Julia May Jonas

A middle-aged English professor's life is upended when her husband, chair of the department, is caught up in a #MeToo scandal. While his behavior wasn't illegal, it was opportunistic and predatory and as he waits for a hearing to find out his future, his wife, who had previously been seen as a popular and as a feminist role model, is being regarded as complicit, especially as she has not spoken out against him. And her husband is feeling hostile and hard done by, leaving her lonely and show more unmoored. Which is when Vladimir enters the picture, new assistant professor and author of a well-regarded novel. Friendly and eager to please, he is exactly the right man to develop a crush on, an easy distraction from unpleasant reality.

For the first two-thirds of this novel, I was sure that the author was engaging in a clever bit of bait and switch. It's a thoughtful and very well-written look at academia, at aging, at a woman having to reassess her ideas about herself, and at a marriage that was not designed to withstand pressure. I enjoyed this part of the book immensely, and was laughing to myself about how an essentially quiet book about a middle-aged woman was marketed with that cover and a misleading title when the novel exploded into an entirely different kind of thing and became anything but quiet and thoughtful. It was definitely a book that surprised me. show less

Ok fine! I’ve changed my rating. Happy?!
(Yelling at my inner self who battled with hating this book and realizing that I was so mad at it because the author did such an amazing job writing something uncomfortable in a weirdly subtle, just-get-under-your-skin, tricky, eye-squinty, are-you-messin-with-me kind of way...)

How to recommend a beautifully written novel with reprehensible characters? Carefully. This novel has received plenty of critical attention as a result of its amazing sentences, paragraphs, pages, chapters...I could go on. The voice is that of an unnamed fifty eight year old academic and her older husband. They agreed early on to an open marriage, primarily due to her contempt for her own physical being, which she has deemed monstrously unattractive since the birth of their child. Her show more husband, English Department Chair John takes full advantage of her granted permission and has consensual relationships with his much younger students up to and until the college deems this to be grounds for dismissal. Eventually, John, and his wife by virtue of her association with him and her non-condemnation of his proclivities, are subject to a hearing and dismissal. Simultaneously, she is violently attracted to a new, younger colleague who is also a brilliant writer. All ill and bad, except for the stupendous nature of the author's talent, including cogent analysis of today’s college students, and an exceedingly clever ending.

Quotes: "We moved around the house hushed and with care, like silent monks on balance beams." show less

This was so creative and surprising and funny and smart. I love books by writers that love books, and boy is this ever that. The connection people assume to Lolita is very much here (though not clear until late in the book) but that connection is not terribly strong and it seemed more for fun than to make a point. I felt at least as much connection to Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf and I saw a subversive nod or two to Roth's Zuckerman books. Both the Albee and Roth references are very much show more updated for the 21st century, but to me quite strong.

Mostly this is a commentary on the death of creative critical thought within academia and outside of it. Lolita is a perfect framework for that now that we live in a world that believes that book is primarily about sex predators (If you have not read it, it is not really about that, though Humbert is ... troubled and troubling.) It is not just in academia people are quick to avoid the rigor of thought, to focus on the most superficial facts, to believe that anything that offends them or includes people doing bad things is bad. This is what will be the death of us. When students' feelings trump the free exchange of ideas for purposes of critical analysis and discussion education is dead. I blame Oprah who convinced people they needed to build their self-esteem. I am only half-joking when I say that. This whole pop psych self-esteem thing allowed people to believe their opinions and gut reactions had the same heft as educated considered supported assertions. You want self-esteem? Do the work required do be worthy of esteem. The line from What to Say When You Talk to Your Self and QAnon is essentially as long as a couple exits on a superhighway. Jonas and I are on the same page on this.

Jonas and I are also on the same page about the things we most enjoy, food and literature and being a mom. Her discussions of all were so gratifying! (I will say that our narrator shops for food like she lives in Brooklyn, not in rural upstate New York.) I think she also did a good job of capturing the internal unexamined self loathing/body dysmorphia that is so common in women of a certain age (that would be my age.) The "a moment on the lips a lifetime on the hips" and the concept of a "cheat day - the messaging that eating is something to be apologized for and that fat makes us worthless." We reject that line of thought, that self-consciousness intellectually and politically, we would rather die than communicate those messages to our children, but they are hard-wired for so many of us.

This book worked very well for me, I am the same age as the narrator and I am a women in academia. As it happens I read it at a time when students' "feelings" were making my life sort of hellish (luckily not their feelings about me, but I got sucked into the muck), so that helped. I did think the climax of the story was stretched out beyond reason, but then I came to feel that the hyperattention to detail was consistent with the narrator's personality. I also felt that Vladimir behaved in a way toward the end of the story that was not consistent with the character. In particular it was not consistent with his earlier interactions with and discussions regarding his young daughter. I would take a half star away for that, but I am going to round up because I just flat out loved reading this. show less