THE TOPEKA SCHOOL
by Ben Lerner (Granta £16.99, 304 pp)
THE TOPEKA SCHOOL by Ben Lerner (Granta £16.99, 304 pp)
American auto-fiction star Ben Lerner’s third novel —which comes endorsed by the uber-cool likes of Sally Rooney and Maggie Nelson — is a potent, painful picking-apart of trauma; the beginnings of the age of information overload and, above all, toxic masculinity.
Having said that, it really takes off when the narrative is picked up by Jane Gordon, an Oprah-famous psychologist and mother of the troubled teenage protagonist Adam.
The loose plot turns on a central act of violence, in which Adam — a poetry-loving school debate champion who disguises his nerdiness behind rage, rap battles and weight-lifting — is complicit.
Lerner brilliantly pleats and plays with time, while moving between Adam, Jane and her husband Jonathan, also a psychologist, whose infidelity devastatingly emerges.
Whether he’s considering our era’s weaponised rhetoric, or the (white middle-class male) national psyche — ‘America is adolescence without end’ — Lerner is consistently searing.
His unashamedly serious, but never worthy, novel feels to be one of the most essential published this year.
GRANDMOTHERS
by Salley Vickers (Viking £16.99, 304 pp)
GRANDMOTHERS by Salley Vickers (Viking £16.99, 304 pp)
A somewhat misleading title, since meek, shepherd’s hut-dwelling Minna — one of three characters at the heart of Vickers’ latest — is childless, her heart having been broken many years previously by a faithless lover.
However, for the former teaching assistant, young book-lover Rose is a granddaughter in all but name.
Meanwhile, mustardy contrarian Nan is intent on educating her grandson Billy in the school of life, while also enjoying a secret career as an acclaimed, but obsessively reclusive, poet.
And finally, there’s elegant Blanche, who, denied access to her beloved grandchildren, is succumbing to drink and kleptomania.
The contrivances that bring the trio together are breezily carried off, and the plot allows likeable characters ample opportunity to reflect wisely on subjects including art, family and mortality.
Yet this gentle, subtly autumnal, tale avoids sentimentality and sententiousness.
THE TENTH MUSE
by Catherine Chung (Little, Brown £16.99, 304 pp)
THE TENTH MUSE by Catherine Chung (Little, Brown £16.99, 304 pp)
Catherine Chung has a degree in mathematics from the University of Chicago, and her passion for the subject is evident throughout this lightly educative novel.
Growing up in Forties and Fifties Michigan, Katherine knows she doesn’t fit in — not least because the mother she never knew was born in China.
As she discovers her gift for maths, she resolves to follow the example of ‘the tenth muse’, rejecting that of the nine other dutiful, mythological sisters and instead carving out her own course.
Easier said than done in such a male-dominated field, but, amid the sexism and prejudice, Katherine finds an ally in glamorous folklorist Henrietta.
There are mysteries (not least Katherine’s parentage), betrayals and heartbreak, although Katherine’s backward gaze makes for a slight flattening effect, and she never quite emerges from her narratorial role to become a fully realised character.
But this affecting tale is nevertheless pleasingly well-crafted.