Our words and wants and limbs would overlap.” Strong writes womanhood with brutal honesty exhaustion, love, desire, anxiety, and the devastation of unfulfilled expectations permeate every page. Strong taps into the intensity of female friendships and how overwhelming, all-consuming, and painful they can be: “I’d forget then, on the best days, that we were separate. As they start to communicate again, Elizabeth thinks back on their decades-old relationship and where it went wrong. On top of declaring bankruptcy with her husband, Elizabeth finds her day filled to the brim: She runs miles at dawn, raises her children, works multiple jobs, tends to her marriage, placates her cruel parents, tries to make rent, navigates her privilege, and rekindles a friendship with Sasha, her ex–best friend and the most formative relationship of her life. Elizabeth, who grew up in a well-off family, now teaches low-income students at a New York City charter school (a job she needs and likes but cannot seem to love) because she cannot find a full-time job in academia. Strong’s second novel follows Elizabeth, a 34-year-old academic and mother of two, who finds herself living a life she never imagined. A deeply overwhelmed mother navigates the banality, joy, and turmoil of her life.
0 kommentar(er)
