How far would you go to get the money to lead the life of your dreams? That’s the central question in Come and Get It, Kiley Reid’s second novel. Race relations were the focal point of the American author’s first book, the bestselling and zeitgeisty Such a Fun Age, which was longlisted for the 2020 Booker prize. In that novel Emira, a young black woman, is falsely accused of kidnapping while babysitting the three-year-old daughter of a privileged white family. Now, in Come and Get It, personal wealth (or lack thereof) is the catalyst for the tension in almost every encounter between Reid’s spirited cast of characters – though we’re still in contemporary America, so we haven’t left racism behind either.
At first, the stakes here seem lower than in Such a Fun Age. No one threatens to call the police within the book’s first chapter, anyway. Millie is a 24-year-old resident assistant at the University of Arkansas, a senior who lives in dormitory accommodation and is on hand to help with problems that arise in the halls. It’s a paid position, which is crucial for Millie, who, “after becoming mildly addicted to TV shows featuring tiny houses and youngish owners”, dreams of buying her own home. She just needs to save the money for a downpayment.
Unlikely financial assistance arrives in the form of 37-year-old Agatha, an author and visiting professor, who first encounters Millie when she calls at the halls of residence to interview a group of students about weddings as research for her next book. Agatha has come to the university from Chicago to escape her own problem: the end of a relationship with a financially dependent partner.
During her initial interview, Agatha is struck by the three students’ callousness and their flippant attitudes towards money – or their parents’. Jenna, Tyler and Casey would make great characters, she thinks. So she and Millie devise a plan by which she can complete more research. Sitting on the floor in Millie’s bedroom, Agatha can hear everything that is said on the other side of the wall – the dorm where Jenna, Tyler and Casey hang out. For every covert visit, Agatha pays Millie $40 for her assistance. Agatha begins selling highly edited versions of these overheard conversations as “money diaries” to Teen Vogue.
Millie and Agatha’s relationship soon becomes sexual. It doesn’t bode well, given the power imbalance. But it’s not the only part of this book that will make you wince. Many of Tyler and Jenna’s exchanges are bigoted. “Awwww, look at her. Little Mexican bebe,” Tyler says, as her friend wraps herself up in a blanket. “I know. I’m just a cute little refugee over here,” is Jenna’s response. Of course, that quote is a shoo-in for one of Agatha’s articles. Here at least it’s clear that Reid is in on the joke, the joke being the ignorance of these white, privileged dorm mates.
On other occasions, it is Reid’s style that is laughable. “It didn’t make a lot of sense but Simi looked like a backpack,” she writes in one inane description of a student. “An Aerosmith song came on from the overhead speakers, the one where he doesn’t want to miss a thing” is a later line, which is just asking to become a meme. What’s more, Reid’s rendering of Casey’s Alabamian accent (the author was born in Los Angeles) feels mocking in its relentlessness: “Hah there … Ah’m Casey. Ah’m a senior at the University of Arkansas … and Ah’ll be 21 this Saturday.”
The novel builds to an unfeasibly violent dorm scene. In exploring the financial anxieties of young women, Reid gives just attention to an important but rarely examined topic. But her depictions too often feel like farce. And what’s the point in that?
Ellen Peirson-Hagger is assistant culture editor at the New Statesman
• Come and Get It by Kiley Reid is published by Bloomsbury (£16.99). To support the Guardian and Observer order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply
