Paint It Black

This dark tale of grief, love and loss was so engrossing from start to finish, I stayed up all night to finish it.

The main character is Josie, a lost soul in a harsh world who learns in the opening pages that her boyfriend has committed suicide while away, supposedly on a trip to his mother's house. Michael, whom Josie was deeply in love with, was a sensitive, gifted artist, but had begun pulling away from Josie in those last weeks of his life.

Josie is devastated and sinks into a deep depression as she tries to understand what happened, what she could have done to make a difference, and how Michael could have abandoned their love to go off and kill himself.

As the story goes on, Josie comes face to face (at the funeral) with Michael's show more equally devastated mother, who immediately lashes out at Josie, whom she considers to be poor white trash, blaming her for the demise of her only son. Thus begins a up and down relationship between the mother, Meredith, who is a world renowned concert pianist and Josie, the waif who is an art model who lives on the fringes of society.

The extreme depth of Josie's grief pours out in this dark novel...I felt Josie's confusion, her desperation, her agony of loss. The author conveyed Josie's pain very well.

As Josie interacts with Meredith, things begin to come out about the mother's relationship with Michael, a secret that Josie realizes could be the reason for this tragic outcome. Josie accuses Meredith of incest, but never really knows for sure if it indeed did happen. As she recounts Michael's references to his mother in the days before his death, she feels strongly that whatever transpired between Michael and his mother must have played a big part in Michael's decision to end his life.

Meredith is a famous pianist who has lived a charmed life, but begins to seek out Josie in order to learn more about this street girl who her son was so enamored by.....she holds Josie in contempt for causing her son to drop out of college in his senior year, even though Michael denied that Josie had anything to do with it.

Closer to the end of the book, Josie recounts a specific episode between she and Michael when she verbally attacks him out of frustration over his lack of communication in those last weeks, when he was growing more distraught....Josie did not understand what to do so she lashed out and said some very hurtful things....and as she relives this terrible moment in time, the crushing guilt causes Josie to consider whether she should end her own life as well, due to her inability to come to terms with everything that has transpired in her young life, along with feeling so alone in the world now that Michael has gone.

The ending was a bit abrupt and there was alot of foul language, but overall the book was absolutely outstanding. The book was incredibly emotionally powerful and I was absorbed from page one. While not everyone's cup of tea, this one earned a high mark from this reader. I would love to read more by this author. show less

3.25 stars.i don't think it was this book's fault that i read it so slowly and couldn't concentrate much on it. the writing is excellent, certainly. admittedly, there are many many surprising paths this book ends up taking (some of which i'm not entirely sure about) that may have made it slower in some places, but over and over i was struck by certain lines and i definitely like the way she was handling this idea both of the aftermath of grief and guilt but also of depression and what it must take (and be like) to give up everything in order to try to experience a life so unlike the one you're born to but that feels more authentic and real. (if this had been written today, this would have been a trans story or something like that, but show more this was about class.) really interesting themes and some very good writing. show less

Paint It Black by Janet Fitch is a gripping examination of the depths of grief, the hopeful moments in life that are lost, and the path self-destructive tendencies tend to take. Josie Tyrell struggles to come to terms with her grief over teh death of her lover, Michael Faraday, leading to an unhealthy relationship based on need and suspicion with Michael's mother, Meredith. Filled with artistic, talented, and tormented characters, Paint It Black engrosses the reader to the last page with a superb use of language and intense storytelling.

"Paint it Black" is Janet Fitch's powerful and compassionate novel of two women trying to get on with their lives in the wake of young Michael Faraday's suicide. Their shared lives and the ultimate divergence of their approaches to Michael's end make up the story.

Josie, the innocent from Bakersfield, is the lover Michael leaves behind, and our main protaganist. Her mix of internal dialog, recollection, and drug-addled guilt and grief make up much of the story. Ms. Fitch's handling of all this shows her great strength. She lets Josie's lament play itself fully out, believably, slowly, doggedly. In someone else's hands, this would not even have been published, but it's sustained and evolving, and true to life in Ms. Fitch's balanced and show more inevitable-seeming prose.

We also meet Meredith, Michael's aggrieved mother, a world-class classical pianist, who is outraged at Michael's leaving Harvard and falling in with Josie in L.A. After all, she's a runaway punk from Bakersfield. Meredith is at first quite hostile toward Josie, but she comes to depend on her and to cling to her as a last remnant of her departed son. She opens her home to Josie when she needs it most, and eventually invites Josie to come to Europe with her on her concert tour. Before she consents to first-class travel and five-star accommodation, though, Josie feels the need to travel to the motel on the edge of nowhere where Michael killed himself. She finds answers there, at the motel ironically called "Paradise," and another young woman who knew Michael only long enough to fall in love with him, and who is also deeply afflicted by Michael's death.

This difference between Meredith and Josie shows in high relief: Meredith wants to run to Europe, with its adoring crowds and flattering men, while Josie wants to follow Michael's path as far is it goes - she owes him that. And there she finds this other girl, with less Michael-history than Josie has, and opens up her home and the the opportunities of Los Angeles to her. Meredith runs, wanting to get away; Josie runs too, but toward the calamity, and eventually finds the answers to urgent questions.

This is compelling, life-affirming stuff. I admire Ms. Fitch's skill with a tricky subject. I'm very glad I picked this up, and I'm sure you will be, too. show less

Josie is an art model and an actor in student films in LA. She meets Michael, a student, when she poses for an art class on The Human Form. She finds out he is a talented artist who is the son of a famous concert pianist, but little else. After living together for a year and a half, he tells her he "needs some space," and takes off. A week later, she is notified by the coroner, who found her name in a suicide note he left, that he blew his brains out in a motel room 3 hours East of LA. For the rest of the book, Josie follows through hints he left, finding out more and more, realizing she'd never known who the boy was that she thought she loved.

This author uses language lovingly, brutally, shaping it like clay in her hands, mapping her show more characters' hearts, souls, the emotions like a labyrinth, untangling the ugly, lonely, desperate human psyche like a tangled ball of yarn. Just an amazing talent. show less

(unabridged audiobook read by Jen Taylor): The story opens with Josie Tyrell waiting for her artist boyfriend Michael, who left a week before to hole up in his mother's empty house and work on a painting. Just as she is beginning to wonder if he'd run off with another woman, the coroner calls. Michael was not at his mother's house, not working on a painting at all. In reality, he had driven to a motel and shot himself. From then on out it is nonstop grief. This is a book I'm not sure I would have enjoyed on paper, but Taylor's narration is absolutely brilliant. She captures the confusion, anger, and despair of Josie and Michael's mother Meredith, as well as the mystery of Michael himself (in flashbacks), without ever sounding show more melodramatic or tiresome. Without her touch, I'm not sure I would have been able to stand such endless misery. But it's only the subject matter that would be difficult to read. Fitch, as always, uses language like a paintbrush. The writing is simply beautiful, even when describing ugly things. Her unabashed love for poetry and art is present again here, as it was in White Oleander; likewise with the independent daughter/powerful mother dynamic. But the story is far from a repeat. And while I enjoyed it, I would have appreciated a little more plot - this was more of a slice-of-life story about Josie going through the stages of grief than a series of interelated events. I also wish the ending had been a touch more conclusive, but in a way the openness gave it more of a feeling of real life, where nothing ever ends. Quibbles aside, I was really touched by this book. Josie and Michael and Meredith and everyone were like real people whose lives I wanted to know more about. I will definitely be on the lookout for more books by Fitch. show less

A great modern coming-of-age story, full of heart-wrenching up and downs. I thought this was a excellent book but this is my first Janet Fitch novel, so I'm not sure how it compares with her other stuff.

Josie is a teenaged runaway who has worked her way into the rock and art scene in Los Angeles in the 80s. She models for artists and does parts in student films, and she is hopelessly in love with her well-off, Harvard-dropout struggling artist boyfriend, Michael. Completing this triangle is Michael's mother Meredith, a controlling well-known pianist who has practically disowned Michael for living with Josie, someone she sees as not good enough for him. When Michael is found dead after a suicide less than one chapter into the book, Josie show more is forced to face life (and Meredith) after her world comes crashing down.

This is definitely a book I will end up reading over and over again through the years because I admire and relate to the character of Josie so much. While she does turn to drugs and alcohol to console her pain, I see her as a brave soul who ends up choosing life over endless sorrow in the end, especially after she visits the motel where her boyfriend killed himself. I liked how the reader never really “met” Michael, but rather Michael’s character was memories that Josie and the other characters had of him. It makes Michael seem more distant and complex, leaving the other characters to create their own impressions of him for the reader.

SPOILER ALERT:
However, the only things I was annoyed with was the part about Meredith and Michael possibly being lovers and the ending – the reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5. The speculation on Josie’s part about Meredith raping Michael seems a bit out of reach and too forceful. The maid never confirms or denies it when Josie asks her but I felt like this bad allegation against Meredith was just there to make the reader dislike her. In addition, I thought the ending was a little too blasé, Josie reading the notebook her boyfriend left behind and “saving” the girl who found him dead and taking her back to Los Angeles. It felt very abrupt, like throughout the book there was all this pain and hurt and then all of a sudden, after reading the notebook, she knew it wasn’t her that drove him to kill himself but his own inner demons and that was where her pain stopped. I’m not sure how it could have ended differently, but I just wasn’t happy with it. show less