Isla McKetta, MFA, Author at A Geography of Reading

Family Dysfunction and Narrative Tension in Bloodline, the Netflix Original Series

April 5, 2015 by Isla McKetta, MFA 1 Comment

Remember the old days when we’d all gather around the water cooler and discuss who shot JR or of Rachel and Ross were ever going to figure things out? Nowadays we’re all watching our own shows at our own paces and unless you’re a fan of Game of Thrones or Mad Men, you mostly miss out on this cultural sharing moment. Well, I finished a fantastic new series on Netflix last night and I want to share it with you here at our virtual water cooler. Let me tell you about Bloodline.

Building Tension

When Danny Rayburn comes home to the Florida Keys to help his family celebrate the dedication of a pier in their honor, the balance of that prominent family is upset and things start to go wrong almost immediately. It starts small as Danny (Ben Mendelsohn) ducks his brother John (Kyle Chandler) at the bus stop only to show up directly at the inn their family manages. But these little upsets are keys to the tension underlying the family dynamic and (as in all good narrative) that tension develops and soon explodes.

The tension seems to center around Danny, the black sheep who wants to be the prodigal son, but Danny is really not just a source of tension but also the Iago—the key to unraveling the smooth facades of everyone around him. Within the first few episodes we see that successful lawyer and youngest daughter Meg (Linda Cardellini) is in a serious relationship with someone else than the guy she is screwing in the backs of cars. Kevin (Norbert Leo Butz) is barely holding on to the pretension that his marriage isn’t headed for divorce. And John is finding it harder and harder to be the upstanding boy scout of a detective that he so desperately wants to be.

I can’t tell you how the story develops (it would spoil all your fun) but I can tell you that after watching an episode or two at night I felt all balled up with tension (and couldn’t wait to watch more). The writers have a very subtle way of focusing each episode around one character’s relationship with Danny even while advancing the story as a whole and it never feels formulaic.

Dysfunctional Families

No matter what Tolstoy said about unhappy families, there are similarities in the threads of dysfunction and one of the things I enjoyed most about watching Bloodline was trying to tie the characters in this show to members of our own families. It was also instructive to watch the master manipulation of characters like Papa Rayburn (Sam Shepard) as he pits his children (oh-so-subtly) against one another and Mama Rayburn (Sissy Spacek) as she feeds the conflict.

What deliciously complicates the dysfunction is the nuances in the character of Danny (and the excellent portrayal by Mendelsohn) that made me hate him, pity him, fear him, and then flat out wonder. To have a character where our understanding shifts and evolves that completely is pretty much unheard of and it’s the main reason I recommend this show.

As Danny’s poking at his siblings and parents, the whole family starts to unravel and secrets are revealed that make you look at all of the characters in a different light. This is such a gorgeous mirror of how small (and big) changes in life shift and re-shift our family relationships. It’s something I’m thinking about a lot as my pregnancy changes my relationship with some family members (I haven’t felt closer to my dad in a long time) and helps me see others more clearly.

I could go on and on about other amazing craft elements in Bloodline (like characterization) but I’m bound to reveal something I’d rather you get to discover on your own. If you like a good mystery and a well conceived and acted show, go watch Bloodline already. Then come back and tell me what you thought.

Alzheimer’s, Her Beautiful Brain, and the Art of Memoir

March 15, 2015 by Isla McKetta, MFA 4 Comments

Alzheimer’s is in the news again this week with the death of beloved novelist Terry Pratchett. I say again, but it seems as though Alzheimer’s is never really out of the news. And while my own life has (thankfully) not been touched by this terrible disease, reading Her Beautiful Brain, a memoir of a daughter’s struggle with her mother’s early onset Alzheimer’s by my friend Ann Hedreen, I see how personal and how consuming the disease is both for those who are suffering from it and for each and every one of their family members.

Reading Books by Friends

I only know the post-Alzheimer’s Ann. She had already lost her mother when we met. She was already volunteering for research to help others and she was already advocating for awareness and funding to fight this terrible disease. I met the Ann who was writing this very memoir on the first day of grad school as we both sought to get our chops up and find the writer within.

So reading this book at times felt like a revelation—learning about the story of Ann’s family and her life, watching her become the person I came to know—and at times it felt overly intimate—like I was skipping ahead in our friendship to stories she wouldn’t normally reveal for years to come—stories of adultery and spousal abuse. All of these essays together form the picture of one woman’s life as she grapples with the hand dealt to her and her mother.

I’ve resisted writing a review of this book for a long time (so long that I had to re-re-read the book before sitting down to write) because reviewing books by friends is an impossible task. I can’t be objective. I don’t even want to be. That’s not to say it isn’t an honestly good book. It is. I’ve bought extra copies and pressed them into the hands of caregivers I love. It’s also a very personal book, and I struggle to separate the book from the person I know.

Searching for Impossible Answers

In many ways this book is a quest for answers—an exploration of “how could I not have seen what my mother was suffering earlier?” and “is there any way this could have been avoided?” All of that is moot, of course, but it’s so very human.

As Ann recalls a trip to Haiti where she “should have” noticed her mother’s failing brain, we see signs noticed in retrospect, but in Arlene (Ann’s mom) we also get to know a schoolteacher who not only raised the kinds of kids who venture off to Haiti in the Peace Corps and as filmmakers, but also visits them there despite recent lapses in memory she’s started to find troubling.

When Ann delves into her mother’s early childhood in the blighted mining town of Butte, Montana, we see the environmental devastation that may (or may not) have contributed to the Alzheimer’s, but we also get to understand a life much different from our own—one that bred hardy people.

We don’t know what causes Alzheimer’s or how to stop it, that’s part of the frustration. And Ann does a wonderful job in this book of showing how maddening and important that search for answers is.

On Motherhood

(Aside here, my dad says all I write about is pregnancy these days, to which I respond, duh… 🙂 )

One of the things I related most closely to in this book is Ann’s story not just of being a daughter but of becoming a mother in this time where she was watching her mother decline and eventually waste away. It’s a particular space in life where you get to see aging, birth, and the essence of who you yourself are becoming, and I was grateful for the window into that time (especially at this time for me).

In many ways I think this book is more about those relationships between mothers and daughters than it is about the disease (which makes the book all the more universal).

The Art of Memoir

I’m not a memoirist and any attempts I’ve ever made in that direction have been failures, so I often wonder what makes a good memoir. In Her Beautiful Brain I learned about telling a bigger story than what you think you’re telling. I learned about staring hard at the particular to ground a reader in the moment. And I learned about building analogies between the “small” stories of your life and the “large” stories that make the memoir universal.

I am grateful to Ann for revealing herself in this memoir. I am grateful that she shares how hard caregiving and watching a parent subsume to a disease like Alzheimer’s can be. I am grateful that she also shows how much of the joy of life continues no matter what else is going on.

If someone you love has been affected by Alzheimer’s or you just want to know more, pick up a copy of Her Beautiful Brain from Powell’s Books. Your purchase keeps indie booksellers in business and I receive a commission.

Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Unconsoled and the Nouveau Roman

March 8, 2015 by Isla McKetta, MFA 4 Comments

I started reading The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishiguro because it’s one of those really thick hardbacks that’s been sitting on my to-read shelf forever, I love Ishiguro, and I’m trying to read through that shelf in the five months before this room becomes a nursery and all the books have to be moved to their new home. What I didn’t realize is how much the book would blow my mind or that I was reading it at exactly the right time.

Big Books

As the tote bag goes, “I like big books and I cannot lie.” Although I frequently leave them sitting on the shelf for far too long because they don’t fit in my purse and a lot of my reading happens on a bus. Ishiguro went with me this week anyway all week because I was immersed in this book.

But what’s odd about The Unconsoled is that it’s the first book I’ve seen by Ishiguro that is long. It’s thicker than the other three books I have of his (An Artist of the Floating World, The Remains of the Day, and A Pale View of Hills) combined. In fact, I swear I have Never Let Me Go around here somewhere and that fourth book would make the inches just about even.

So what’s going on when a writer known for his understatement and his concision suddenly writes a 500+ page tome that spans four days? Something very unexpected. In fact, although I’m no literary theorist, I think Ishiguro was writing a modern version of the nouveau roman.

The Nouveau Roman

What the what? According to Wikipedia, “nouveau roman” was first used in the 1950s to describe the work of a few French writers who were experimenting with form. I think of Alain Robbe-Grillet and Marguerite Duras and the way their work can feel so disjointed that you’re entering a new, wonderful dimension.

What happens in The Unconsoled is you think you’re entering a novel about a pianist (Ryder) on tour in a strange city according to a schedule he never quite receives, but it quickly unfolds that the book is just as much about the people around him. Doesn’t sound too unusual too far, except that the book is really about the people around him. As in, the hotel porter goes on for pages about how his profession has been denigrated over the years in the entire chapter it takes to settle Ryder in his room.

It started out as kind of maddening, but when I saw what Ishiguro was doing by creating these huge, looping speeches where the “side” characters used so many words to say so few things, I started to understand the effect (and why the book was driving me so batty). From one angle he’s highlighting how small the concerns of the townspeople are and how wrapped up they are in themselves while from another he’s concealing the trick he’s using to disorient readers. Because as readers it’s our job to follow the narrative, so we get immersed in this winding tale of nothing and then that winding tale of nothing and we’re grasping for information or a toehold at the same time Ryder is. We become the main character.

Meanwhile, Ryder’s experiences shift as he’s talking with these characters. Sent to make peace between the hotel porter and his daughter and halfway through a conversation with her he starts to recall memories of their life together. Eventually he recognizes her child as his child. But it’s not so simple, because this isn’t a “big reveal” kind of novel and Ryder continues to have trouble recognizing simple things like the house they shared, so we (and he) are kept disoriented the entire time.

Reading this book felt a lot like watching Last Year at Marienbad which I also find completely maddening—but fascinating. In fact, I still haven’t finished the book (I wanted to put it down so many times but these effects are compelling). I had to come here to this blog to chat with you about what Ishiguro was doing to my brain before I could go back into that world and see what (if anything) happens.

Where Art Meets Life

I’m enjoying reading this book right now because Ishiguro is currently out in the world touring his latest book, and I can only imagine that The Unconsoled is actually an artistic expression of what it feels like to be on a book tour. Ryder is in a small, unfamiliar town surrounded by people who are all too familiar with him and have all kinds of wants, needs, and desires of him. He’s following along as well as he can but he can’t even remember where he’s supposed to be. And his relationship with his family (who by now has grown somewhat unfamiliar and distant) pulls at him all the time.

It made me not ever want to tour a book.

I don’t know yet if The Unconsoled is about more than that (I still have about 200 pages to read) but I can tell you that this book, like all of Ishiguro’s books, is masterfully done. I may not love the feeling of being inside Ryder’s world, but I am enthralled by the artistry that created it.

If you want to get lost in The Unconsoled, pick up a copy from Powell’s Books. Your purchase keeps indie booksellers in business and I receive a commission.

Reading The Blue Jay’s Dance: A Memoir of Early Motherhood

February 22, 2015 by Isla McKetta, MFA 4 Comments

Pregnancy is a weird time. My body is changing radically but only incrementally. I can’t bear to be out of sight of my husband. The world is full of advice and stories of their own experiences (which I need but is mostly misplaced). I’m full of worries that seem ridiculous but mean everything—if I can’t feel the baby moving is it okay? will I ever write again? And I’m too tired, mostly, to read properly and too tired to do anything but read.

So when someone recommended The Blue Jay’s Dance: A Memoir of Early Motherhood by Louise Erdrich, it sounded like the answer to all my needs, and as I read this book, I realized its open, meditative nature makes it a book that can be enjoyed by parents and non-parents, writers and non-writers, and anyone who loves nature.

Conceiving a Life

“To make love with the desire for a child is to move the act out of its singularity, to make the need of the moment an eternal wish. But of all passing notions, that of a human being for a child is perhaps the purest in the abstract, and the most complicated in reality.” – Louise Erdrich

I wanted this baby so much. My husband and I have been talking about starting a family for a couple of years now and in many ways the last nineteen years have been us getting ready to be parents. But neither of us had any idea that we’d get pregnant so easily. So I felt less prepared embarking on this adventure than I wanted to, even acknowledging that there wasn’t going to be much I could do to prepare. Hell, I’m still convinced that conception, rather than science, is magic.

I very much enjoyed that many of the essays in the book are actually an amalgam of Erdrich’s three pregnancies. She never names which daughter a section is about, but acknowledges how different her children are. This gives the book a stunning openness because it’s non didactically about what a pregnancy or parenting should be, it’s about that moment with that child. But because the child is never named, the essays can be about any child, and unlike so much of the advice offered by others (which carries an air of justifying that person’s own choices) these stories and fragments can be taken in part or in whole—however the reader wants.

Fear

“The self will not be forced under, nor will the baby’s needs gracefully retreat…. To keep the door to the other self—the writing self—open, I scratch messages on the envelopes of letters I can’t answer, in the margins of books I’m too tired to review.” – Louise Erdrich

Fear is the biggest harbinger of the unknown, and for me that fear has centered around blend of losing myself and of being inadequate. I know (pregnancy has already shown me) that my relationship with the things I love—my writing and reading—will necessarily change, but if I let them go (or if they are wrenched from me or change into unrecognizable beings), I don’t know who that makes me. At the same time I will be responsible for the care and well being of another human in a way that seems so all consuming…

So reading about the way Erdrich balances the parent self and the writing self—and the ways she copes with what will not balance—was extremely helpful to me. This book showed me it’s possible, at times, to write with a baby in one arm when neither urge will retreat. It showed me too how much the act of raising a child can feed the writing self, even when writing is not possible. Perhaps the hardest part of this—my biggest fear—has been about losing myself to the pregnancy, to the child, to parenting, but Erdrich has shown me that I will make this my own and that who I am actually shapes my own experience. It’s reassuring.

Advice

“Most of the instructions given to pregnant women is as chirpy and condescending as the usual run of maternity clothes…. We are too often treated like babies having babies when we should be in training, like acolytes, novices to high priestesshood, like serious applicants for the space program.” – Louise Erdrich

I believe in the well meaning nature of others. I believe I have the power (and sometimes responsibility) to witness their stories in order to help them feel whole. I know how healing and validating that can be. But right now, I want to—can only really—focus on me. Because this thing that is happening to me and my body and my husband and my home and our family—it is the biggest thing that will ever happen to us (at least until death) and while some people have the gift for sharing their experience without trying to smother mine, most don’t. Which is challenging for me, because I believe in the well meaning nature of others…

Writing

“Part of a writer’s task is to put her failings at the service of her pen.” – Louise Erdrich

My biggest fear throughout this pregnancy and really in life is that I will at some point fail to be a writer (and thus lose myself). Because writing is the one way in which I express my true nature. The page is the place where the complexities, ambiguities, and conflicts of my thoughts can coexist and complement and make sense. Writing helps me think. It calms me. It’s made me who I am.

I stepped down from the board of Hugo House to prepare for having a family. My reading slowed down when I got pregnant because all I could do was sleep. I even felt like I stopped writing except for these silly scraps of what I thought were drippily sentimental pregnancy poetry. Now I’m finding that pregnancy has given me a new vocation, one I tried at in high school and then abandoned—pregnancy is turning me into a poet. And while I don’t yet have the skills to polish those scribblings, I cherish this new project and the idea that while my writing might be changing, I am still a writer.

Sleep (Where I’ve Been)

“Sleep is the only truly palatable food at first. I sleep hungrily, angry, needy for sleep, jealous for sleep, devouring it and yet resentful of the time it takes away from conscious life.” – Louise Erdrich

I’ve had a couple of inquiries in the past couple of days about where I’ve been and if I’m okay—inquiries that meant the world to me. I am okay, if you call okay spending most of my available hours either napping, sleeping, or planning when next I’ll get to do one of the two. Turns out that growing another human is EXHAUSTING. But I’m a champion sleeper from way back, so I’m trying to relish the excuse. Even when it takes me away from things I love.

That’s to say that these reviews will continue to be erratic. And they may continue to focus on pregnancy for awhile. See, I tried to write a review that wasn’t about pregnancy (because I know other people have other things on their minds) but it’s where I’m at. It’s the biggest thing going for me right now. And I can’t really think about anything else.

We heard our baby’s heartbeat for the first time on Friday. A rapid little 130bpm. And afterwards I couldn’t think of any other thing.

I’ll be back here when I can because you matter to me and writing these reviews matter to me. I’ll even continue to strive to write the non-pregnancy review. But if you need something to keep you occupied and inspired in the meantime, go read The Blue Jay’s Dance, it’s worth a read and a reread and another reread. You might even discover how much of the book speaks to the non-pregnant 🙂

The Role of Pregnancy in California by Edan Lepucki

January 18, 2015 by Isla McKetta, MFA 6 Comments

You may have first heard of Edan Lepucki and her novel, California, when Stephen Colbert featured the book on his show as part of his coverage of the Amazon-Hachette debacle. California was not being sold on Amazon at the time and he wanted to push the book to the top of the New York Times bestseller list by getting people to buy it from independent bookstores.

But as much as I was watching that battle and I support buying books from indies, that is not why I wanted to read California. See, I’d read Lepucki’s debut novella, If You’re Not Yet Like Me, which is reason enough to buy her next book, but in addition, she’s been really kind to me on Twitter in the few instances where I’ve had a reason to reach out to her (even when I somewhat brashly questioned the use of the term “debut novelist” for someone who’d previously written a novella), plus I love dystopian fiction.

Little did I know that I would love California for a completely different reason and that I would be reading it at the exact right moment in my life. Because the story focuses around Cal and Frida who have made their way out to the woods to live off the land after a series of weather and social events disrupted the societal core. And not too far into the book, Frida discovers she is pregnant.

Pregnancy on My Mind

The timing on my reading this book really couldn’t be more perfect. My husband gave me my copy (diligently sourced from a local indie and autographed to boot) on Christmas day this year–the day after the doctor confirmed we are pregnant with our first child. So while there are loads of interesting things to talk about regarding California, I can’t quite get over how much it spoke to me right where I was at in that moment.

Pregnancy as a Catalyst

I’ve read books before and since where pregnancy was a plot point, but never have I seen it used so effectively as a catalyst to action. Cal and Frida are relatively comfortable living in their small shack with their garden. They have no contact with the outside world except for a nearby family who befriends them and August, a trader who stops by on a semi-regular basis with all sorts of odds and ends. When the family vacates their home (for reasons I’m not going to reveal here) Cal and Frida move in.

But other than that move, they are leading a comfortable (enough) life and there is no reason for the story to move forward. Until Frida suspects she is pregnant. And suddenly, whether it’s for want of resources, fear of birthing her child on her own, or just the sheer desire for community, she sets out after August one day on her own. That quest, although she does return to take Cal with her, sets the two of them on the path to see what life is like outside their Eden. And I can’t tell you any of the things that happen or who they might meet along the way, but it’s so worth reading. I didn’t love love the ending, which is why I only gave the book four stars, but it was right for the story, and you have to respect that.

The thing that was different from how pregnancy is handled in other books is that Lepucki got inside the (somewhat complex) hormonal changes and related motivations of the characters. It wasn’t just “pregnancy=change.” And as a result, I could relate to Frida’s sense of vulnerability and her quest for community. I feel vulnerable all the time right now in a way I never thought I would. I also feel fiercely protective of myself as a guardian of this little bean (who is less of a bean and more of a baby every day) inside of me. Those feelings are so strong, so primal, and Lepucki does a beautiful job of using them to their best narrative potential.

While a lot of things happen in this book, it’s this really rich character development that I enjoyed most and where Lepucki finds her own blend of literary and genre fiction.

How Pregnancy Changes Others

I’ll admit, one of the most fascinating parts of this book for me was Cal’s reaction to Frida’s pregnancy. It mirrored and helped me understand my husband’s reaction to ours. Cal is someone who is relatively comfortable living off the land and he was the instigator for getting the two of them out of the city in the first place. There were definite echoes of The Parable of the Sower in how crucial cultivation was to survival. But what was interesting was how much his provider instincts were triggered by the pregnancy and how protective he became of Frida.

I know (because my husband tells me, because he’s the one reading the pregnancy books right now) that his hormones are changing too to accommodate for our new situation, but I did not realize how much he would feel compelled to take care of me (whether it’s fetching that 40th glass of water or making basically all the meals based on whatever weird requirements I have that minute) and how visceral his need to protect me would become (don’t barrel up and down 12th Ave, really, please). I didn’t realize how much he was ready to be a dad or what that would even look like.

As much as I feel like I need to understand that what I’m going through is normal, it was equally helpful to me to understand more of the context for what he’s experiencing right now and I learned so much from Cal.

Pregnancy is the Future

That isn’t some weird, mystical prediction or assertion that everyone should go have babies now, but one of the things I’ve most wanted to do since getting pregnant is to sit down and watch Children of Men again. Because while I very much wanted to have a family with my husband, I could never quite articulate why, and I thought that movie would help. See, Children of Men touches on one of the same point that California does, which is that without kids, the world ends with us. And I know some people are okay with that (and I am not at all one to judge) but it’s something that I’m realizing matters very deeply to me.

California helped me understand that although I love living in my little Eden with my husband–we’ve been very comfortable here for over 19 years–we’re ready for the catalyst into the next phase of our relationship, our lives, and the world.

Regardless of where you’re at in your life of what your next steps might be with kids or otherwise, read this book. It’s one of those rare ones that I’d recommend to nearly everyone.

If this review made you want to read the book, pick up a copy of California from Powell’s Books. Your purchase keeps indie booksellers in business and I receive a commission. If this review made you want to go make babies, you’re welcome?