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Revenge of the Scapegoat
One day Iris, an adjunct at a city arts college, receives a terrible package: recently unearthed letters that her father had written to her in her teens, in which he blames her for their family’s crises. Driven by the raw fact of receiving these devastating letters not once but twice in a lifetime, and in a panic of chronic pain brought on by rheumatoid arthritis, Iris escapes to the countryside—or some absurdist version of it. Nazi cows, Picassos used as tampons, and a pair of arthritic feet that speak in the voices of Flaubert’s Bouvard and Pécuchet are standard fare in this beguiling novel of odd characters, surprising circumstances, and intuitive leaps, all brought together in profoundly serious ways.
167 pages, Paperback
First published April 12, 2022
87 people are currently reading
3149 people want to read
About the author
Caren Beilin
14 books52 followersCaren Beilin is the author, most recently, of the novel REVENGE OF THE SCAPEGOAT (Dorothy, 2022). She has also written a nonfiction book, BLACKFISHING THE IUD (Wolfman Books, 2019), and a memoir, SPAIN (Rescue Press, 2018). She teaches at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts and lives close by, in Vermont.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 179 reviews
April 25, 2022
This is a provocative little novel from Caren Beilin, an exploration and examination of Rene Girard's ideas, particularly the scapegoat mechanism in the context of family dynamics. Using fiction to explore - deeply explore - philosophy is hard to do. Ultimately, Beilin's story here is in service of the ideas she examines, so it often felt like the story was shoehorned into the philosophical discussion. There are surrealist elements that keep things interesting, although I'm not sure the surrealism was a good fit for this book except to keep it from getting too dry. Still, there is a lot going on here and I frequently found myself wanting to discuss it and unpack it further. As it happened, I read it over Easter weekend, which seemed apt given the title.
March 21, 2022
Vermont-based, author Caren Beilen’s novel mines elements of her past, as well as her earlier non-fiction and interest in bodily pain and gender. Here Beilen adds in several layers of semi-philosophical musings on the nature of family, trauma and above all the idea of the scapegoat. The story’s narrated by Iris who, like Beilen, is struggling with the impact of a devastating autoimmune condition. A part-time lecturer, Iris lives in a crumbling house, enmeshed in a failing relationship with Joe her drug-addicted husband. Then, out of the blue, her long-estranged father sends her a bundle of papers from her teens including the letters where he blamed her for everything wrong with his life and their family, including the suffering of her terminally-ill mother. The traumatic memories stirred up by this package take Iris on a bizarre journey that leads to a private, rural, museum, its grounds filled with cows, the descendants of herds bred to track down concentration-camp escapees in Nazi Germany.
Beilen rapidly abandons any pretence at realism to spin an intricate tale partly inspired by Rene Girard’s ideas on scapegoating, that’s also laced with hints of Nietzche, Deleuze and even Flaubert. It’s a highly-referential piece that takes in life as the child of second-generation, Holocaust survivors; the evils of patriarchy; art, ethics, and commodification. A narrative in which characters routinely launch into monologues - some based on transcripts of Beilen’s actual interactions - from their thoughts on queer theory to competing forms of knowledge. It’s sometimes fascinating, a little dizzying at times, couched in a style that veers between chaotically informal and drily academic, bordering on forensic. Numerous elements felt more than a little forced and awkwardly constructed but nonetheless I found this a surprisingly accessible read, at its best inventive and thought-provoking. Although I’m not sure I agree with many of Beilen’s arguments or her conclusions. Beilen’s brand of experimental writing’s not that easy to sum up, she’s been compared to Kathy Acker and Lynne Tillman, and certainly her work’s very much in that tradition i.e. the type of prose commonly associated with Semiotext(e)’s iconic Native Agents imprint. She’s also been linked to Sheila Heti and there’s definitely a resemblance here, although this also reminded me of writers like Miranda July.
Thanks to Edelweiss and publisher Dorothy Project for an ARC
Rating: 3/3.5
Beilen rapidly abandons any pretence at realism to spin an intricate tale partly inspired by Rene Girard’s ideas on scapegoating, that’s also laced with hints of Nietzche, Deleuze and even Flaubert. It’s a highly-referential piece that takes in life as the child of second-generation, Holocaust survivors; the evils of patriarchy; art, ethics, and commodification. A narrative in which characters routinely launch into monologues - some based on transcripts of Beilen’s actual interactions - from their thoughts on queer theory to competing forms of knowledge. It’s sometimes fascinating, a little dizzying at times, couched in a style that veers between chaotically informal and drily academic, bordering on forensic. Numerous elements felt more than a little forced and awkwardly constructed but nonetheless I found this a surprisingly accessible read, at its best inventive and thought-provoking. Although I’m not sure I agree with many of Beilen’s arguments or her conclusions. Beilen’s brand of experimental writing’s not that easy to sum up, she’s been compared to Kathy Acker and Lynne Tillman, and certainly her work’s very much in that tradition i.e. the type of prose commonly associated with Semiotext(e)’s iconic Native Agents imprint. She’s also been linked to Sheila Heti and there’s definitely a resemblance here, although this also reminded me of writers like Miranda July.
Thanks to Edelweiss and publisher Dorothy Project for an ARC
Rating: 3/3.5
January 8, 2022
3.5 - A bewitching and surreal examination of unearthed familial trauma, chronic illness, art, and the consequences and benefits of documentation. Witty and dark yet pretentiously droll - the fantastical elements and oddball characters admittedly caused certain parts to fly over my head on a first read. This book nearly demands to be reread and discussed with others (I wish I buddy read this). I want to rate this higher purely for its boldness in craft and the nuggets of brilliance throughout, particularly in its reflections on living with chronic illness and reckoning with parental hostility, but I can’t deny that the book felt too showy for me, particularly the surrealist middle sections. Definitely one I want to revisit in the future, and a worthwhile read if you want something brief, challenging, and a unique take on the hot topic of “trauma plot.”
May 6, 2022
“But whoever you're writing about, they probably excused themselves at some point to collect themselves and to pee or empty their bowel and marvel at soaps, but in fiction you don't say everything unless you're a man."
Caren Beilin’s Revenge of the Scapegoat snuck in there at the right time. I had recently finished and really enjoyed Ann Quin’s Berg and I had sat over the course of a day and hate-read the sh** out of Kate Zambreno’s Drifts. Scapegoat has several overlapping elements to these two, but is also absolutely singular. Here we had another character in a psychological turned surreal and absurd battle with their father, but this time from a female character. And where, to me at least, Drifts was a very cold, pretentious, and boring account of a writer/ non-tenure-track writing instructor, here we are given an account that is full of humor and warmth, that never takes itself too seriously, even poking fun at itself (I admit that this is unfair to Drifts… I’m not saying that Zembreno had to go all out and have her narrator name her feet Bouvard and Pécuchet and intersperse conversations between the two old men throughout the book, nor did she have to have her narrator take a Picasso sketch off the wall and use it as a tampon… *but*… maybe it wouldn’t have hurt?).
Anyways.
This book is really an experience. It had me laughing out loud and scratching my head simultaneously. It is bold, stepping into territory with themes & language that have traditionally belonged to men (while simultaneously stepping on said males), but it's also deeply personal and empathetic. Another excellent book from Dorothy.
“Did writing exist in books anyway these days? I thought, perhaps very defensively. Maybe it didn't.”
“Did I think anyone is a beat poet if they use women as a metaphor? Is a beat poet anyone who exalts and so silos women? Is a beat poet someone who uses his journey as the template for human time? Is a beat poet someone who has a lot of "pubic" episodes?”
“I had told my students as much, ‘Don't bother writing a character since people change.’”
“But it's good, too, I thought, to be lazy like that, as an artist. Especially if you're a woman. Fuck work.”
4-4.5*
Caren Beilin’s Revenge of the Scapegoat snuck in there at the right time. I had recently finished and really enjoyed Ann Quin’s Berg and I had sat over the course of a day and hate-read the sh** out of Kate Zambreno’s Drifts. Scapegoat has several overlapping elements to these two, but is also absolutely singular. Here we had another character in a psychological turned surreal and absurd battle with their father, but this time from a female character. And where, to me at least, Drifts was a very cold, pretentious, and boring account of a writer/ non-tenure-track writing instructor, here we are given an account that is full of humor and warmth, that never takes itself too seriously, even poking fun at itself (I admit that this is unfair to Drifts… I’m not saying that Zembreno had to go all out and have her narrator name her feet Bouvard and Pécuchet and intersperse conversations between the two old men throughout the book, nor did she have to have her narrator take a Picasso sketch off the wall and use it as a tampon… *but*… maybe it wouldn’t have hurt?).
Anyways.
This book is really an experience. It had me laughing out loud and scratching my head simultaneously. It is bold, stepping into territory with themes & language that have traditionally belonged to men (while simultaneously stepping on said males), but it's also deeply personal and empathetic. Another excellent book from Dorothy.
“Did writing exist in books anyway these days? I thought, perhaps very defensively. Maybe it didn't.”
“Did I think anyone is a beat poet if they use women as a metaphor? Is a beat poet anyone who exalts and so silos women? Is a beat poet someone who uses his journey as the template for human time? Is a beat poet someone who has a lot of "pubic" episodes?”
“I had told my students as much, ‘Don't bother writing a character since people change.’”
“But it's good, too, I thought, to be lazy like that, as an artist. Especially if you're a woman. Fuck work.”
4-4.5*
Read
March 5, 2023This one didn’t do much for me. I liked the language at first, and then it just washed over me, disjointed and just not compelling, wtf but not in a good way in the middle, and then it comes together in the end—anticipating the anticlimax of the letters, the book includes a review of an art piece that prints those letters, and rebuts them, and so yes, I guess things can be traumatic to some people that seem quite banal, but also, yes, when you’re young people need to let you fuck up and still love you unconditionally even when you’re being ugly and unlovable.
Read
May 29, 2022I have no idea what the hell I just read, but it was wild and surreal and just what my brain needed in these really awful times.
July 9, 2022
Clever and creative but borderline unreadable. I like the cover
May 6, 2022
It is through dialogue that we are getting most of the plot of this story, but my god, the dialogue is so badly written.
I felt that we weren’t given enough context to understand why Iris felt so hurt by the letters. She was traumatized beyond my comprehension. We got to read the letters, but then we would get Iris almost begging to be pitied just by saying that the letters destroyed her and made her want to kill herself. But why did they do that? Why do the letters still matter? It felt like it was decided that the letters’ capacity to traumatize was self-explanatory. I tried to imagine being Iris and having my dad send me these letters, but that alone, without explaining the dynamic between her and her dad, didn’t give me enough material to properly synthesize this imagination and use it to empathize. Even a flashback to a real key dialogue between them would have helped. I understand that different people are traumatized by different things and to different extents, but the fact that I need to say this or think this to justify Iris’s reaction tells me that the book failed to make a sufficient connection between how much Iris was hurt by these letters (which we were told) and WHY Iris was so hurt by these letters (which we didn’t really get and which could’ve been done with further context and more flashbacks to encounters between her and her dad.)
When I first started reading this, I felt I was reading something brilliant, something that makes a very unique collage of references from psychology, history, art, so even while I was nearing the end, I kept waiting to be impressed.
I enjoyed the sections about bees in the beginning and about bathrooms in the 2nd part. The exchanges with her students about what not to include in writing were very amusing.
I felt that we weren’t given enough context to understand why Iris felt so hurt by the letters. She was traumatized beyond my comprehension. We got to read the letters, but then we would get Iris almost begging to be pitied just by saying that the letters destroyed her and made her want to kill herself. But why did they do that? Why do the letters still matter? It felt like it was decided that the letters’ capacity to traumatize was self-explanatory. I tried to imagine being Iris and having my dad send me these letters, but that alone, without explaining the dynamic between her and her dad, didn’t give me enough material to properly synthesize this imagination and use it to empathize. Even a flashback to a real key dialogue between them would have helped. I understand that different people are traumatized by different things and to different extents, but the fact that I need to say this or think this to justify Iris’s reaction tells me that the book failed to make a sufficient connection between how much Iris was hurt by these letters (which we were told) and WHY Iris was so hurt by these letters (which we didn’t really get and which could’ve been done with further context and more flashbacks to encounters between her and her dad.)
When I first started reading this, I felt I was reading something brilliant, something that makes a very unique collage of references from psychology, history, art, so even while I was nearing the end, I kept waiting to be impressed.
I enjoyed the sections about bees in the beginning and about bathrooms in the 2nd part. The exchanges with her students about what not to include in writing were very amusing.
January 16, 2022
So many wild risks taken in this strange tale. There's a clash of pent-up family trauma and displacement that is reborn as a rural cow field of performance art. The narrator is so aware of the punishment her feet are experiencing that their plight is almost like an aria within the opera of this jagged novel. Caren Beilin is always a riot and an enchantment.
April 23, 2022
as delightfully oddball as you'd hope from a dorothy project book
March 28, 2023
wacky! didn’t love it but liked the bits about chronic pain and the ending and the absurdity of it all - 3.5?
July 28, 2023
:) <3 made me think and feel and marvel! magical realism is for the girls. and the russians and sometimes gabriel garcia marquez
December 14, 2022
One of my favorites this year. You never really stop being a teenager, even at thirty-six pretending to be a cowherd. Sardonic and surreal and self-pitying and goofy, at times. Everything heavy turns laughable when someone else looks at it, then turns into a high-brow reference that makes the narrator feel good about herself and makes you feel good about yourself for catching it before making you feel bad about yourself for being just as pretentious as everyone in this book. I loved every page of it.
October 20, 2022
Honestly, very very confused by much of the content of the book. I like how the book began to tackle an infringed father/daughter relationship but it failed to come to any type of conclusion or reason of thought by the end. I think that it may have been that this structure of novels is not my cup of tea which I acknowledge. I will say though that I enjoyed the quickness of the book.
Read
March 28, 2024“To scapegoat is to wrong someone so young.”
it was confusing or maybe the writing style isn’t for me. carrying the family trauma up to your 30s isn’t easy and sometimes learning how to live with it is agonizing.
it was confusing or maybe the writing style isn’t for me. carrying the family trauma up to your 30s isn’t easy and sometimes learning how to live with it is agonizing.
Read
February 24, 2023Sometimes confusing but never boring. It's a shortcoming more on my part that many of the references flew over my head in this one, but for the parts I could properly understand, I immensely enjoyed it. The most grounded aspects, e.g., the contradictory simultaneous love/ hate we nurse for family members, female selfhood and illness, transformations, questioning whether origins are a legitimate way of understanding a person, worked best for me. I felt a little lost in the middle of the book, with Beilin totally embracing the absurd and surreal (on top of the references I didn't get, haha). It got better when I let go and just went along for the ride. Despite how jarring some of the reading was for me, I can't not like this book because of how funny it is.
April 18, 2024
Are all of the very best writers so skeptical of narrative that they will only ever produce these odd, rambling, cracked books of scattered scenes and non-linear dialogue? I love it and yet. But still. However. I can’t help but imagine what kind of a perfect novel we might have if Beilin chose to write in a little more connective tissue, to place one thing after another, hold our hand a bit before slapping it away. Maybe it will come, but even if it doesn’t I’ll be there for whatever she writes next because goddamn.
May 4, 2022
More like a 4.5
December 6, 2021
Imagine the love child of Miranda July and David Hume directed by Noah Baumbach. Like every Dorothy title, it’s fresh and bold and chewy. As a former therapist, I’ve devised several theories about the family dynamics in here. Enjoy the cow-herding but listen—really listen—to what this book is telling us about the world.
August 10, 2024
A book that feels like it can be milked time and again, like a heart-stomping cow
September 10, 2022
i hated this book at first and then LOVED IT wow what an amazing weird little book 😆
June 27, 2022
I couldn’t follow the story !!!
I think I was too distracted while reading this book. I’ll have to give it another try.
I think I was too distracted while reading this book. I’ll have to give it another try.
November 23, 2022
"Revenge of the scapegoat' is a novel consisting of four parts following thirty-six year old Iris as she reconciles with being her family's scapegoat as well as a character study in how to write a novel.
In part one, good karma, Iris is upset. At the age of thirty-six, Iris is thinking about how her role in her family has been the scapegoat. While father is cleaning out old family home, he sends Iris a package containing two traumatic letters he gave her when she was thirteen and sixteen as well as half a play she wrote when she seventeen years old. The most shocking thing to Iris is not her dad sending her the package but how he found he address considering that they haven’t talked in over a decade.
Iris tried to distance self from dysfunctional family but she is pulled back in by her older brother Kenneth. Seeing the letters from her dad given to her during her teen years shifts Iris into a protective role and leads to resentment of brother for trying to force a relationship between her and their father. Iris feels father is malicious in sending her the package while her Kenneth tries to convince her that their father was is old, senile and meant Iris no harm. Part one ends with Iris making an subpar trade and then leaving hometown of Philly.
In part two, Vivitrix Marigold in the the country, Iris decides to reinvent herself as Vivitrix Marigold. As Vivitrix, she is stepped on by a cow, is stranded at a museum in the middle of nowhere, and reconsiders what she wants to do with her life. While pondering her rheumatoid arthritis and her special diet, Vivitrix receives a phone call from her estranged husband Joe, meets a woman named Caroline, and finds work as a cowherd. Iris’s privacy is violated and she responds in a gross way. Part two ends with Vivitrix wondering if her new boss killed her husband.
In part three, Billy the ID, Vivitrix finds her play being used as a topic of discussion among new boss, her boss' son, and a visiting artist Although Vivitrix feels violated, she accepts that some find her family drama not traumatic but boring. Part three ends with Vivitrix having a conversation with visiting artist Irina and discovering a cow calf.
In part four, lapidary circle, Vivitrix returns to Philly due to a raise at work. and discovers the letter from her father is being used as art. Vivitrix shares with friend Ray the main source of her teen trauma was her father thinking of her as his equal when she was a child. Iris feels that no one truly understands the emotional impact the letters from her father had on her and instead, it invites people to blame her for being a selfish teenager.
In part five, 4, there is simply a photo of a typed to the author's father asking for his help with writing a book about her family's connection to the Holocaust which is signed by the author.
As I started reading the book, I liked that Iris/Vivitrix appears to be vegan (as noted by her wearing vegan leather clothes and shoes.) Despite this, I felt that the author is trying to write a book that’s wants to be highbrow but isn’t. Iris’ referring to her feet as Bouvard and Pécuchet assumes that the reader has read "Bouvard et Pécuchet" by Gustave Flaubert and seems pretentious to me.
It was fascinating to learn about the concept of being the family scapegoat who is a common enemy for the others in the family to focus their attention on, a person to blame all of family’s woes on. Those who decide to make a family member a scapegoat, doesn’t take into account how the person who is given this role is affected in the long term.
As I finished the novel, I was unsure of what exactly I had read since the novel seemed unsure of itself except for the occasional odd characters including Nazi cows, talking arthritic feet, and using a Picasso as a tampon. Having said this, I'm unsure as why this novel is viewed as satire.
In part one, good karma, Iris is upset. At the age of thirty-six, Iris is thinking about how her role in her family has been the scapegoat. While father is cleaning out old family home, he sends Iris a package containing two traumatic letters he gave her when she was thirteen and sixteen as well as half a play she wrote when she seventeen years old. The most shocking thing to Iris is not her dad sending her the package but how he found he address considering that they haven’t talked in over a decade.
Iris tried to distance self from dysfunctional family but she is pulled back in by her older brother Kenneth. Seeing the letters from her dad given to her during her teen years shifts Iris into a protective role and leads to resentment of brother for trying to force a relationship between her and their father. Iris feels father is malicious in sending her the package while her Kenneth tries to convince her that their father was is old, senile and meant Iris no harm. Part one ends with Iris making an subpar trade and then leaving hometown of Philly.
In part two, Vivitrix Marigold in the the country, Iris decides to reinvent herself as Vivitrix Marigold. As Vivitrix, she is stepped on by a cow, is stranded at a museum in the middle of nowhere, and reconsiders what she wants to do with her life. While pondering her rheumatoid arthritis and her special diet, Vivitrix receives a phone call from her estranged husband Joe, meets a woman named Caroline, and finds work as a cowherd. Iris’s privacy is violated and she responds in a gross way. Part two ends with Vivitrix wondering if her new boss killed her husband.
In part three, Billy the ID, Vivitrix finds her play being used as a topic of discussion among new boss, her boss' son, and a visiting artist Although Vivitrix feels violated, she accepts that some find her family drama not traumatic but boring. Part three ends with Vivitrix having a conversation with visiting artist Irina and discovering a cow calf.
In part four, lapidary circle, Vivitrix returns to Philly due to a raise at work. and discovers the letter from her father is being used as art. Vivitrix shares with friend Ray the main source of her teen trauma was her father thinking of her as his equal when she was a child. Iris feels that no one truly understands the emotional impact the letters from her father had on her and instead, it invites people to blame her for being a selfish teenager.
In part five, 4, there is simply a photo of a typed to the author's father asking for his help with writing a book about her family's connection to the Holocaust which is signed by the author.
As I started reading the book, I liked that Iris/Vivitrix appears to be vegan (as noted by her wearing vegan leather clothes and shoes.) Despite this, I felt that the author is trying to write a book that’s wants to be highbrow but isn’t. Iris’ referring to her feet as Bouvard and Pécuchet assumes that the reader has read "Bouvard et Pécuchet" by Gustave Flaubert and seems pretentious to me.
It was fascinating to learn about the concept of being the family scapegoat who is a common enemy for the others in the family to focus their attention on, a person to blame all of family’s woes on. Those who decide to make a family member a scapegoat, doesn’t take into account how the person who is given this role is affected in the long term.
As I finished the novel, I was unsure of what exactly I had read since the novel seemed unsure of itself except for the occasional odd characters including Nazi cows, talking arthritic feet, and using a Picasso as a tampon. Having said this, I'm unsure as why this novel is viewed as satire.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 9, 2022
This was the book that finally broke through a months-long reading slump that made me question whether I'd ever read a novel again.
Caren Beilin's sentences are so bizarre and surprising and heartbreaking and beautiful that after I finished this I immediately wanted to read everything else she has ever written, and everything her friends have ever written, and every book she likes to read. It is actually funny (most people are lying when they say a book is funny, but this one is.) It made me cry sometimes, a little bit (not so much that I felt manipulated.) The author is so good at words that she made me remember that I liked words, too. But here's what really made me excited about reading it (and reading in general): there is also a good and compelling and unpredictable plot, which a lot of books tend to forget about.
This is my first goodreads review and I can tell it's going off the rails because here I arrive at my very stupid summary of this incredible book:
It has great words and things happen in it.
But it's difficult to find both of those elements in the same set of pages. I am so happy they are in this one. Go read this book.
Caren Beilin's sentences are so bizarre and surprising and heartbreaking and beautiful that after I finished this I immediately wanted to read everything else she has ever written, and everything her friends have ever written, and every book she likes to read. It is actually funny (most people are lying when they say a book is funny, but this one is.) It made me cry sometimes, a little bit (not so much that I felt manipulated.) The author is so good at words that she made me remember that I liked words, too. But here's what really made me excited about reading it (and reading in general): there is also a good and compelling and unpredictable plot, which a lot of books tend to forget about.
This is my first goodreads review and I can tell it's going off the rails because here I arrive at my very stupid summary of this incredible book:
It has great words and things happen in it.
But it's difficult to find both of those elements in the same set of pages. I am so happy they are in this one. Go read this book.
May 19, 2022
"A scapegoat does not believe, and I'll say this twice, that /anything/ coming out of her mouth can be heard. Not without SCREAMING. Not without a trick. It does not work to say, This hurts. It does not work to say, Please. . . . A scapegoat doesn't think she can ask. No, she doesn't believe in honest questions."
January 6, 2024
This is for all daughters who have been hurting quietly for a long, long time now. This is a group hug.
Sometimes, I see my wounds reflected in a book so I caress it and place it inside my heart like some balm. I have to admit, though, that I don't fully understand this book. I got lost in the middle and did not understand what is happening, but I very much appreciate the message it is trying to convey.
** more rumblings to follow about revenge, strong heart, and Heathcliff **
Sometimes, I see my wounds reflected in a book so I caress it and place it inside my heart like some balm. I have to admit, though, that I don't fully understand this book. I got lost in the middle and did not understand what is happening, but I very much appreciate the message it is trying to convey.
** more rumblings to follow about revenge, strong heart, and Heathcliff **
August 12, 2022
How I got through reading this without it leaving permanent damage to my brain is beyond me.
November 10, 2023
Was I confused? Yes. Am I still obsessed with this? Absolutely.
May 20, 2023
I don’t think I really grasped the purpose of this novel until the very end, with the conversation between Iris and Ray about the holocaust and generational trauma. What a metaphor. Like damn. Beilin gives us the weirdest of the weird in terms of literary fiction. Like the blurb says: talking feet, nazi cows, etc. What more could you want?
What really gets me about this novel, though, is it’s precision when it comes to narrativizing abuse. The scapegoat, yes—I am the scapegoat, too! All great texts makes us come to a moment where we sincerely believe that we ARE the protagonist(s) themselves. I felt this book in my spleen!
What really gets me about this novel, though, is it’s precision when it comes to narrativizing abuse. The scapegoat, yes—I am the scapegoat, too! All great texts makes us come to a moment where we sincerely believe that we ARE the protagonist(s) themselves. I felt this book in my spleen!
July 9, 2022
such a strange and profoundly interesting little book. what was partly so fascinating about it was how you could truly see Iris working through her emotions. it was entirely character based with nothing inherently interesting happening but still so, so entertaining.
the way beilin writes about the complexity of familial dynamics, in particular father/daughter, is so accurate it’s scary. only negative was that quite a bit of the book felt like beilin working through her own life, which wasn’t bad to read but felt slightly like reading her diary, with bits that were hard to tell if they were fictional or based in truth.
definitely meant to be read quickly so as to absorb the weirdness
the way beilin writes about the complexity of familial dynamics, in particular father/daughter, is so accurate it’s scary. only negative was that quite a bit of the book felt like beilin working through her own life, which wasn’t bad to read but felt slightly like reading her diary, with bits that were hard to tell if they were fictional or based in truth.
definitely meant to be read quickly so as to absorb the weirdness
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