ON THE RUN FROM HER ABUSIVE EX FOR DECADES

BUT NOW KAREN PALMER IS HOME SAFE. HER MEMOIR, 'SHE'S UNDER HERE,' RECOUNTS A KIDNAPPING, FAKE IDENTITIES — AND JOY.

- BY BETHANNE PATRICK

THE AUTHOR was born in L.A., then fled the city to avoid her ex-husband. Decades later, she returned.

KAREN PALMER lives just west of the Beverly Center's shiny consumerism, but she might as well be in a different city: Up a steep flight of stairs and behind stucco walls is her modest two-bedroom apartment. Inside, low-key furnishings and her overflowing bookshelves share space with husband Vinnie Scarelli's fine cabinetry. But Palmer's unglitzy Los Angeles existence has less to do with possessions than identity. For 23 years, Palmer, Scarelli and her two daughters had fake identities, which she started thinking about the day her ex-husband Gil (not his real name) pointed a loaded gun at her pregnant belly. What happened next makes for an intense, and intensely observed, memoir that has taken Palmer nearly 50 years to untangle. "She's Under Here" details forgery, a child's kidnapping, a mental breakdown, struggles to stay afloat and joy.

Karen Palmer - the name she chose and still uses - was born in L.A., but she doesn't know where or precisely to whom. As an adult she learned her biological mother's name. Nothing more. Adopted in infancy, Palmer was raised in Silver Lake, her upbringing impacted by her journalist father's alcoholism and her stay-at-home mother's religiosity. She got pregnant at 15 and her parents sent her to a nearby Catholic home for unwed mothers where she gave birth to a baby boy, whom she placed for adoption. Despite deep grief over these events, Palmer attended UCLA to study piano performance. But she left without earning her degree after meeting and marrying Gil.