Book Review: "Friends and Strangers" by J. Courtney Sullivan
“Friends and Strangers” by J. Courtney Sullivan
Synopsis: Elisabeth, an accomplished journalist and new mother, is struggling to adjust to life in a small town after nearly twenty years in New York City. Alone in the house with her infant son all day (and awake with him much of the night), she feels uneasy, adrift. She neglects her work, losing untold hours to her Brooklyn moms' Facebook group, her "influencer" sister's Instagram feed, and text messages with the best friend she never sees anymore. Enter Sam, a senior at the local women's college, whom Elisabeth hires to babysit. Sam is struggling to decide between the path she's always planned on and a romantic entanglement that threatens her ambition. She's worried about student loan debt and what the future holds. In short order, they grow close. But when Sam finds an unlikely kindred spirit in Elisabeth's father-in-law, the true differences between the women's lives become starkly revealed and a betrayal has devastating consequences.
A masterful exploration of motherhood, power dynamics, and privilege in its many forms, Friends and Strangers reveals how a single year can shape the course of a life.—Knopf
Rating (out of 5): 4.5
Review: J. Courtney Sullivan’s new novel is a lovely, eminently readable, compelling story about two women, and the way privilege informs their relationship. Elisabeth is a recent transplant to suburbia from a (highly) gentrified corner of Brooklyn, adrift in a sea of SAHMs with whom she feels she has nothing in common. She’s also secretly squandered her nest egg by giving it to her influencer sister, whose promises to repay seem increasingly fruitless. In order to return to her professional life, she hires a nanny, Sam, who is a senior at the local women’s college from a lower middle class background.
Elisabeth and Sam become close, blurring the lines of their professional relationship as they confide in each other. Sam has her own struggles, with a much-older boyfriend who adores her but is kind of a cad, and constant worries about money when peers are more than flush with cash. Their relationship becomes more and more entangled, and they each cross boundaries into each other’s lives that change their paths permanently.
Both Elisabeth and Sam are compelling and sympathetic, if flawed. No Nanny Diaries Mrs. X here, Elisabeth cares deeply about Sam, even if her oversteps can be cringeworthy. She is blinded by her own privilege—but then, even Sam struggles to acknowledge her own privilege when overstepping into the lives of co-workers at her university.
The book doesn’t tell a huge story: its scope is small, and it is long—and I loved this about it. We get to know Sam and Elisabeth so well that the minutiae of their lives is deeply affecting to us. The betrayal that occurs near the end of the book is thoroughly heartbreaking and believable.
This is a 2020 must-read, definitely among my top five of the calendar year!
TL;DR: Add this to your beach read stash (or your sitting in the backyard pretending you’re at the beach stash). This is a lovely, well-paced examination of privilege and power, written in a compellingly conversational tone.
If you liked this, try:
Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid-(SFOL Book Club here)-Bookshop | Kindle
Maine by J. Courtney Sullivan-Bookshop | Kindle
The Hopefuls by Jennifer Close- Bookshop | Kindle
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