In This Altered Body

Fantastically detailed descriptions of medical ramifications, emotional turmoil, surguries, every aspect of a life that a tragedy touches that you wouldn't think of. No one should ever have to endure such an extreme horror, but unfortunately as we know, people do every single day. Charlene does an excellent job of telling the story of how her entire world and person was altered and how she came to accept the new person she was forced to be, both physically and personally.

A beautiful testament to a humans will to live in spite of great pain and tragedy. Charlene did a tremendous job bringing to life the plane crash and fire that forever changed her reality. She is a true angel and gave me much to ponder as I rethink my choices snd attitude to slight inconveniences. Amazing lady and amazing first book!

You don't always hear positivity after such a devastating accident so it was interesting to hear the challenges and how hard the author worked to regain her life. I will say the only downside to me, was that it was a little too religious in parts. Many thanks for the opportunity to read this book.

In This Altered Body by Charlene Pell is a true survival story of tragedy, resilience, faith, loss and overcoming almost insurmountable mental and physical barriers after an unimaginable plane accident.

Thirty years ago, Charlene and her pilot fiancé Roger were involved in a horrendous plane crash fire and were rescued by a close friend. However, Roger did not survive which shattered Charlene who had been told the news after being in a coma for nearly two months. Her anguish and agonies are described in vivid detail which is important and heart crushingly personal. Not only did she endure excruciating procedures and countless surgeries but also humiliation, morphine hallucinations, being stared at, pity and grief of missing Roger and what she used to have. Additionally, she went through the stress of a wreck investigation. But she chose to push for life and became a burn survivor advocate, implementing practical solutions to regain independence and dignity.

Charlene credits God with saving her and enabling her to help others through her experiences. Those close to her were and are invaluable to her healing. She determined to find the good in her pain and created Facing Forward which focuses on inner beauty and strength.

This book should be required reading for everyone regardless of life journeys as it contains relatable emotions at some level to every human. Charlene Pell is a true heroine and I have tremendous respect and admiration for her. Even on her darkest days she did not give up or indulge in self pity. Talk about beautiful inspiration!

My sincere thank you to Girl Friday Productions and NetGalley for providing me with a digital copy of this phenomenal book. Kudos to Charlene for your advocacy, empathy and telling your story to benefit others.

Thank you to Netgalley and Facing Forward Books for an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review. This book officially publishes on 6/11/24!

This book is an incredible story of the sheer willpower and perseverance of its author. Both inspiring and educational, this book will definitely be sticking with me for some time to come. Immediately after reading the book, I am in awe of the author’s determination amongst the setbacks that she has faced. The author retells some of her most difficult moments in a raw and unflinching way, and as someone who does not have any experience or prior knowledge of these types of medical issues, the author’s words were eye-opening. Highly recommend giving this one a read if you enjoy memoirs!

Charlene Pell had a perfect life with her fiancé Roger. Both had successful careers, enjoying life in South Florida and a vacation home in the Bahamas. On an evening flight to Cat Island, their plane crashes. Roger dies and Charlene is burned over 60% over her body. Her life will never be the same again.

Charlene is determined to do all she can to recover. With her mother and sister at her side, she undergoes multiple surgeries to repair her face and hands. Both had been melted away in the fire. All her battles are to regain what she once had, She learns to walk, to eat with utensils, to find clothing that will not irritate her tender skin and to ignore the stares of others. She has succeeded over the past thirty years and is now a happily married public speaker. In This Altered Body is a story of resilience, survival and strength. Congratulation to you Charlene Pell! 5 stars.

The first major statement this book makes is the cover. You don’t even need to read the title. If you are the sort of person who needs content warnings and somehow managed to obtain a copy without a cover, ask yourself whether you can keep reading after the sentence “I was unaware that my facial features had melted and my hair has burned.”

So many memoirs open with the Big Tension Scene, then move back to “when I was six, I called my doll Barbara and we had tea parties.” Not this. The book is really short – excluding the front matter, there are 224 pages including lengthy Acknowledgments section. Which is worth reading, too, those are not your regular acknowledgments. Except for a word in the first chapter’s title, nothing about Pell’s book is ‘normal’ – a word I loathe (it’s not EVEN a setting on my washing machine). This memoir is a blade. A very sharp blade.

“I’d gone from being vice president of communications at the top design center in America to someone who didn’t even have the vocabulary to understand her current situation.” It’s such a cliche – an accident can alter your life. Well, in this case, the accident alters everything about the author’s everything. And she doesn’t shy away from telling it all – the accident itself, what followed immediately afterwards, progressing with time; there are 61 days of medically induced coma, and then there are weeks, months, years. (As Charlene Pell says in the acknowledgments section, this memoir has taken her 20 years to write.)

While shocking for someone who’s never been in a similar situation, it was all-too-familiar for me to read about a gathering of burn specialists who neither welcomed, nor wished to have any actual burn victims present, and the lack of realisation (in 1996, luckily, not recently) that the mind and the body are actually connected. The author worked hard, once she has sufficiently recovered, to change this state of affairs. This is what I mean by ‘blade’ – the combination of her ‘old’ persona of vice-president of communication and her new person created someone who might be either invisible or too visible for a lot of people who like their women pretty, glossy, and ideally either printed or on a screen.

Towards the end, the author states: “Some people treat me as if I’m invisible. This behaviour is the most painful reaction because, as a total lack of acknowledgment, it disavows me as a human being. […] A less painful form of invisibility happens when people avoid me altogether by looking away or down. […] I refuse to allow the spontaneous reactions of strangers to have any control over my well-being. I have become ‘staring-resistant’.” Way more than that. She has become an inspiration (not in trauma-porn way, there’s a specific quote I have in mind) for other burn victims; an aspiration, possibly. She has survived the plane accident, losing the man she loved, losing the job she loved, not knowing for many years whether she’d ever be able to recover the physical abilities she used to take for granted. And the one thing that’s clear at the end is that this blade is not about to become blunt or rest somewhere as a souvenir.

A legacy (“traditional”) publishing contract has fallen apart, as the author mentions in the Acknowledgments section. I have a feeling that a ‘real’ publisher might have found this book to be too much. There’s the ‘raw and honest’ to be praised and then there’s a real person who does not hide anything not to make the reader uncomfortable. Yes, a burn victim can crave sex and intimacy (if I were a betting person…) and share how her new body and mind experiences both.

Who would I recommend this book to? Myself, for starters. My disabilities are invisible, wounds still hidden (or rather still trying to heal – my memoir might also take 20 years to write). And to people who are ashamed of who they are or have become, in the society’s eyes, but also their own; who believe they can only become ‘staring-resistant’ by making themselves invisible. This is not a book of platitudes, a gratitude diary, or even a “if I can do it, you can too.” It’s an exceptional person sharing her exceptional self.

This was a painful, difficult, incredible read. Those 224 pages took me two weeks to complete. And yet, I can see myself returning to the book – once I grow enough to understand it better.

Charlene Pell is a remarkable and resilient woman with an indomitable spirit. She is a great role model to those suffering from facial deformities or debilitating injuries.

Charlene survived a fiery plane crash in 1994 and this is the story of her miraculous recovery from the burns that affected over 60% of her body, including her face. Thanks to her loving family, her attentive medical team and her resolve to live as normal a life as possible, she achieves that goal and also becomes a great advocate to burn victims.

This book is about so much more than survival after tragedy. Pell teaches us how to move on and accept what has happened, accept your disabilities and your disfigurement and live your life.

In This Altered Body is a great teaching tool on how to accept what is given to us. 5/5 stars. Thank you, NetGalley and Girl Friday Productions for the ARC.

"The Best thing about the future is that it comes only one day at a time."
Abraham Lincoln

As a result of a private plane crash in 1994, 64 percent of the author's body, including her face, was burned. What she experienced, just from the time of the crash to finally getting to Florida for treatment, was riveting and heart-wrenching. And that was only the beginning.

There was so much in In this Altered Body that I had never considered, such as listening to soothing music and having a lamp emitting a soft glow at night, which helped her sleep while in the hospital. (Why didn't the hospital think of that?)

The author was blessed to have such a loving and supportive family on her journey back to reality. And her willingness to accept that her life as she previously knew it had changed forever was inspiring. We ALL need to learn how to accept that what's in the past is OVER and to move on.

It's hard to which what parts of the book to touch on so I'm choosing to simply state that In this Altered Body is such an important book for everyone to read.

Many thanks to both #FacingForwardBooks and #NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review an early copy of In this Altered Body, which has an expected publication date of June 11, 2024.

#CharlenePell #BurnSurvivor

Charlene's story is so powerful. After surviving a plane crash and subsequent fire she was left with burns that covered 64 % of her body. The fact that she survived is a feat in and of itself. Pell takes us with her as she recounts the events of the crash and her hospitalization and rehabilitation. I wanted to read this book to help understand more of what burn survivors go through but this is much more than just a story of surviving. Pell brought me to tears of sorrow and joy. This book is an experience. Pell is open and honest about her struggles and her recovery. She is also honest about her faith during her journey. She was and is resilient. I thank her for sharing her story with the world.
Thank you to NetGalley. These opinions are my own.

Thank you to Netgalley for my ARC. This was a great read and Charlene’s story and resilience is incredible. It is amazing how much she has supported burn survivors in the years after her injury.