Vladimir
By Julia May Jonas
238 pages
What’s it about?
The narrator in this novel is a middle-aged professor at a small liberal arts college whose husband (a fellow professor) has just been accused of sexual misconduct by several of his former students. The twist for this novel is that the narrator is NOT a sympathetic character.What did it make me think about?
How the line of what constitutes sexual misconduct keeps moving.Should I read it?
My first question must be – who chose the cover art for this book? Obviously someone changed the cover art before the book was added as a Book of the Month selection. Bad choice! It totally looks like a Harlequin Romance novel and almost put me off of reading it at all. It just does not adequately represent all that this book is about which is why I chose the earlier cover to display. Now about the book-
This book was actually full of ideas that I would love to discuss. The story itself kind of got off track for me towards the end- but so much of this ambitious novel is worth reading. Julia May Jonas writes a very provocative debut and presents us with lots of questions about sexual mortality, generational differences, and the climate in college campuses today. I would definitely pick this one up! Although the cover does not lie, sexuality is a large part of the story, there is so much more to this book than the cover promises.
Quote-
“At one point we would have called these affairs consensual, for they were. … Now, however, young women have apparently lost all agency in romantic entanglements. Now my husband was abusing his power, never mind that power is the reason they desired him in the first place….”
What’s it about?
The narrator in this novel is a middle-aged professor at a small liberal arts college whose husband (a fellow professor) has just been accused of sexual misconduct by several of his former students. The twist for this novel is that the narrator is NOT a sympathetic character.
What did it make me think about?
How the line of what constitutes sexual misconduct keeps moving.
Should I read it?
My first question must be – who chose the cover art for this book? Obviously someone changed the cover art before the book was added as a Book of the Month selection. Bad choice! It totally looks like a Harlequin Romance novel and almost put me off of reading it at all. It just does not adequately represent all that this book is about which is why I chose the earlier cover to display. Now about the book-
This book was actually full of ideas that I would love to discuss. The story itself kind of got off track for me towards the end- but so much of this ambitious novel is worth reading. Julia May Jonas writes a very provocative debut and presents us with lots of questions about sexual mortality, generational differences, and the climate in college campuses today. I would definitely pick this one up! Although the cover does not lie, sexuality is a large part of the story, there is so much more to this book than the cover promises.
Quote-
“At one point we would have called these affairs consensual, for they were. … Now, however, young women have apparently lost all agency in romantic entanglements. Now my husband was abusing his power, never mind that power is the reason they desired him in the first place….”
