Meg Wolitzer

The Female Persuasion by Meg Wolitzer is a highly recommended coming-of-age novel that follows a decade in the life of a young woman and explores friendship, relationships, ambition, and mentors.

Greer Kadetsky is a freshman at Ryland College who is trying to keep a long-distance relationship going with her high school boy friend, Cory Pinto, who is attending Princeton. She has always been a bookish, intelligent, independent girl with parents who were more self-involved than parental. She was show more also accepted at and planning to attend an Ivy league school with Cory, but her parents messed up the financial aid form, which Greer still resents. When Greer gets groped at a frat party during her first weekend at college, she is hesitant to report it. Her politically savvy friend Zee urges her to, but she doesn't until other girls go through the same thing. When the university hearing on the matter results in no sanctions or actions, Greer and Zee are angry at their inability to address the actions of this young man.

Greer and Zee are still angry when they go to hear the famous, charismatic feminist Faith Frank, sixty-three, speak on campus. Greer is mesmerized by Frank, asks her a question related to the groping incident, and the university's empty response to the charges. Later the two continue their discussion in the bathroom. Faith is taken by Greer, talks to the young woman and gives her her card. This leads to an opportunity after Greer graduates to work for the feminist icon at her new foundation, Loci, which sponsors conferences about women's issues.

The writing is excellent. I loved this: "You know, I sometimes think that the most effective people in the world are introverts who taught themselves how to be extroverts." It is clear from the beginning that Wolitzer knows how to tell an entertaining and engaging story while keeping her plot moving forward. The Female Persuasion really becomes a saga as it follows Greer and the others through the decade. The narrative follows Greer, Cory, Faith, Zee, and another male character. These are all well-developed but flawed characters, with strengths and weaknesses. The characters are all distinctive and have their own individual voices. While Greer is the compelling central character, in some ways Cory is actually the more sympathetic and humane character.

Is this the feminist blockbuster of our times? Well, I'm not convinced it is, but perhaps I'm too old for it. It is certainly a very good novel and I was engrossed in the story. I would agree that it explores embracing womanhood, yet also suffering because of it. All the young characters start out emotional, wanting to change the world, striving to make their mark on the world and do something. They are also can be a bit entitled, naive, and sometimes, well, whiny. I realize that they don't feel the need to acknowledge what women before them have experienced, how many of us have been groped, or worse long before they came along, but they also seem to want all women to be pigeon-holed into walking lock-step with a set list of ideals.

"'Sisterhood,' she said, 'is about being together with other women in a cause that allows all women to make the individual choices they want.'" Although this sentiment was shared, it was never really embraced in the novel and perhaps that is what is bothering me. As women, we fought for the right to be individuals and to be able to voice our own opinions and be in charge of our own bodies. We don't need to throw that away by insisting that it means only these ideals or only a specific stand on certain issues. Sometimes I see women destroying our own freedoms by not allowing others to have their own views and opinions based on their experiences.

Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of the Penguin Publishing Group.
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A Lifetime of Friendship, Love, and Disappointment

Probably most of us of a certain age and background have never been to an away summer camp for an entire summer. What a magical experience it appears: to meet new people; to be seen differently; to see yourself differently; to see new possibilities for yourself; and to establish friendships that survive for a lifetime. So, from the outset, Meg Wolitzer's novel of friendship, love, and, as is often the case with life, disappointment, show more captivates from the beginning. From start to poignant conclusion, you'll find it a thoroughly enjoyable experience.

Succinctly, the novel maps the lives of adolescents who meet at the Spirit-in-the-Woods summer camp and dub themselves The Interestings, because that's how they see each other. The main characters who form the core of the novel, the people you'll find yourself caring most about, are the "poor" girl from Long Island, Julie Jacobson, who gets renamed Jules and discovers a new, unimagined potential for her life; Ash Wolf, a girl possessing ephemeral beauty and theatrical ambitions; and Ethan Figman, a gnome of a fellow from a difficult home that he copes with using an enormous talent for animation. Supporting characters who comprise the rest of the group include Ash's attractive but irresponsible brother Goodman; Cathy Kiplinger, a girl physically mature for her age who desires a dancing career; and Jonah Bay, whose mother Susannah is a famous but fading folk star. There are numerous others, parents, husbands, other friends, abusers, children, pretty much everything real life tosses your way from childhood to the doorstep of old age. But these are the three who get the most page time and the three you'll care most about, and who provide quite an emotional ending.

As you might guess, life does not work out as any of the three and the others had hoped in summer camp, not just professionally, but personally and emotionally, too. Life has a way of surprising us. Some surprises are good, though usually mixed with troubles. Other surprises are not so good, and some horrible. So it is for The Interestings, a long and winding road that doesn't always cooperate in fulfilling dreams, but that cannot destroy what holds Jules, Ash, and Ethan together: their friendship with and love for each other, not even, in the end, death.

This friendship among the three principals is not without some huge challenges of the sort that end not only friendships but marriages, too. If you've ever felt envy for a friend who has achieved something you yourself has wanted and striven for, you'll immediately identify with Jules. And, if you've loved unreturned, and nurtured that unrequited love over a lifetime, you'll understand Ethan's feelings, while also experiencing the ending more deeply.

Recommended as an engaging journey through interesting lives, and for Wolitzer's skillfulness in blending the story into the issues of the last quarter of the 20th century, and for making the lives of her people feel real.

If you're old enough, Wolitzer's novel, especially the opening in a summer camp, will immediately bring to mind the wonderful Marjorie Morningstar by Herman Wouk. Wouk, now in his hundreds and still writing, is a master storyteller and Marjorie Morningstar is among his most popular novels. Like Jules, Marjorie Morgenstern aspires to a life in the theater. She falls madly for Noel Airman, pursues him, while maintaining a friendship with the man who really loves her, Wally Wronken. You might enjoy it. show less

This is a coming-of-age story that lasts into middle age. Julie (Jules) Jacobsen attends Spirit in the Woods camp for art-y students the summer she turns 15 (and the summer of Watergate) and her life is forever changed. Never one of the "cool" kids in her life at home, she is immediately included in the "cool" group at camp, the Interestings, anchored by brother and sister Goodman and Ash Wolf and evened up as 3 boys and 3 girls: Jonah Bay, a talented musician and son of a famous folk show more singer, Ethan Figman, an animator who goes on to Simpsons-style success by age 25, and Cathy Kiplinger, a beautiful, busty dancer. This first summer they are only shades of who they will become and there is the predictable coupling over the next 3 summers they return. The only couple that sticks is the most unlikely: goofy Ethan and the beautiful, refined, rich Ash. Jules finds herself a constant centerpoint between them; she is the best girlfriend to Ash, and vice-versa, and Ethan always loved Jules first -- there is a deep best-friend comfort between them that supersedes both their marriages. The summers are idyllic and the friends often meet up in NYC through the school year, but when Goodman and Cathy become a couple, the Interestings bust apart. Cathy accuses Goodman of rape and his resulting reaction becomes a shadow they all live under well into adulthood. Wolitzer does a nice job of providing backstory for the main characters as well as following all the individuals into adulthood, both on their own and as a group. No thread is left to ravel. Jules tries to make it as a comic actress in NYC, and Ash also pursues the theatre with better results, in part due to money and influence. Ethan is a runaway success and Jonah abandons music for MIT and a career in engineering. Cathy and Goodman are out of the picture, for the most part, though they linger in the collective memory of the group and also make unexpected appearances at unexpected times. By her thirties, Jules is married to solid, nice-guy, not-artsy Dennis, who still fits in well with the crowd and she has abandoned the stage for a career as a social worker. As lives take predictable arcs, through careers, marriage, children, the friendship persists, and morphs to fit the stage of life. I liked the author's detached tone, verging on snarky, and mostly from Jules' point of view. It is honest and poignant and raises some great questions about art and success and friendship and envy. Jules is a smart and self-aware woman and as such is able to see the pitfalls of this sometimes toxic friendship as well as keep her own life fairly grounded. She says in one of the camp summers: "When you looked closely at something, you could almost faint...but you had to look closely if you wanted any knowledge at all in life." Sometimes Jules sees things with crystal clarity, sometimes she misses the big picture, and sometimes she is blind to the pervasive influence the Interestings have had on her life, but still she looks and that examination is worth hearing about. show less

The Wife blew me away for many reasons. But what truly floored me was the fact that Meg Wolitzer combined all of my very least favorite story elements (contemporary-ish setting, 1st person narrator, impending divorce, affairs galore) and somehow turned it into one of my favorite books of the year!

I think that one of the aspects of Wolitzer’s writing that made this book such a hit for me is her ability to write a story with many layers of depth. In a way, it reminded me of Kazuo show more Ishiguro’s writing. Their styles of writing are completely different, but they both write layered stories with far more depth than is initially apparent at the start. Those are the kinds of stories I love to read and can’t get enough of! Wolitzer also knows how to write 1st person well - I loved getting to follow Joan’s very distinct voice. I understood her as a character and felt so much empathy for her.

I managed to correctly guess the ending towards the beginning of the book, and it didn’t ruin the reading experience for me at all - in fact, I was dying to get to the end so I could see if I was right, and get to witness the culmination of the story. It’s wild to me that it isn’t more highly rated on Goodreads, because I think it comes awfully close to being a perfectly written book. Can’t wait to read more by Meg Wolitzer! show less