The Believers by Zoe Heller, 335 pages.
Summary from the back cover:
When a stroke fells radical New York lawyer Joel Litvinoff, a secret is revealed that forced Audrey, his wife, to reexamine everything she believed about their forty-year marriage. In the meantime Joel's children are struggling with their own dilemmas and doubts.
The Litvinoffs add a whole new dimension to the word dysfunction. And Heller does a fabulous job of making them recognizable while still laying bare their ugliness, hypocrisy, and weaknesses. It would be easy to stereotype this crew with their liberal ideology and turn them into wackos, but Heller's ability turns this story into something smart and entertaining.
I can't talk about The Believers without mentioning the mother Audrey, who gives Mommie Dearest a run for her money. She is just plain mean and hopelessly self centered. While her interactions with family and friends are definitely cringe-worthy, Audrey remains true to herself and I admire Heller for keeping her irredeemable. Her daughters are struggling - having grown up in a household rooted in extreme ideology but without any real core, they don't know how to find their way in the world. Her adopted son continues to get a free pass from responsibility, looking to manipulate every situation.
On Audrey as a mother:
In the years since then, Audrey's attachment to Lenny had been a frequent source of tension in their marriage. Joel, for all his talk of communal childbearing and tribes, deeply resented the idea that Lenny should have succeeded in evoking Audrey's passion where her "real" children had failed. "Karla and Rosa are your flesh and blood," he would chide her. But these appeals to sanguine loyalty missed the point, she felt. If anything, the fact that Lenny was not hers made it easier to love him. As the coauthor of Karla and Rosa, she could not help but look upon them with the dissatisfied eye of an artist assessing her own flawed handiwork. Lenny, on the other hand, as an unsolicited donation: she was free to enjoy the gift of him without any burden of genetic responsibility for his imperfections. She had chosen to love him. The disparity in her feelings toward her daughters and her son was regrettable, but it was not something that was in her gift to correct. (pg. 148)
Heller has an obvious gift for creating unlikeable characters without apology. The darkly comedic tone had me chuckling while shaking my head - Audrey, in particular, is so awful that there is no other remedy except to laugh. The author's talent lies in striking this perfect balance of disapproval and curiosity. Similar to coming upon a traffic accident - you have no idea who is at fault, but you know it is a hot mess and you can't help but look twice.
This is the first Heller novel I've read, but I will be seeking out her other novels - Everything You Know and What Was She Thinking? Notes on a Scandal
The End.
Many thanks to TLC Book Tours for providing me a copy to read and review.
Here are the other tour stops:
Tuesday, January 19, 2010: Lit and Life
Tuesday, January 26, 2010: Raging Bibliomania
Wednesday, January 27, 2010: Steph and Tony Investigate!
Thursday, January 28, 2010: Life in the Thumb
Thursday, February 11, 2010: The Brain Lair
Monday, February 15, 2010: Book Club Classics!
Wednesday, February 17, 2010: Sasha and the Silverfish
Thursday, February 18, 2010: Nonsuch Book
*my apologies to the author, i'm umlaut challenged - if anyone knows how to add one, i'll be happy to edit :)
