Autofiction and autofact
Growing My Way Home: Stories of Resilience and Care
by Jenn Ashton
Vancouver: Talonbooks, 2026
$24.95 / 9781772017038
Reviewed by Candace Fertile
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Described as “autofiction” by the publisher, Jenn Ashton’s work in Growing My Way Home: Stories of Resilience and Care, dives into the life of a woman who has experienced much adversity and managed to come through to a place of calm. The twenty stories are based mainly on Ashton’s years as a teenage runaway and young mother. They move quickly through some adult events and then end with Ashton now, in her early sixties.
Autofiction is often written in third person, but Ashton remains in the first person, a technique that keeps readers firmly in Ashton’s thoughts and feelings, but which constantly raises the question: is this event or detail fictionalized or not? What is clear is that Ashton was an unhappy girl who sought whatever means to dull the pain and insecurity that overwhelmed her.
Although she always knew she wanted to be a writer, and she always wrote a journal, as a child she lacked the environment to build her self-esteem. Her parents were mostly missing in action, and then they separated, so she ran wild. And for whatever reason, they didn’t seem to care, simply labelling her as a bad kid if they thought about her at all, it seems.
What happens is a sad and familiar story. Ashton gets involved with other troubled teens, attempts to find solace in drugs, alcohol, and sex, and then ends up a mother at the age of fifteen. She endures homelessness and poverty, both before and after she has her daughter. Somehow, she has a spark that keeps her going, and she’s not afraid of hard physical work. But life keeps throwing garbage at her, or maybe her poor choices make that happen.
Ashton owns her bad decisions, and it would be too easy and unfair to blame her for the early mess of her life. She was a child who had a child. She had little help and support. She sought validation but had never been taught to respect herself or others. Whether the fault of the family or society or the individual or all three, the mess created still needs to be addressed, and Ashton manages over time to change her life.
Life for a female can be focused on the body. In “Virgin,” the second story, Ashton recounts getting her period and not knowing what’s happening: “I sat very still for the next eighteen hours with a huge wad of toilet paper pressed up between my legs, trying to staunch the flow of blood, like what they teach you in first-aid class.” The story jumps to Ashton’s being kicked out of a boy’s life after his mother finds them having sex. It jumps again to a scene years later when Ashton and her husband see a group of teenage girls: “Bras are once again out of fashion, just as they were when I was that age…. The girls themselves are happy and proud…. But me, I’m angry, jealous, happy, stunned, and clammy, and in that moment I am regretful, proud, embarrassed, and mostly sad that my time is over.” This incoherence or elasticity in time is a hallmark of the book, and it can be trying at times.
A couple of people apart from family are mentioned more than once. A school friend named Julie reappears as does a man named Agar, her daughter’s father and first husband. Agar turns out to be a poor choice, so she leaves him. Ashton (People Like Frank, And Other Stories From the Edge of Normal) mentions a younger sister a few times, along with her parents, their partners, and her grandmother.
But it’s impossible to know what is fact. The collection is evidently a way for Ashton to work out in various stories the trauma she has endured, and her descriptions of homelessness and poverty are compelling. She also shows that people can be kind, but too often, the kindness is a precursor to a request or demand for sex. While Ashton is direct in acknowledging that she likes sex, sex under duress because you have no place to sleep is another matter.
All in all, the stories in this collection are powerful, but they are similar, and they raise more questions for me than they ask. Ashton’s daughter is, as expected, profoundly important to her, but Ashton avoids their life once the child is no longer a toddler. As an adult, Ashton has come to understand the damage done by her father’s desire to separate from his Indigenous roots. She has worked her way back into systems of knowledge and belonging, and the prevailing metaphor for her growth is her attention to building a greenhouse. I suppose what I am longing for is an autobiography that shows how Ashton overcame her rough start and became the successful Sḵwx̱wú7mesh creative person that she now is.
[Editor’s note: At Talonbooks Spring Launch on May 1, Jenn Ashton will read along with a handful of authors (Taryn Hubbard, George Bowering, Danielle LaFrance, and others). The event will be hosted by Jeff Derkson. Doors open at 7:00.]
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Candace Fertile has a PhD in English literature from the University of Alberta. She teaches English at Camosun College in Victoria, writes book reviews for several Canadian publications, and is on the editorial board of Room Magazine. [Editor’s note: Candace has reviewed recent books by Marina Sonkina, Terence Young, Bill Gaston, Heather Ramsay, Leslie Shimitakahara, Hannah Calder, M.V. Feehan, S.C. Lalli, Rebecca Godfrey with Leslie Jamison, Ian and Will Ferguson, Shashi Bhat, Carleigh Baker, and Kathryn Mockler for BCR.]
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The British Columbia Review
Interim Editors: Trevor Marc Hughes (nonfiction), Brett Josef Grubisic (fiction and poetry)
Publisher: Richard Mackie
Formerly The Ormsby Review, The British Columbia Review is an online book review and journal service for BC writers and readers. The Advisory Board now consists of Jean Barman, Wade Davis, Robin Fisher, Barry Gough, Hugh Johnston, Kathy Mezei, Patricia Roy, and Graeme Wynn. Provincial Government Patron (since September 2018): Creative BC. Honorary Patron: Yosef Wosk. Scholarly Patron: SFU Graduate Liberal Studies. The British Columbia Review was founded in 2016 by Richard Mackie and Alan Twigg.
“Only connect.” – E.M. Forster