Autumn Reads...

We Were The Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates- 5 stars *****

This was my final holiday book, and my favourite. It is an intense read that really plays with the emotions, both good and bad. It begins by describing the Mulvaneys; a perfect American family, wealthy, well respected, living in the countryside with a big farm and a seemingly happy outlook on life. After the Mulvaney's only daughter, Marianne, is raped on her prom night, everything changes, and the book proceeds by showing the awful breakdown of their family life as it once was.

The tale is told through the eyes of Judd, the youngest child, looking back upon his life as an adult. His perspective provides a really interesting take on the story as a whole, as he describes how each family member gradually self destructs trying to pretend as if nothing has happened.

Oates has a way of writing that is unbelievably real, as though each and every character, no matter how minor, is a real person. An example is when she describes Patrick Mulvaney's first experience of a rock concert; 'The lead singer Traumeri was alarmingly emaciated, his chest sickly-pale, virtually concave, covered in an oily film. His bony-pouty face was made up pasty-white, his thick lips crimson, druggy-glassy eyes outlined in black mascara; his dyed black hair, braided in long dreadlocks, flew about his head as he threw himself about the stage with the manic abandon of an epilectic in a seizure.' Traumeri never appears again, yet you can tell that she has clearly constructed him in her head, and this is apparent for all of her characters. It helps to make the whole novel hugely convincing, and because of this it is much more hard-hitting to read when the plot develops.

I honestly loved reading this book, and couldn't recommend it highly enough. It depicts an idealistic picture of family life which makes it heartbreaking to continue reading when it starts to go pearshaped. Though each Mulvaney is drastically different, they all have points in the story where you can relate to how they are feeling, and despite the seemingly happy ending, it leaves you slightly tinged with sorrow that things can't always stay the same.