A Novel About My Wife

I'm a wee bit late with my book review, but I did get the book read on time! This month's selection by Helen over at One Trick Pony was Emily Perkins Novel About My Wife. Emily Perkins is a New Zealand author so I was excited to broaden my reading circle to an author of my country of residence. 

 
The reviews on the book jacket described the read as "a disturbing, sad and brilliantly paced novel"..."complex and original...a true page-turner".  How exciting to open that first page and delve into the story of Tom Stone and his pregnant wife, Ann! 

Living in Hackney, Tom is a struggling, no scratch that, FAILURE of a screen-writer, who as the story unfolds, fails to contribute much financially, fails to remain focused on any one project to deliver anything potentially money earning. And his wife, Ann, a pregnant mould-maker for the hospital's radiology department, who is at times familiar and someone I can empathise with, but most of the time is this unreachable, complex, manic-depressive behaving, paranoid, mother to be.  

This book was depressing. There ended up being NO REAL sense of direction. We cut to Tom's narrative of how their marriage came about through a wedding in Fiji here and there; we witness this paranoia of Ann's through Tom's eyes but let's be honest, the man's version of a woman's worries is probably never a full reflection of what the woman is truly feeling. The familiar moments are those times Ann is preparing for motherhood: nesting, eating crazy concotions, reading baby books, blossoming, taking baths that are too hot, consulting a naturopath. These are all the things I do when pregnant. The unreachable? Her constant references to the man following her, sometimes coming so close as her door. The strange little clay figurines she overpopulates their house with as protective models. Her shrouded past in Australia...her fear of one of Tom's past bosses Halli. The strange memory when she's with her brother and his friends and the sexual inuendos. 

I chose not to read too much into Halli, only to be blindsided at the end by Ann's suicide (?) following a phone call to the house by Halli's secretary. This left me with disturbing sense that Halli had somehow hurt her badly somewhere along the way, probably when she still lived in Australia, but Emily Perkins, NZ author, chose to RUSH that connection and didn't develop it enough before the book ended. To be forced to accept Tom as a widow and single parent, when he hadn't even been able to produce a screen play the entire read, was a big ask. And then to learn that he's taking their son to Australia, back to Ann's roots? Where the heck did he get the money for THAT? 

The books was too fragmented for my tastes. The subway incident, Tom getting jumped in the park, the aftermath of the fiasco in Fiji, the friendship with the strange Simon and Kate, Ann's past...all of these could have been developed more and become exciting tidbits stitching the picture together. I don't do random, abrupt endings. 

So to describe this book as "A disturbing, sad and brilliantly paced novel' Time Out or "Complex and original...a true page-turner" Independent, I just have to wonder; was an intern  on a late night deadline reading this book, trying to submit a review to their impossible-to-please editor boss by 7am the next morning because in my opinion, both reviews completely missed the point of this book and don't accurately describe it all!  It has shaken my faith on those compelling reviews plastered all over the jackets of books. I'll be a bit more cautious in the future!