Read Women 2014 - Her Fearful Symmetry

Well hello there lovely readers!

As promised, I am back with an update on my activities for #readwomen2014, and I've reviewed Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger for your brain pleasure. I've challenged myself to keep these book reviews to 500 words, otherwise I will write whole essays, so read below for my thoughts on the novel, and please feel free to 'friend' me on Goodreads if you would like to see or discuss my reads! 

The first book I’ve chosen to review for #readwomen2014 is Audrey Niffenegger’s 2009 Her Fearful Symmetry.  It tells the story of Julia and Valentina, two young twins who are spookily alike, who insist on dressing the same, and have the disturbing habit of holding hands a lot. Though brought up in Chicago, the twins inherit an ornate London flat from their aunt, Elspeth, who dies after battling with cancer at the opening of the novel, and who is also the estranged twin of their mother, Edie. The twins begin to inhabit the life of their aunt, occupying her flat, her clothes, and her belongings, and even begin to befriend her former lover and neighbour, Robert. 

Niffenegger’s in-depth characterisation of each player is pure mastery, and the first half of the novel is intensely compelling. The book is seductive from the beginning – the sexual tension between each couple, or potential couple, is just enough to be satisfyingly erotic without being tacky, and the mystery of what drove twins Elspeth and Edie apart quickly grips the reader. 

However, the introduction of the novel’s main ‘twist,’ Elpeth’s ghostly rescue of Valentina from the oppressive relationship with her sister, is woefully unsubstantiated. The pair, the ghost of Elpeth and her neice Valentina, plot to temporarily remove the young twins’ soul, to convince the outside world she is dead and allow her to escape and start life afresh. This strange, Frankenstein-esque plan is agreed to by Robert and Elspeth, who fear that Valentina will commit suicide if they refuse, a character trait which, as one contemporary reviewer pointed out, is “an impulse that is absent from Niffenegger’s characterisation up to this point.”(1)  

The dramatis personae themselves point out the obvious, human solution to Valentina’s problems (simply moving out the house they share), and this suggestion is never satisfyingly refuted. Thus, the strong sense that this scheme is futile makes the consequent supernatural action seem all too unrealistic – the preservation of Valentina’s lifeless body, its exhumation, the re-introduction of the soul, the ghost that’s left behind - they all seem unlikely. What began as a beautifully compelling examination of love, obsession, and human behaviour, remains so - but with the unfortunate caveat that this richly accomplished characterisation comes at the expense of the most basic plot line.

Additionally, for a novel so filled with vital, powerful female presences, Her Fearful Symmetry still falls into the old trap of women who must not take up space in the world. While Elspeth’s voice, thoughts, opinions and belongings permeate the novel and haunt all those who remain behind, she herself is ethereal, insubstantial, mostly invisible. The younger twins are similarly waif-like. Short, painfully thin, virginal, and incontrovertibly associated with the colour white – they are defined by their lack rather than their presence, they are blank, and they are, to a great extent, also uninteresting. 

All in all the novel has a lot to offer, not least in its breath-taking imagery and visualisation. However, the plot line itself is problematic, and Niffenegger has missed a trick with her female characters.

(1)   The Telegraph – Lorna Bradbury, 19^th October 2009