Review: The life and death of a marriage
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 07 16, 2014
This is one of those books that I needed to think about after I finished reading it. I had to sort of digest what happened and try to wrap my head around what I thought about it and how it made me feel.It isn't so much that Robin Black manipulates her readers as it is that she challenges them. Can you accept that she knows how to tell a story? Can you accept that she knows her characters and knows what's best for them? Can you accept that her concept of this novel might be different from yours?Augusta, known as Gus, tells us about the events that took place over the course of several months. She's looking back at her marriage to Owen and their recent relocation to the rural Pennsylvania countryside, where Owen, an author, and Gus, an artist, could pursue their artistic bents. In the first couple of chapters, Gus alludes to additional reasons for their move to the country, and she tells us that Owen has died.So from those initial chapters, I occasionally had to remind myself, "Wait. She said Owen died, right?" And I realized that there was a bit of suspense to this tale. What happens to Owen?Gus also reveals to us that she had an affair, about which she somewhat smugly, somewhat proudly says she divulged to Owen.But resentments linger. Owen has worked to rebuild his trust in his wife, but the knowledge that she cheated is always there, always lurking, operating as a third person in the marriage. There will be no other persons, by the way; Owen is unable to father children.Yet their marriage is stable and contented, or at least as contented as two artists can be. Owen struggles with writer's block at the moment, retreating to write in the barn on their property while Gus works in a makeshift studio. Theirs is a happy life.Into this Eden comes Allison, an attractive British divorcée. She and Gus strike up an immediately friendship, and Gus realizes how starved she is for a personal connection with someone. Owen doesn't take to Allison with the assuredness of his wife, but he accepts her presence.When Thanksgiving rolls around, Allison's daughter Nora arrives, with all of her tall, blonde, sophisticated youth and beauty. Gus reacts with eye-rolling derision as she observes this girl's hopeless crush on Owen. Gus has always assumed that Owen would "even the score" in their relationship, but she's certain it won't be with Nora.While Nora's appearance causes tensions to rise between Gus and Owen, it creates a barrier between Gus and Allison. Gone is their easy friendship, replaced by Allison's skittishness where her daughter is concerned. Allison has her reasons for wanting to protect Nora and keep her close, and while Gus does understand, she nonetheless feels hurt, a bit abandoned, a bit betrayed.One of the subplots involves Gus's Alzheimer's riddled father, with whom Gus has never been particularly close. This echoes one of the themes of the novel: how do we deal with death? There are several over the course of the book, some physical and others not. There is the death of the father Gus knew, now replaced by a man who doesn't know who she is. There is the death of the relationship Gus and Owen enjoyed before her betrayal, the death of the friendship Gus had with Allison prior to Nora showing up, the death of Owen's creative spark. There is even the death of a deer. Can you recover from death? Can you regain your equilibrium? Can you allow yourself to be happy afterwards?This is a lyrical, beautifully written book that is forcibly honest. Gus is not always easy to like, nor is Owen. He does not play the victim, yet he occasionally behaves as if he's being victimized. If Allison is not quite the serpent in the garden, she certainly does represent a sort of temptation. Gus has already physically betrayed her husband. With Allison, the betrayal is emotional. And then there is Nora. Think of her as the apple Eve extends to Adam.We all know how the story ends in the Book of Genesis. Adam and Eve get kicked out of Eden, forced to live in their new reality, in a world that has none of the beauty and freedom of Eden. And so it is with Gus. How does she respond to all of this death? You must read and find out. I promise you will enjoy every page.Published on VoxLibris.net@voxlibris