Title: The Book of Mother
Author: Violaine Huisman, Translated by Leslie Camhi
Rating: 5 / 5 stars
Favorite Quote: “I’d hesitate to call my lovers men. Not out of ambivalence regarding my sexual orientation - I like rough skin, strong smells, being sized up, dealing with bodies that take up more space than mine and can find a place inside me, hands restraining mine - but because men belonged to Maman. Though some of her lovers were in fact closer in age to me, my lovers always remained boys. With this linguistic infantilization I set up a barrier in words. I placed limits where we were so lacking in them, rules where there were never any.”
Review: Thank you to the publisher, Scribner, who sent me a free e-ARC of this book through the NetGalley platform, in exchange for an honest review.
What can I say about this book? If you follow my Instagram (please ignore that shameless plug), you may have seen that I took the month of November off from social media and blogging. This unplanned break came as work went from normal levels of chaos to absolute chaos, I had some apartment maintenance issues that took up more time than anticipated, and my mental health was not at its best. Candidly, I stopped reading almost altogether.
I started reading The Book of Mother before that break, although I didn’t finish it. And picking it back up again was what broke me out of that reading slump. So, that’s the tldr version - this book got me out of a reading slump. If that isn’t an endorsement, I don’t know what is. Also, even after receiving a free digital copy, I’ll be purchasing a physical copy for my shelves, for re-reads, and so that I can annotate all my favorite passages.
But - you might be thinking - what about the substance? Good question, my friends. Let’s talk about it.
The Book of Mother is broken down into three sections that take place in three separate time frames. The first tells of the early child of one of the title character’s daughters as she witnesses her mother’s mental and emotional deterioration (with hints, however, that the mother does, at some point, reach some sort of recovery). The second takes place earlier, as that woman who eventually becomes the titular mother ages from childhood, to early adulthood, to motherhood. In that section, readers are privy to her early mental and emotional struggles that are explored further in the first section. And finally, in the third section (SPOILER ALERT), readers learn of her death and see how her now-adult daughters cope with the loss of the person who was so central to their development and their lives.
But more than its plot, this novel is an exploration of the human psyche at its most fragile. At the center is a character in equal parts vulnerable, manic, angry, passionate, and cruel. In part one, readers are forced to question whether she loves her daughters at all - or, at the very least, whether her mostly unnamed mental illness has so overtaken her that her love for her children has been consumed in it.
But that image of her - the selfish one who curses her daughters and leaves them scared, vulnerable, and responsible for parenting her more than she ever parents them - is challenged in the second section, where her own point of view is brought to light. Her dotage on them, to the point of obsession, shows that at some point in their lives, her obsession and her mania manifested in different ways - making her devoted to them above all else. And then her deterioration. And that’s where she is when the novel begins.
And when the novel ends - that third part - it’s the end of an era. She dies within the first few paragraphs. And so what’s left, and told from the perspective of one of her daughters - is how they got there and what happens next. And demonstrates that even after all those years, the mother is still the center of the story.
Huisman’s exploration of time adds another layer to her already impeccable storytelling. The time jumps between the three sections means various strands of the story are established long before they are pulled into the primary narrative.
Finally, the language in this novel is absolutely stunning. I always get a little bit nervous about translated works because I’m worried that a clunky or inaccurate translation might take away from an otherwise great read, but those fears were completely unfounded when it came to this book. Both Huisman and Camhi are clearly artists when it comes to their respective languages, and that artistry rings powerfully from the pages of this novel.
One note about this book, much like in my review of The Leftovers, I don’t know how accurately this book portrays mental health concerns. So while I found the read truly harrowing and completely engrossing, if the depictions of mental illness ring hollow or seem exploitative or unfair, I would certainly invite criticism of my own review and would remain open to changing my opinion as I learned more. A brief internet search didn’t yield any noticeable criticism of this book that I could find, but since this book was originally published in a language I can’t read, there may be more that I’m just not seeing at the moment.
About that Quote: This quote demonstrates both the attention to language that the author clearly paid and that the translator is careful to preserve, where even the character, the narrator at the time, is aware of her language choice. So too does it show just how deeply the mother has enmeshed herself into even the most intimate parts of her daughter’s life. Here is a woman who shies away from identifying her sexual partners specifically filtered through a lens that incorporates her mother’s perspective. This passage does more than just show how influential the mother is in this book - it also shows her limits. With her language, the narrator here is able to create a sense of order where her previous life, her life with her mother, clearly lacked any such order.
TW for The Book of Mother: This book contains SA, inc*st, s*icide, self-harm, child neglect, and probably other triggers as well. Feel free to message me on Instagram for more information.
Have you read The Book of Mother? Share your thoughts below!
コメント