Unveiling Secrets: Karen Palmer’s Shocking Journey Behind She’s Under Here
LL: Interestingly, She’s Under Here began as a way to hide, to disappear, but I found it as a way of becoming more visible, of resurfacing. Was that intentional, or one of the gifts that the subconscious process of writing gives us?
KP: I originally thought of the book as an account of a disappearance. Yet even as I was getting down different parts of the story, I was blinded by the drama of my first marriage. I didn’t understand what anything meant. I knew I didn’t want to write a victim narrative — that felt dishonest, another kind of hiding — but for a long time I was stumped. Finally, I relented and wrote about the long aftermath of running, which became the “reckoning” of the subtitle. It was, as you say, a way of resurfacing, of stepping into the light.
