sargeson turned her life around when he put her up in his garden shed and encouraged her writing.

From meganh’s bookshelf (real, not cyberspace!). My reading for the long flight home. Will probably vie with whatever movies are on offer! Looking forward to reading this NZ writer.

A very interesting autobiography by an author new to me. It’s always difficult to comprehend how someone could have been subjected to such misunderstanding and downright cruelty. A whole life time wasted by lack of understanding. Many of course who suffered this fate never made back into daily life again. At least Janet Frame finally had the opportunity to fulfil her ambition and become a real writer! A fascinating book!