Despite their appalling faults, Dani really did like the Normal Women. She really, really did. Usually. Sometimes, anyway. And maybe, eventually, she could persuade the Normal Women to not be dicks; show the Normal Women, at the very least, that all the best-looking people held the same views that Dani did.
Just as with her last novel, Motherthing, Ainslie Hogarth has written a truly strange/entertaining/relatable/feminist work of fiction this time around with Normal Women. And it maybe won’t be for everyone, but I winced and laughed and nodded my head with recognition throughout; and while straight married women might benefit from seeing themselves in this, men might benefit even more by getting a peek inside their wives’ secret thoughts. I loved the whole thing. (Note: I read an ARC through NetGalley and passages quoted may not be in their final form.)
As I did with Motherthing, I’m going to start with a longish quote that gives a representative sense of the style: Here, the main character, Dani, is remembering being out for lunch with a group of moms (the “Normal Women”) while pregnant and having asked what a “fourth degree tear” is during childbirth (and one having replied that it means a bad rip, from “poo hole to goo hole”) :
That’s not going to be for everyone, but it worked for me. The review proper:
While pregnant with their first child — and living in a cramped one bedroom condo in the city — Dani’s husband, Clark, announces that he’s up for a big promotion — one that means Dani can be a stay-at-home mom if she wants — but the catch is that they would have to move back to Dani’s hometown; which is complicated given the well-known family legacy that she had tried to run away from. On the one hand, Dani (with a degree in philosophy) doesn’t have a “career” per se — and they already know that finding day care will be an issue — but on the other, Dani understands the power and freedom that she’ll be giving up if she allows Clark to make all the money. In the end, moving closer to her mother and her oldest friend (who introduces her to her mommy group, the “Normal Women”), and being able to buy a large family home, convinces Dani to make the move. But when one of Clark’s coworkers is diagnosed with colon cancer, Dani realises how financially vulnerable she and her infant daughter are; and when she notices how glamorous and carefree the staff of a local yoga studio/spa/nightclub/ (brothel?) appears to be, she begins to wonder if working somewhere like that could be her safety net.
The relationship between Dani and Clark is 100% believable: they are both a little selfish, a little guarded, but make efforts to take care of one another (with both feeling resentful when those efforts aren’t recognised). They are also unequivocally devoted to their daughter, Lotte — Clark being the kind of dad who bristles when someone calls it babysitting as he cares for his own child; Dani being the kind of mom who scrolls online mommy forums to confirm her ideas about motherhood — both of them giving Lotte constant attention and love and care. Dani’s new friends are wealthy and chic — with their cocktail brunches, athletic tights, affogatos, and momfluencer blogs — and while the details of Dani’s modern experience are different from my days as a stay-at-home mom, Hogarth absolutely captured the ambivalence of the situation; of feeling both gratitude and resentment; being both anchored and trapped. When Dani starts a friendship with the owner of The Temple, this Renata explains that men, too, are trapped in their roles, as they have had the “crucial feminine” stamped out of them since birth:
I’m just hitting some of the beats here — there’s plenty more plot going on to develop the characters and relate the truths — but again, I winced and laughed and nodded my head with recognition throughout; this reads like lived experience, and I saw myself in it. I enjoy Hogarth’s voice and style and I will read her again.
As I did with Motherthing, I’m going to start with a longish quote that gives a representative sense of the style: Here, the main character, Dani, is remembering being out for lunch with a group of moms (the “Normal Women”) while pregnant and having asked what a “fourth degree tear” is during childbirth (and one having replied that it means a bad rip, from “poo hole to goo hole”) :
Maybe that’s why the C-section happened. Because Dani had just wanted it so very badly: sweating, panicked, coiled helplessly around every contraction, incapable of just letting go, of breathing, her mind’s eye yoked to Ellen’s salted lips, tight around the vowels: “poooooo hole to goooooo hole.” And the body is just such a mysterious thing, especially as it pertains to childbirth. In fact, after reading book after book about the connection between fear and pain, the orgasmic, ecstatic, rapturous birth experience, the power of visualizations — I am petals unfurling, I am huge, I am opening wide as a cave, exactly as I should, for my baby to spill without pain — one might even come to the conclusion that the body is only mysterious as it pertains to childbirth. That otherwise it’s actually pretty predictable: a system of sphincters and pipes and cables that harmonize chaos like the warming of an orchestra pit, ins and outs and organs thumping, processing fuel, petals unfurling, becoming huge, ejecting waste and sometimes life, and that was Lotte, Dani’s precious baby, who mercifully bypassed her vagina, cried only when she really meant it, and completed a truly sublime figure eight when she pressed her face into Dani’s breast to eat.
That’s not going to be for everyone, but it worked for me. The review proper:
No one had to tell Clark to be good. He simply was good. He bought ethically sourced coffee. He donated a dollar when prompted by cashiers. He never took a sick day and doggedly pursued promotions and took on extra projects and stayed late and mentored his juniors. Clark did everything correctly, and all he asked for in return was everything.
While pregnant with their first child — and living in a cramped one bedroom condo in the city — Dani’s husband, Clark, announces that he’s up for a big promotion — one that means Dani can be a stay-at-home mom if she wants — but the catch is that they would have to move back to Dani’s hometown; which is complicated given the well-known family legacy that she had tried to run away from. On the one hand, Dani (with a degree in philosophy) doesn’t have a “career” per se — and they already know that finding day care will be an issue — but on the other, Dani understands the power and freedom that she’ll be giving up if she allows Clark to make all the money. In the end, moving closer to her mother and her oldest friend (who introduces her to her mommy group, the “Normal Women”), and being able to buy a large family home, convinces Dani to make the move. But when one of Clark’s coworkers is diagnosed with colon cancer, Dani realises how financially vulnerable she and her infant daughter are; and when she notices how glamorous and carefree the staff of a local yoga studio/spa/nightclub/ (brothel?) appears to be, she begins to wonder if working somewhere like that could be her safety net.
The relationship between Dani and Clark is 100% believable: they are both a little selfish, a little guarded, but make efforts to take care of one another (with both feeling resentful when those efforts aren’t recognised). They are also unequivocally devoted to their daughter, Lotte — Clark being the kind of dad who bristles when someone calls it babysitting as he cares for his own child; Dani being the kind of mom who scrolls online mommy forums to confirm her ideas about motherhood — both of them giving Lotte constant attention and love and care. Dani’s new friends are wealthy and chic — with their cocktail brunches, athletic tights, affogatos, and momfluencer blogs — and while the details of Dani’s modern experience are different from my days as a stay-at-home mom, Hogarth absolutely captured the ambivalence of the situation; of feeling both gratitude and resentment; being both anchored and trapped. When Dani starts a friendship with the owner of The Temple, this Renata explains that men, too, are trapped in their roles, as they have had the “crucial feminine” stamped out of them since birth:
“Imagine if men could enjoy tenderness, could connect with other people, the way they did when they were infants. Imagine the world this could be. Right now, a lot of men, not all men but a lot of them, when they indulge in tenderness, when they experience vulnerability, they become enraged, ashamed, humiliated. It makes them want to kill us, literally. Hurt people. But the men that come to The Temple, the men we work with, they’re changing. And they’re changing each other. They’re changing their brothers, their nephews. Their sons. We’re making a difference here, Dani. Maybe even saving the fucking world.”
I’m just hitting some of the beats here — there’s plenty more plot going on to develop the characters and relate the truths — but again, I winced and laughed and nodded my head with recognition throughout; this reads like lived experience, and I saw myself in it. I enjoy Hogarth’s voice and style and I will read her again.
