Body Friend unfolds across the days following an operation, during which the novel’s unnamed protagonist meets two women also in recovery, Frida and Sylvia. Their presence is a relief to the protagonist, who sees her own chronic pain reflected in them and feels an immediate intimacy with each, a feeling that gives her an “inexplicable certainty” that she knows their experience and vice versa. In her third novel, Vogel prize-winner Katherine Brabon uses the inversions of these women to draw out specific, contradictory aspects of her protagonist and to explore the complex realities of a body in pain.
Despite the deep and instant connection the protagonist feels with each woman, Frida and Sylvia are polar opposites. Frida finds strength in exercise and encourages the protagonist to join her on daily swims, both pushing themselves towards the goal of recovery. Frida’s presence in her life is energising and compulsive – “her words were golden to me; I never spoke to myself like this.” She tries to keep up with Frida’s obsessive commitment to swimming and physical therapy, convinced that their bodies must continue to reflect each other. But on a day when the protagonist is exhausted by this determination and cannot push through the pain of her body, she meets Sylvia, who encourages her to rest, to go slow. With Sylvia, the protagonist eases into her pain, allowing her body the time it needs to rest – until she becomes frustrated with the pace and once again seeks out the pool and Frida.
