The trauma of surviving an abusive marriage didn’t make Kelly Sundberg stronger. In fact, it nearly broke her. But leaving the abuse behind was not the end of the story but the beginning of a new one. In that journey, Sundberg learned in ways both good and bad, that one doesn’t necessarily get to leave abuse behind. Sometimes, everywhere you go, the memories of the abuse go with you. First learning to coexist with her rage and then turn that rage into strength and power, Sundberg’s journey to alchemizing her suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder into post-traumatic stress growth was neither easy nor simple. But far from bleak, her story provides vital insight into the little-known recovery process, and how healing is possible.

A narrative following a process of discovery as Sundberg’s personal story is juxtaposed against established research, The Answer Is in the Wound offers a redemptive arc for trauma survivors, arguing for healing through an acceptance of their new state of being. Sundberg uses metaphors like the act of erasure—shown in erasure poetry created from her abusive ex-husband’s apologetic emails—and includes theories from psychiatrists and researchers like Judith Herman, Bessel van der Kolk, and Peter A. Levine to construct a balanced meditation on trauma and the imprint it leaves.

For readers of In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado and The Empathy Exams by Leslie Jamison, The Answer Is in the Wound is a beautiful, devastating, and nuanced examination into embracing a new reality after trauma and finding power and beauty in it.

Praise for The Answer is in the Wound:

“In The Answer Is in the Wound, Kelly Sundberg explores what it means to be alchemized by trauma into something, and someone, new. With goosebump-raising erasures from her abusive ex-husband’s emails, an essay entirely in couplets, and correspondence with law enforcement, this innovative collection is at once lyrical and brutal, intimate and culturally relevant. I’ve never read anything like it.”—Maggie Smith, New York Times bestselling author of You Could Make This Place Beautiful

“The Answer Is in the Wound is a powerful, formally inventive book. Gratitude to Kelly Sundberg for such a tender and nuanced window into an arc of healing, of reevaluating the individual pieces of a self in an attempt to become whole again.”—Hanif Abdurraqib, New York Times bestselling author of There’s Always This Year and A Little Devil in America

“In this incandescent excavation of trauma and transformation, Kelly Sundberg beautifully braids scholarly insight and emotional truth to create a work of profound intricacy and grace. Warm, wise, and wildly insightful, The Answer Is in the Wound is both an intellectual exploration and a deeply human chronicle of survival, class, motherhood, magic, friendship, and independence.”— Kimberly King Parsons, National Book Award-nominated author of Black Light and We Were the Universe

“The Answer Is in the Wound candidly depicts the resilience and creativity it takes to thrive after trauma and shows us how to find our way along the road to healing. Kelly Sundberg has given us a beautiful, necessary book.”—Lori Gottlieb, bestselling author of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone and New York Times “Ask The Therapist” columnist

“The Answer Is in the Wound upends, subverts, and refracts the trauma narrative. Sundberg describes the ways she has been harmed—by her abusive ex-husband, the system that enabled him, her own parents—but refuses to fit herself tidily into the role of ‘victim.’ She writes of healing, without claiming to have healed. She wields her anger without apology, and moves through the story with an armor made of silk: both strong and delicate. This book will be a balm for anyone navigating the fragmented, circuitous experience of building a new life after trauma.”—Lilly Dancyger, author of First Love

Praise for Kelly Sundberg and Goodbye, Sweet Girl:

“Heartbreaking, breathtaking in its scope, and urgently truthful in its harrowing and tender examination of when empathy fails—and when it wins.”—Los Angeles Review

“Reading Kelly Sundberg’s writing—fresh, luminous, spirited—is a pleasure second only to witnessing her decision to survive.”—Ariel Levy, author of The Rules Do Not Apply

“Mesmerizing and poetic, Goodbye, Sweet Girl is a harrowing, cautionary and ultimately redemptive tale that brilliantly illuminates one woman’s transformation.”—BookReporter

“This is an immensely courageous story that will break your heart, leave you in tears, and, finally, offer hope and redemption. Brava, Kelly Sundberg.”—Rene Denfeld, author of The Child Finder

“A breathtaking gut-punch of a memoir . . . Sundberg gives us the truth in all its complexity; fear and hope and fury in gorgeous, near-cinematic prose that made me weep, and cheer, and understand.”—Megan Stielstra, author of The Wrong Way to Save Your Life