The Hottest Girl at Burn Camp by Krystal Evans

Dear friends.

Publisher's Description

When Krystal Evans was 14, the house that she shared with her mother and sister burned down. Narrowly escaping by breaking a window and jumping out head-first Krystal suffered burns, smoke inhalation, and the unimaginable tragedy of losing her sister.

This is a spellbinding story of growing up poor living with a mentally ill mother, and having a wolf for a pet (really). From the indignities of being rejected from a summer camp for burn victims, to putting up with a succession of her mother's increasingly shady friends and partners, Krystal and Kale's childhoods were marked by adult chaos, inappropriate behaviour, and never knowing what the next day would bring.

But, writing with joy, skill and candour, we witness Krystal growing as a person from the ashes of disaster into the confident, funny, and (reasonably) well-hinged adult, mother and comedian that she is today.

My Thoughts

Not many autobiographies live up to such hype in a publisher's description, but this one does. It helps that there has been a lot of drama - good and bad - in Krystal's life. She has plenty of jaw-dropping incidents to relate.

UK-based Krystal has turned tragedy into the strongest and most powerful form of comedy, creating a one-woman show which has been seen by some of her US based family, and lauded by the critics.

Her mother, Tracy, left her father for good when Krystal was one year old. A pattern developed where Tracy would start relationships with unsuitable men and then move somewhere else.

Tracy's relationships were always very volatile. On one occasion she was admitted to a psychiatric ward but left without telling anyone and took her two daughters away and wasn't contacted or traced for two months. Krystal was exposed to a lot of grief and sadness with her mother but she remained resilient, with people often asking how it was she was so "normal." But to her, the life she led was her day-to-day reality. She writes about Tracy with mostly kindness. Her mother was abused by her father, as were her siblings. She had also not received a proper mental health diagnosis, although Munchausen's Syndrome was identified not too long ago.

At one point Tracy married a 91 year old man, ("the mummy of Tutankhamun"), having been persuaded by her mother who said he wouldn't last long and she could have his house. The relationship lasted 8 weeks, with the marriage annulled.

Incidents of mania led Krystal to assume the role of adult. She dialled 911 after her mother started screaming and saying she could see tigers and animals crawling up the walls. Her medication was changed, but a few days later she drove too fast and their car crashed. "For me and Katie, life was increasingly like being in the back of a car climbing a steep hill, not knowing what was just over the crest."

The death of her sister Katie in a house fire is recounted in heart breaking detail. At 14, Krystal herself seriously injured, was the one who called the emergency services and her grandparents while her mother lay crying. Krystal spent two days in intensive care followed by three weeks in a children's burns unit before being released into her dad Steve's care. She was shown how to apply thick makeup to cover the burns on her face so that she could return to school.

At the "Burn Camp" of the title, Krystal was one of several teenagers sent to a summer camp for kids with burn injuries. Her mother was to be a counsellor. Unfortunately this did not go well: her mother was supposed to offer support to burns victims in a safe space, but she kept telling her own story and sobbing, expecting the youngsters to give her support instead. After Tracy got involved in a food fight with two 12 year olds, she and Krystal were forced to leave.

Krystal discovered a love for Scotland following a three-week holiday with a Scottish boyfriend called Stuart. She returned to New York and married Stuart within 3 months of meeting him in order to get a visa. She didn't tell her parents, figuring they would have a "proper" wedding in a few years' time and tell them them.

Stand Up Comedy Starts

In 2014 she and Stuart settled in Scotland, opening a restaurant, and she was tempted to try stand-up at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Instead she convinced herself it was too attention seeking in the way her mother had been. But she continued to keep a document in her drafts folder that contained joke ideas.

Her first performance at The Stand Comedy Club in Edinburgh came a few weeks after the birth of baby Sonny. She was so nervous she barely made it on stage, but had the audience laughing from the first joke (about sushi being sold at Boots). From then she began honing her craft, leading her to develop a one-woman show based on her traumatic upbringing.

Another baby later and she was on her way to Edinburgh Fringe 2020. The lockdown started, and with it Krystal began to experience fear and depression. She started therapy over Zoom with a psychiatrist specialising in extreme trauma. She was encouraged to write down her thoughts about Tracy, the fire and the loss of Katie.

In 2022, a neurosurgeon called from the US to say Tracy, who by now had been diagnosed with Munchausen's Syndrome, was in a coma and probably didn't have much time left. Krystal suspected she was probably faking it, and two days later, Tracy recovered.

Her book ends with a trip back to Washington state and a visit, for the first time, to her sister's grave. She was horrified to find it was tiny, and abandoned, and had been funded by her grandparents who couldn't afford much. "I felt as though my 6 year old sister had been here, cold and alone, up this hill for 22 years; I imagined her being sad that no one had visited her. I was deeply ashamed."

This is a powerful memoir that can make us laugh or cry, or both at the same time. Highly recommended.

Thanks to Anne Cater from Random Things Tours, Octopus, the publisher, and the author, for the opportunity to read an advance digital copy of The Hottest Girl at Burn Camp, in return for an honest review.

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