{"product_id":"girls-play-dead-jen-percy-9780385550048","title":"Girls Play Dead: Acts of Self-Preservation","description":"\u003cb\u003eNational Magazine Award winner and author of the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/i\u003eNotable \u003ci\u003eDemon Camp, \u003c\/i\u003e Jen Percy returns with a devastating exploration of womanhood and survival in this groundbreaking work of narrative nonfiction.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWhat does it mean to endure as a woman? Percy, who has written extensively on trauma responses and PTSD, revisits these subjects using her personal experience, including sexual assault, to examine a broader social and cultural history of trauma. Beginning with her childhood in rural Oregon, Percy dissects the moments that shaped her girlhood. She learns from her mother, who teaches her wilderness survival strategies (and who eventually joins a cult), and she interrogates the biological basis for \"freezing,\" or tonic immobility, that is instinctual for humans in moments of physical danger. Percy's writing chronicles women venturing into fantasies, cults, and hypnosis in order to cope with suffering and abuse. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThis is a book about women forced to play dead, and others fighting for their lives. It follows women in bunkers preparing for the apocalypse when the apocalypse might be embodied by the person darkening their door and women imprisoned for killing their attackers, all in an effort to better understand how people get stuck in inescapable circumstances--of domestic abuse, sexual assault, and vigilantism. Percy depicts the thrilling grit it takes to escape such evil and overcome moments of paralysis when women are so often conditioned by the myth of \"fight or flight.\" \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eIn electrifying prose, reminiscent of Joan Didion and Robert Kolker, Percy combines personal and cultural history, psychology, and reportage to deliver an astonishing examination of the malignant forces women face in the everyday, and the depths forged by the American character to confront them.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Jen Percy\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0385550049\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780385550048\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Doubleday Books\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 11\/11\/2025\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 240\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.88lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.25h x 5.50w x 0.66d","brand":"Jen Percy","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":46670655553791,"sku":"9780385550048","price":28.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_e17832fb-ce5b-4e64-9dc1-a64f354f778e.jpg?v=1741317064","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/girls-play-dead-jen-percy-9780385550048","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}