Book Review #87
You Will Know Me
by Megan Abbott
"You Will Know Me" (a very good title, by the way, for a not very good book that I increasingly grew to dislike) is a kind of cross between "I, Tonya" and "The Bad Seed." Eric and Katie are the parents of Devon, a teenage girl upon whose shoulders lie the hopes and dreams, not only of her family and herself but apparently the entire town. Their wish is that she will rise to the status of an Olympian gymnast. Devon is as driven as everyone around her. Virtually all the parents, including her own, are willing to sacrifice everything, money, morals, the truth, to achieve success for "our Devon." To almost everyone Devon is a stranger. "Nearly sixteen. Fearless. Extraordinary. Like no one else. Only like herself. Whoever that was." Katie, too, is a stranger (or estranged) within her own household. She no longer recognizes her daughter or her husband. No one is who they seem. The entire town is riddled with secrets and lies.
I realize that I am making this novel sound a lot better than it is. Yes, it is highly readable and suspenseful and stuffed with enough red herrings to fill a fish market. But it is also peopled with ugly and unpleasant characters lacking any semblance of morality whose sole purpose in life is driven by ambition. There are also nightmarish words and phrases that jump out at you like cheap shock effects in a horror movie.
Abbott keeps you guessing while creating an undercurrent of desire and dread throughout. But the ending, which should have culminated in a sinister and cynical conclusion, is a complete cop-out.
Devon lies to her parents about what really happened to Ryan, her secret paramour, that fateful night on Ash Road. Eric and Katie and others cover her tracks and shield her from the prying eyes of the police. But how much more powerful would this ending have been if everyone had continued protecting Devon, knowing that she had not been involved in a tragic accident but rather had committed a coldblooded murder? Also, the final sentences of the book are as flat and anticlimatic and disappointing as those that end that other acclaimed thriller "Gone Girl."
by Megan Abbott
"You Will Know Me" (a very good title, by the way, for a not very good book that I increasingly grew to dislike) is a kind of cross between "I, Tonya" and "The Bad Seed." Eric and Katie are the parents of Devon, a teenage girl upon whose shoulders lie the hopes and dreams, not only of her family and herself but apparently the entire town. Their wish is that she will rise to the status of an Olympian gymnast. Devon is as driven as everyone around her. Virtually all the parents, including her own, are willing to sacrifice everything, money, morals, the truth, to achieve success for "our Devon." To almost everyone Devon is a stranger. "Nearly sixteen. Fearless. Extraordinary. Like no one else. Only like herself. Whoever that was." Katie, too, is a stranger (or estranged) within her own household. She no longer recognizes her daughter or her husband. No one is who they seem. The entire town is riddled with secrets and lies.
I realize that I am making this novel sound a lot better than it is. Yes, it is highly readable and suspenseful and stuffed with enough red herrings to fill a fish market. But it is also peopled with ugly and unpleasant characters lacking any semblance of morality whose sole purpose in life is driven by ambition. There are also nightmarish words and phrases that jump out at you like cheap shock effects in a horror movie.
Abbott keeps you guessing while creating an undercurrent of desire and dread throughout. But the ending, which should have culminated in a sinister and cynical conclusion, is a complete cop-out.
Devon lies to her parents about what really happened to Ryan, her secret paramour, that fateful night on Ash Road. Eric and Katie and others cover her tracks and shield her from the prying eyes of the police. But how much more powerful would this ending have been if everyone had continued protecting Devon, knowing that she had not been involved in a tragic accident but rather had committed a coldblooded murder? Also, the final sentences of the book are as flat and anticlimatic and disappointing as those that end that other acclaimed thriller "Gone Girl."
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