´Close your eyes, Thursday. See it again, as it really way´.
Thursday, the storyteller of The Wives by Tarryn Fisher is apparently part of a polygamist triangle with other two women. She is the ´official´ wife, while one is a former and the other the newest and youngest acquisition, pregnant with Seth´s child. But as we are advancing through the story, from a relativey slow start, focused on explaining the distribution of roles between the three, based on the days of the week the husband is visiting them and other details of the relationship dynamics, we are suddenly brought into a grey zone of doubt and suspense: should we really believe Thursday?
´I remember thinking how fragile we were as humans, souls covered in tender flesh and brittle bone; one wrong step and we became someone else entirely´.
From one paragraph to another, you get more and more confused. Is there anything Thursday herself is hiding? Does she tell the truth? Is she indeed seriously mentally disturbed in order to deserve being placed in a mental institution? What about the ´wives´?
Thus, from one eventful polygamist story we are smoothly transitioning towards a suspenseful psychological thriller with a special focus on (women) mental health. After all, I was thinking, mostly unrelated to the story, are men so easily and fast accepted into a mental health facility and threated as irresponsible adults? But this is just my random spin which does not necessarily have anything to do with the topic of the book.
Although equally interesting, the game of the smoked mirrors confusing the reader, finelly played, is however not completely and, in my opinion, in a very moderate way. I would have liked more radical connections and even more shocking twists, but maybe it was because I was on vacation and my brain was missing the everyday dosis of work-infused adrenaline.
I would love to explore more books by Fisher as for sure I enjoyed her style and brutal exploring of deceiving and mental fragility.
Rating: 3.5 stars
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