Stephanie Johnson on a novel that dissects middle class obsessions
Megan Nicol Reed’s first novel One of Those Mothers is a winning contemporary tale. Jacqueline Bublitz in her cover endorsement describes it as "domestic noir". Contemporary woes – children spending too much time online, the ubiquitous and worsening exposure to pornography, terror of the climate crisis, alcohol and substance use and negotiating modern marriage – are entertainingly evoked.
Central character Bridget, mother of two and wife of Greg, ex-journalist now turned online content producer, guides the reader back and forth between an eventful summer holiday and the last months of the following year. She is honest, hardworking, likeable and prone to anxious examination of herself as mother, wife and friend. The latter is most important.
Bridget and husband Greg are close friends with two other couples, Lucy and Tristan, and Roz and Jono. Tristan is Greg’s best friend, Lucy is Bridget’s, but Roz comes a close second and the women spend as much time together without the men as they do enjoying family barbecues and enduring school functions. They live in the same suburb, Point Heed, and the holiday together, one of many, was spent on an island called Hine.
The unnamed city the friends inhabit is Auckland and Point Heed is Point Chevalier. The architecture, landscape, single road in, the enclosed harbour and view of Highway 16 (given another number in the novel) from the beach, which during Bridget’s childhood was filthy but now is cleaner, makes it clear. Hine, an unlikely name for an island, is more than likely Kawau, complete with colonial mansion. I wished at times that Nicol Reed had set the novel in the places that so obviously occupied her imagination. To own and name your setting is to give the narrative strong roots and resonance.
In all other respects the author is true to her setting. After an island night on E, Lucy remarks that there is a "special skill to parenting when you’re off your face." We can snigger along with Bridget at how an acquaintance’s child is "burdened with being both highly academic and hugely creative. Poor thing." Bridget fears aging and imminent menopause, and all the friends are preoccupied to varying degrees by human sexuality in its various forms: loving, abusive, illicit, commercial and seriously perverted. Bridget and Greg have been married for 13 years, have three children, and their love is still true and strong. Roz has her problems with Jono, Lucy has hers with Tristan.
The depiction of Bridget and Lucy’s friendship is full-blooded. Of all the characters they have known each other for the longest, since they were children. They travelled together and had adventures. Bridget’s childhood was loving, liberal and comfortable; Lucy’s was the diametric opposite. There was a period in their 20s where Lucy dropped from view, caught up in drug addiction, and it was during this time that she had her unpleasant son Zachariah. There are small tensions between the three women, two being company and three a crowd, but they have one another’s backs. The break in the connection, when it comes, is tragic.
Money does not seem to be a problem for any of the friends. They shop easily at the supermarket, cook delicious meals for one another, and enjoy fine wine
The opening chapter quotes "two paltry lines" on a news website that there is a paedophile in Point Head. The action moves slowly and the revelation, when it comes, may well have been predicted by many readers. One of Those Mothers is structured in chapters that mostly alternate between the summer holiday and nine or 10 months later. This dissipates the tension slightly. When the children go missing, the reader does not overly engage because those same children are alive and kicking in the present. Another dissipation occurs when backstory is eagerly filled in, disobeying the old adage to show, not tell.
It's only a slight reservation, though, because the strong characters and mystery of the identity of the neighbourhood child pornographer drive the narration on. Language is plain and the story rapidly told. Sometimes it seems that words that rose to the surface the fastest were used, as in Bridget experiencing a "terrible dullness". Figurative language is rare, and sometimes a little strained. After hearing a friend’s confession, for example, Bridget experiences it as "a woollen shawl embroidered with lead bearing down upon her shoulders, chaffing at her."
Money does not seem to be a problem for any of the friends. They shop easily at the supermarket, cook delicious meals for one another, and enjoy fine wine. All of them own their houses and can afford to holiday away. Food is described lovingly enough to make the reader hungry, even though Bridget will stuff herself with anything she can lay her hands on when she’s stressed. She remarks, wisely, that comfort eating is not comforting. Another winning piece of wisdom she quotes is how "we are only ever as happy as our unhappiest child."
In Nicol Reed’s previous career as a columnist, she was well known for dissecting the obsessions and foibles of the middle classes. One of Those Mothers does this in novel form. The main question she seems to be asking of that sprawling socioeconomic group is, what responsibilities do we bear for our friends in our adult friendships, in the end? And also, more particularly – what responsibility do we owe to their children?
One of Those Mothers by Megan Nicol Reed (Allen & Unwin, $36.99) is available in bookstores nationwide. Stephanie's review concludes our week-long coverage of the novel which may or may not be set to roar up the bestseller charts. Monday: the explosive opening chapter. Tuesday: the author's thoughts on sex. Yesterday: An interview with the author about Dyson vacuums, Bosch fridges, Womanizer vibrators and other middle class possessions.
