Maggie; or, a Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar
By Katie Yee
★★★★★★★★☆☆ 8/10
208 pages
What’s it about?
Our unnamed narrator walks into a restaurant with her unnamed husband, perfectly content. She later walks out of the restaurant with the knowledge that her husband is having an affair and is in love with another woman. As she tries to process this, she finds herself walking into a doctor's office and walking out with the knowledge that she has cancer. Our unnamed narrator has so much to process. With the help of her best friend Darlene, she makes her way through both crises and finds herself on the other side.
What did it make me think about?
Marriage, health, family, and how tenuous our lives are.
Should I read it?
I love a novel with some underlying humor. While this is not laugh-out-loud funny (her circumstances are not humorous), the narrator has a unique perspective on the world, and her observations did make me smile. I found her coping mechanisms to be quite different from what I assume mine would be. Where is the anger? While not outwardly emotional, she is a keen observer, and that is what makes this novel work. She is a compelling character that I am guessing some women will not like. However, I am glad to have met her- although I still don't know her name...
A passage I marked
"My kids are half silver spoon and half service industry."
