... engrossing and powerful ... The novel is written in alternating timelines and perspectives, with well-researched nods to the 1970s-1980s Manhattan art scene and keenly felt deep dives into Miranda’s unraveling mental state as she contends with her husband’s increasing jealousy and resentment...Sligar prompts readers to muse on the ways in which artists often suffer greatly for their creations, especially if they are women. She also, with great empathy, explores the potentially devastating effects of untreated mental illness and the downsides of ambition, success and fame ... rife with fascinating dichotomies—gossip is corrosive but sometimes useful; trauma is torturous but may inspire powerful art; success is desirable but exhausting to maintain—and offers a fresh look at the legacies we leave behind, in all their painful and powerful humanity.
... a circuitous first novel ... Ms. Sligar’s debut is by turns an art-world satire, an erotic romance and a descent into madness. Its gratifying conclusion proves well worth the digressive journey.
Like any good noir, Take Me Apart has frequent flashes of fine art, and many passages sparkle with Sligar’s style ... Through the stories of Kate and Miranda, Sligar explores the sticky territory of power dynamics between men and women, whether boss and employee, teacher and student, or husband and wife. She threads a scathing feminist critique throughout both narratives, nailing all the right talking points of the current discourse ... The riskier parts of Take Me Apart are when Sligar opens up the more ambiguous spaces of the #MeToo conversation ... Sligar avoids an easy cliché, changing what could have been a caricature [of Kate] into an authentically complex character ... Exploring this ambiguity may make readers uncomfortable, even upset ... But that’s okay. As Miranda Brand writes in her diary, 'Art is supposed to upset you. Art is supposed to make you feel afraid.'
Sligar, it seems, has added all the correct ingredients to create a book that will appeal to the left-leaning millennial reader. But the result feels less like a novel about actual people than a book designed by algorithm ... This could have made for an enjoyable, well-paced thriller, but Sligar keeps tripping over her own attempts to seem ultracontemporary. Her portraits of 2017 are full of references that usually feel a little off ... the bigger problem is Sligar’s one-dimensional treatment of contemporary social issues. Take Me Apart seems ready to tackle big topics—#MeToo, race and representation—but in the end it’s not clear what Sligar wants to say about them ... The novel’s treatment of racial inequality is similarly superficial ... By trying so hard to please, with synthetic pop-culture asides and woke political takes, Take Me Apart overburdens the engrossing mystery at its heart. 'Our contemporary moment' does call for an urgent response. Novels that tell people what the author thinks they want to hear are anything but.
Sligar exposes the eccentric Miranda’s depression and insanity in unfiltered, uncensored and graphic detail, especially in the diary – including Miranda’s psychiatric hospital stay, her postpartum psychosis and her abusive marriage. Reading it is painful. Yet these are some of the novel’s strongest pages ... But other than Kate’s unhealthy obsession with Miranda, her paranoia, bad decisions and romantic interest in Theo don’t seem as troubling as perhaps they should. Still, our heroine’s mental reliability remains in doubt throughout ... Not actually a murder mystery, or a suspense thriller, Take Me Apart is a low-intensity psychological drama – a reading experience like peeling an onion layer by layer. Clearly a rising new novelist, Sligar writes narrative that’s more absorbing than compelling: You can put this book down, just not for long.
Sligar’s first thriller is cleverly constructed, as she intersperses Kate’s present-day investigation with snippets of archival materials, including letters, receipts and passages from Miranda’s journals. Readers will begin to feel something like archivists or detectives themselves as they help to piece together the fragments of the deceased artist’s life ... This narrative structure is an effective way to convey the story, which unfolds suspensefully. Unfortunately, neither Kate’s mysterious backstory nor the true circumstances of Miranda’s death quite live up to the buildup that the author creates. Sligar capably illustrates the challenges that creative women contend with, but also seems intent on tying both plotlines into the current #MeToo discourse. Although the stories she tells do resonate in some ways with these very real concerns, ultimately the narrative falls short of any sort of overarching thematic clarity ... Overall, however, Take Me Apart is a promising debut that will leave readers eager to see how Sligar continues to grow as a writer.
Sligar’s perceptive debut follows two women who appear collected on the surface but silently endure struggles ... Though the novel falters somewhat in its home stretch, Sligar shows off a keen ear for dialogue, and Kate and Miranda hold interest. With a cool style and fast pace, Sligar achieves a propulsive exploration of these ambitious women’s inner turbulence...
Kate and Miranda are vividly rendered, and an entire novel could easily be crafted out of Miranda’s fascinating diary, letters, and other ephemera, snippets of which are sprinkled liberally throughout. Sligar delivers an intriguing mystery while tackling big themes, especially sexism and the societal restraints placed on women’s bodies and minds. The results are spellbinding ... A raw and sophisticated debut.
