Praise and Reviews
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Indigo Review​
This book is a fantastic weaving of memoir and monumental Canadian history. A relatable story for many and a courageous and compelling writer!
​AMAZON REVIEWS​
MadMax*****
​Great mix of history and real life. Would make a fabulous movie.​
Pat H*****
​Great Read​. Growing up in Ottawa around the same time, Elvira's story brought back many years memories, good and bad. It left me wanting more.​
Nicola P*****
​Extremely interesting. ​Just loved it​
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Goodreads
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Carla *****
​​This memoir is well written and covers both the family issues (warts and all) and what was happening in the late 60s / early 70s in the province (worrisome to all but especially to the children who did not really understand what was happening). This is a story about control, or lack of control, and the effect that it has, especially on vulnerable people. Definitely worth a read.
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Montreal Review of Books
Joan Didion said we tell ourselves stories in order to live. Elvie, Girl Under Glass is the culmination of how, with distance and healing, we can attempt to organize the chaos of our lives into coherent narratives – for art, for memory, for further healing, or maybe for activism.
Elvie, Girl Under Glass is an ambitious memoir following Elvira Cordileone’s early life in Montreal amid cultural revolution. The prologue reads like a fairytale, describing a recurring childhood dream of a girl trapped in a room, observing others from her window, longing to escape and be with everyone else. ​
Cordileone was three years old when she and her mother immigrated from Campochiaro, Italy, to Montreal. From the moment she rejoins her father in Canada, Elvie is afraid of him. Her home life is chaotic, demanding, and sometimes dangerous, dominated by her father and his mental illness. As the eldest daughter of immigrant parents, Elvie bears a heavy burden: looking out for her younger siblings, attempting to protect her mother, performing household duties expected of girls, and navigating her father’s moods.
Cordileone’s father is never labelled a villain, but he is rightfully characterized as one. The memoir’s perspective is black-and-white, like a child’s. But this is never acknowledged or explored beyond Elvie’s mother, who laments her daughter’s binary thinking. Does Cordileone agree in retrospect? The years seem to have granted her some new perspective, though she still harbours anger as she details the dark and uncomfortable truths of her past.
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Nadia Trudel
Montreal Review of Books