Pretend We Are Lovely - Noley Reid

Tin House Books, July 18, 2017.

 

Four Stars

 

Pretend We Are Lovely explores the lives of the Sobel family in small town Virginia in the 1980s. The parents, Francie and Tate, are recently separated and the entire family is still dealing with the aftermath of the death of their son/brother seven years previous – the boy died under suspicious circumstances, and Francie carries the blame for his loss.

 

Francie has always struggled with food, but with her estranged husband out of the house, her eating disorder has completely taken over the family. She compulsively weighs each item she eats and records the calories in a notebook kept in the kitchen. Her daughters, ten-year-old Enid and thirteen-year-old Vivvy, cannot help but observe their mother’s obsessive behaviour regarding food, and it affects them both dramatically. In contrast, their father Tate brings the girls unhealthy snacks such as donuts, sneaking them into the house behind their mother’s back. Because of both parents, the girls end up having complicated relationships with food, often confusing nourishment (or its denial) with love.

 

We witness the lives of the Sobel family over the course of one summer vacation, in which the girls are mostly left to their own devices. Francie is lost in her own world of food obsession, and college professor Tate has begun an affair with a nineteen-year-old student – likely transferring his paternal feelings from his estranged daughters to another young girl. Enid and Vivvy, meanwhile, are on their own – Enid binge eating while Vivvy starves herself, and both girls experiment with the boy next door.

 

As Francie spirals out of control, starving herself and eventually disappearing, the rest of the family is damaged almost beyond repair. The level of dysfunction at play here is difficult to read, as the girls are taught to confuse hunger with desire – to fit in, to be loved, to be forgiven, and much more. The alternating point of view chapters create a strong narrative in which the painful misunderstandings between family members are highlighted. All of them are keeping secrets, but each character knows more about the others than they think. This novel is an intimate, voyeuristic view of gritty and believable familial dysfunction.

 

The shifting relationships between the family members are realistic and their distinct voices are insightful and raw. Although it took some time, I felt connected to all the characters as they evolved, despite or even because of their flaws. The story is often depressing, and it was painful to see the dangerous effects of the parents’ behaviour on their impressionable children – but even so, the novel is filled with a tenuous sense of hope that the family can come back together and even thrive. I was very impressed with Reid’s writing and I would love to read more by this talented author.

 

I received this book from Tin House Books and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.