摘要：I had the pleasure of seeing daughter Elena Dunkle and mother Clare Dunkle speak on a panel at the Assembly on Literature for Adolescents of NCTE (ALAN) conference of 2014. Their stories, narrated in Elena Vanishing (2015) chronicles primarily Elena's experiences with Anorexia Nervosa. Their heartfelt talk piqued my curiosity, yet I was hesitant to read another tale of a struggling teen dealing with an eating disorder. I say this not because the market has been overwhelmed with books on this topic, but from the perspective of one who as faced this battle herself and read extensively on the topic. Memoirs and fictional tales dealing with the topic, as Elena herself points out in her Afterward, often glorify the topic or focus less on the day-to-day experiences and more on the recovery.
