A wife discovering a sex doll is the catalyst but the author offers deep insights into loneliness and human frailty
Should you dread wandering into the darker areas of your home for fear of encountering a nest of decomposing mice, spare a thought for Dolores, the narrator of Sarah Crossan’s latest novel, who, in the opening pages, opens a bag in her garage to discover “a woman with long, smooth limbs ... her hair disarranged, her lips fleshy, her eyes open”.
Angered but also intrigued by David’s intimacy with an object made primarily from latex and electrical chips, Dolores admits to owning a toy of her own although the battery has run down and she can’t find the charger. It’s a throwaway line but one that tells the reader a lot about her relationship with her own body.
Simultaneously, she finds herself drawn to one of her students, Oliver. Ironically, she’s trying to tear him away from the rumours of a liaison with a young woman teacher. No matter how often the reader suspects that something untoward is going to take place, Crossan subverts our expectations, leaving us instead to decipher what he, a quiet and studious boy, is adding to her life.
There’s an old saying that if you want unqualified loyalty and unconditional love, get a dog. That might have been true for centuries but, in 2024, it’s easy to see the allure of a doll that, for the most part, replicates the human experience while offering none of the trauma associated with connection to our fellow beings.
Discussing this thought-provoking novel with a writer friend who also had a chance to read it before publication, my phone pinged with, “It remained with me; how do we write about trauma?” A good answer to this question would be, ask Sarah Crossan.Like Love by Maggie Nelson review: wise, genre-defying observations from a very sharp thinker
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