I have received many what I consider bewildering readers’ responses to reviews or articles I have written over the years. When I worked at Heat magazine, one vociferous e-mail criticised me for describing Tom Cruise as “His Royal Shortness” in a movie review I wrote about Valkyrie. I just thought it was a flippant remark, a bit smart arsey, cheeky and fun and in no way did I think I would get a reader response like that, but I clearly hit a nerve. Strange thing is, I praised him in that movie. I too am a huge fan of his work. I don’t think there is a film of his I didn’t watch. I even made myself stay awake during the awful mehness and mess of Vanilla Sky.
The second piece of “what the hell” correspondence was when I used the word postmodern in a review of a book. It was a tiny review, only about 60 words. The reader wrote that it was obnoxious. I don’t know if she was referring to the review, me, the book or the word itself.
I flip and stare at the cover every time I’ve finished a new chapter.
I was thinking about this because I am reading the amazing True Story by Kate Reed Petty, an astonishing genre-bending novel with elements of postmodernism or as some would call it metamodernism or as some would call it post-postmodernism. It’s all confusing and totally obnoxious and I give the reader of my previous review totes cred if she hates on this as well.
The cover of True Story (the best I’ve seen in a long time) reflects how books handle stories and in particular truth in several ways. There are four different types of mini covers on the cover: the first one looks like a true-crime set in American suburbia with a sinister Twin Peaks feeling, the second is creepy cabin-in-the woods horror, the third is a pic of 1950s Americana building and car that is very mysterious and sinister, and the fourth, a stark image of a woman with a blank white background, seems like it could be a serious memoir or feminist journal. Each part in the book reflects one or more of these covers. I flip and stare at the cover every time I’ve finished a new chapter. It’s so clever and fresh, and this being Petty’s debut makes it even more remarkable.
It starts off as a straightforward hallmark movie-of-the-week type story with a bunch of high school lacrosse players and how their nascent toxic masculinity leads to a rape, a cover-up and victim blaming. At a party, Alice, a young private school girl, has too much to drink and passes out. On the ride home, according to the boys who gleefully brag about it to their fellow bros, they rape her. They are overheard by her friend Hayley, who is hanging out with one of the boys – the narrator of this story Nick Brothers.
Part 2 consists of several drafts that Alice writes for her college application. It’s amazing how Petty turns this into a heartbreakingly sad reflection of how society never wants to hear or think about rape. How a woman is silenced.
Interspersed between the chapters are childhood plays that Hayley and Alice have written, which is another way of demonstrating different voices and realities. There are several other fabulous parts to the book and there’s the end, which is simply mind-blowing.
Dare I say it, this has been one of the most innovative novels I have read this year. Please feel free to comment if you hate the word postmodern.
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