Book Review of One Hour in Paris by Karyn L. Freedman

As a pastor, I am faced daily with the possibility that I might be required to provide comfort and assistance to people in crisis. This is why I am grateful for the knowledge and wisdom passed on from others who have experience in dealing with difficult situations, understanding that some knowledge is only gained by incredibly unfortunate means.

In the honest and courageous memoir, One Hour in Paris, readers are provided with a window into what it is like to experience, and begin to recover from, one of the most devastating events anyone can imagine. On August 1, 1990, at the age of 22, Karyn Freedman’s life was changed for the worse because of the terrible actions of a man in Paris.

She describes the details of her rape, and how she managed to narrowly escape from being killed by a man out of control. Although the graphic details of the rape make the first chapter a challenge to read, Freedman quickly moves on to the process of recovery, which is an incredibly helpful description of what a rape survivor experiences on a regular basis. More than twenty years after her rape, Freedman is now a philosophy professor at the University of Guelph in Ontario, and is an advocate for social justice and women’s rights around the world.

While the descriptions in the first chapter may be triggering for survivors of rape or violence, this short book is for those who need some hope for recovery. It is also for those with loved ones in their lives who have survived rape or violence. I commend Karyn Freedman for her courage; publishing a book is a very public way to share a very private and tragic experience. She has done it well and I believe many will benefit from her story.