397 pages Fiction
Is it hard to enjoy a family novel when life at your house
is chaos? Or is it easier to love a
family novel when everything is peaceful at your house? That is the question I
asked myself as I was plowing through Sisterland by Curtis Sittenfeld. It is a very well-written novel, but I wasn’t enjoying myself. Probably I should have
put the book down and started it again when things calmed down in my life. It
is to the author’s credit that I finished the book, as hung up as I was on our
own family dramas. For you see, we have a wedding in three weeks and I am in
Chicago taking care of a grandchild instead of at home doing little bits and
pieces for the wedding. However, it’s not much better at home; there’s a guy
there refinishing the living room floor and another guy painting the house
trim. No matter where I turn, it’s chaos.
So before I go on and on about my own drama, let’s talk
about Kate and Vi, the twins who are the protagonists in Sisterland. They are
the product of a depressed mother and a distant but loving father and spend
most of their lives in St. Louis. Like most twins, they are inseparable as
children and raise themselves because their mother has a hard time getting out
of bed. Kate, who was born Daisy, and Vi realize early in their lives that they
are psychics…they have premonitions about things, and see things that other
people don’t see. Kate marries conventionally, and Vi tries out all sorts of
things before she becomes a professional psychic. “All hell” breaks loose in
both of their lives when Vi predicts a devastating earthquake for St. Louis on
national television. Although Vi becomes a celebrity following her appearance
on the Today show, Kate’s life is affected the most, and she makes some rather
unseemly decisions that are as much an earthquake in her life as the earthquake
her sister has predicted.
The story moves back and forth between the past and present.
In other novels that aren’t linear, it sometimes is difficult to figure out the
past from the present. Sittenfeld makes effortless transitions. We know exactly
which time frame we are in, which I appreciated. The characters are all
complex; but some of them are difficult to like, although Sittenfeld says that it is not her job to create likeable characters. The New York Times reviewer
says, “Kate and Violet may look alike, especially as children, but it’s the
artful rendering of each one’s idiosyncrasies that makes this novel so
affecting. In this, as in her other books — “Prep,” “The Man of My Dreams” and
“American Wife” — Sittenfeld’s confident, no-frills style belies the
complexities of her characters and their relationships. Her protagonists tend
to be shrewdly observant outliers, neither Queen Bees nor Wannabes; they seem
relatable, and they make us feel complicit.” Of course in a family drama, it is
the choices that family members make that drives the plot. Sometimes, in
Sisterland, the reader is shaking her head wondering why this or that
particular decision was made. Frankly, the spouses of Vi and Kate are the real
heroes of the novel; they love these women despite the implausible decisions
they make. In the end Vi is a much more enjoyable character than Kate, and we
can’t help questioning the decisions Kate makes, psychic or not.
One of the most intriguing parts of the story is the twin’s
psychic abilities. The NPR reviewer suggests that “Sittenfeld handles Kate's
contact with the psychic realm with a light and logical touch that keeps Sisterland artfully within the
bounds of believability.” In other words, Sittenfeld doesn’t overplay her hand with
this as a plot device, although a couple of the reviewers felt that she could
have done more with it. Vi embraces her gift while Kate is embarrassed by it
and tends to push her premonitions into the background. This becomes a key plot
device, because when Vi is predicting an earthquake, Kate knows that she is
right, but Kate is embarrassed by the very idea that she knows it. In an
interview in the Chicago Tribune, Sittenfeld talks about interviewing some St.
Louis psychics as she was researching the novel. Interestingly enough, she
didn’t probe them about their psychic abilities as much as she discussed with
them the way in which they operated their lives and their businesses. This is apparent in the book because
Sittenfeld doesn’t go too deep into the inner workings of either of the twin’s
minds.
I have twin granddaughters, who are twelve, and every time I
read a twin novel (which has happened several times in the last four years), I
look at my beautiful granddaughters and wonder what the future holds for them.
If you enjoy Sisterland, you might also enjoy The
Orphan Sister by Gwendolen Gross or I
See You Everywhere by Julia Glass. I have to say that I liked I See You
Everywhere more.
Sisterland is a very intriguing novel.
The NPR review: http://www.npr.org/2013/06/26/189316744/in-sisterland-familial-fissures-and-a-pair-of-psychic-twins
The New York Times review: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/30/books/review/sisterland-a-novel-by-curtis-sittenfeld.html?_r=0
The interview in the Chicago Tribune: http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2013-06-29/features/ct-prj-0630-curtis-sittenfeld-sisterland-20130629_1_printers-row-journal-kate-violet
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