Thank you to Netgalley and Vintage books for this digital copy in exchange for an honest review. 

 

This is the nonfiction narrative story of the life of Marty Goddard, the mostly unknown inventor of the rape kit. It is an expanded on article originally published in the New York Times in 2020. The story mainly unfolds from our author as she goes on a journey to find out the history of not just this woman, but how she came about the invention in 1971 Chicago. 

 

I found this book really easy to read, and I was really intrigued by Goddard's unusual life and how she came up with this idea, as an outsider to the police department. Of course, she saw a desperate need for woman to get justice, who were often dismissed in SA cases. They were mainly dismissed, because there was no way to provide evidence. When Marty suggested collaborating with the hospitals, police, and attorneys, to come up with a kit that could provide evidence but be collected by trained nurses in hospitals, she was also dismissed. But Marty was a determined woman who didn't really take no for an answer. 

 

I appreciated the author's thorough history of the kit and she even delved into the issues of it today. Which I hadn't even considered. I did not love how much the story meandered in ways, and this writing very much felt like a long news article. Not much nuance I feel like was added onto the original text. 

 

All this to say, this is such an important story that needs to be heard.