#Review: Scrap by Luanne Castle

Scrap: Salvaging a Family

Author: Luanne Castle

Publisher: ELJ Editions, Ltd.

Rating: ⅘

Scrap: Salvaging a Family by Luanne Castle feels less like something you read and more like something you sit with. As a hybrid flash memoir, it moves in brief, flickering pieces, almost like someone handing you fragments of memory and trusting you to assemble the emotional truth yourself. Some lines arrive quietly and then refuse to leave. “We are formed by little scraps of wisdom” sounds simple at first, but it deepens as the book unfolds. And then there are moments like “Anger and fear… overflow often,” which carry a stark honesty that doesn’t ask for sympathy, only recognition.

At its core, the memoir circles around a daughter trying to understand her father, his past, and the way that past shapes her own childhood. Set within mid-century American domestic life, it explores family silences, inherited pain, and the uneasy overlap between love and fear. The hybrid structure allows poetry, reflection, and narrative to blend, so the story emerges in layers rather than a straight line.

What stayed with me most was how the form mirrors the content. The fragments feel intentional, like the only honest way to tell this story. Childhood here isn’t softened or romanticised. It’s confusing, sometimes tender, often unsettling. The writing doesn’t over-explain, and that restraint works in its favour. You’re not told how to feel, but you feel it anyway.

At times, though, the same fragmentation becomes a bit distancing. Just when a moment begins to fully open up, it shifts. I found myself wanting to linger longer in certain scenes, to understand them more deeply before being moved along.

Still, there’s a quiet power in the way the book holds together. It doesn’t try to resolve everything neatly, and that feels honest. By the end, it leaves you with the sense that healing isn’t a straight line, but something assembled, piece by piece, from whatever remains.