PanThe Times (UK)In this absurd, self-deluded book virtually immobile bodies are deemed as healthy as slim ones and obesity is no more linked with type 2 diabetes than, apparently, using mouthwash ... This book is a super-processed sausage of identity politics and fat activism.
Curtis Sittenfeld
MixedThe Times (UK)Alas, this novel is blighted by Hillary’s perennial problem; as both presidential candidate and fictional protagonist she is admirable, but not loveable. Worse, all the novel’s fun and fizz departs with Bill, a bad boyfriend, but a great character, catalyst and adversary ... However much Sittenfeld wants us to be compelled by Hillary’s intellect, ambition, idealism, her steady, diligent ascent, it’s hard to cry, \'You go, girl!\' when this process is as leaden as Hillary’s actual memoir. Fictional Hillary stands for Senate a decade earlier than in real life, since she isn’t slowed down by eight years as first lady. And, of course, she gets stuck into committees, hearings and progressive legislation. Brava and all that. But also zzzz ... Perhaps the problem with this alternative account of US politics is that the present reality is so exhausting, grotesque and bizarre, any fictionalised alternative seems bland or trifling. And who has the spare mental space? Sittenfeld won’t even grant those who mourned when Hillary lost, who are howling in pain through Trump’s term, a wholly golden catharsis. Along the way she has jettisoned the person who, however much he betrayed her, made her mind and body (and this novel) sing. Rodham is fan fiction that won’t even please the fans.
Anne Tyler
RaveThe Times (UK)Yes, a minor novel, but this being Tyler, it is a fully realised world full of dry humour, especially at the expense of tech hermits everywhere ... Each character is deftly drawn in a few lines ... Tyler notes how each of us tries to create, with rules and little self-deceptions, the fragile edifice of a tolerable life. But also that sometimes we must smash it down in order to love.
