I’m a bit out of the loop. The film adaptation of this novel was nominated for three Academy Awards in 2007, yet when I plucked the book from the ‘last chance’ shelf at Chapters, I had never heard of it before.
I paid $2 for this book. Two bucks, can you believe it?
What drew me to the book was the sexy-wexy cover of Kate Winslet and some dude I didn’t recognize (He turns out to be hottie Patrick Wilson).
That Ms. Winslet is just something else, isn’t she? She is stunningly beautiful, yet at the same time she seems like she’d be very down-to-earth and approachable. I can completely picture myself sneaking a cigarette with her behind the school auditorium while our kids fumble around on stage dressed as turkeys for a Thanksgiving pageant.
And, oh, yeah – she can actually act.
Since the cover art for my movie tie-in edition of Little Children reminded me of the poster for the movie Blow, my subconscious decided this book would be about drug addiction.
Which it is not.
The original cover art of two goldfish crackers ‘kissing’ on the grass is a better depiction of the subject matter of the novel. In fact, it is artistic genius. I could do a whole blog post on the symbolism of goldfish crackers.
Maybe next time.
This book is a terrific character study. What is really remarkable is that I deeply dislike most of the characters in this story. A few of them outright repulse me. Yet I love the book and you should too.
What follows is not so much a review, but my rambling, somewhat incoherent, book club discussion-y thoughts, feeling and opinions on the characters of the novel. It is rife with spoilers, so if you plan to read this book (and you should), please bookmark this page and come back after you’ve read the novel. Then we can tawk.
Remember: Spoilers follow. Don’t act like I didn’t give you a chance to bail.
First, let’s start with the “men” in this book! Ugh.
Todd
Todd is a total pussy. He’s afraid to talk to his wife and he won’t get a real job. And before you all start harping on me about how “being a stay-at-home parent IS a real job”, let me say this: The man just spent over 100 grand on law school, and now he won’t even ball up and make a legit attempt at the bar exam. Being a stay-at-home-parent is fine, if that was the family plan he and his wife agreed to. But it isn’t. The plan was for him to become a lawyer so his wife, Kathy, could take her turn at being a stay-at-home parent. He’s not holding up his end of the bargain because he’s “scared” and he also won’t talk to his wife about it.
There is a scene in which he recalls an incident in his frat house, where a drunk “chubby” girl absolutely insists on giving all of the boys blow-jobs. I mean, she practically raped him, right? There was just no way out of that situation for poor old Todd. *eyeroll* That’s how Todd makes it sound – like he was coerced into the situation, like he submitted to it against his will, when he easily could have shown some steel, stood up and walked away. OR, he could just be man enough to admit that he enjoyed it and would do it again!
Some will argue - “Hey, what about gender equity? You don’t believe it’s possible for a young man with low self-esteem to be coerced into sex? It happens to women in college all the time!” Yes, it does happen to women all the time. But here’s the thing: Ask Todd if he enjoyed that blowjob. Ask Todd if he was in physical pain afterwards. Ask Todd if he spent the next few weeks, months, or years of his life spiralling into a depression over the incident. Ask Todd being ‘coerced’ into oral sex with a girl at a frat party had a negative effect on all his future sexual relationships.
That is why I do not believe a grown man can be ‘coerced’ into oral sex with a female at a frat party.
In the end, it’s not surprising to me at all when Todd doesn’t show up in the park to meet Sarah. Admittedly, this was the best move as I don’t think a ‘normal’ relationship between the two would have been successful. Todd isn’t ready for the job, and Sarah’s expectations are too high. Instead, he’ll go back to leading his dull, unsatisfying life.
Richard
Wah, wah, wah, my wife and kids have trapped me. Sorry, Richard, did she get pregnant by herself (referring to his first wife)? No, I believe you had a hand in that. So stop blaming your entire life’s failures on her. And yeah, if I was one of your grown twin daughters, I wouldn’t want to talk to you either after what you did to our mom. But I’d still take your “buckets of money”, too, because you fucking OWE IT TO US!
His storyline isn’t cleanly wrapped up. We can assume he’s helping Slutty Kay make mucho dinero with his scheme for mass-producing used panties, but I don’t for a second believe he’s going to fall into any sort of domestic bliss with Slutty Kay/Carla. He’s just far too much of a weasel.
Enjoy your lifetime of child support and alimony payments, Richard. That’s a lot of panties!
Ronnie J. McGorvey
I think my feelings for Ronnie the baby killer are pretty obvious. Perrotta did a fabulous job with that character – I felt no sympathy towards him at all. I felt loads for his mother, May, but not for R.J. The fact that he had “paid his debt to society” is irrelevant to me – child molesters cannot be reformed. Period.
Larry Hedges
Seriously, dude, get a life. Yeah, I wouldn’t want a child molester in my neighbourhood either, but leaving flaming poop on an old lady’s doorstep? Waking up neighbours at 3am with a bullhorn? Your wife has left you over this. It’s time to move on to more constructive hobbies.
Football
One thing I found distracting about the book is the author describes the football scenes using a lot of jargon. Is it assumed that anyone who reads the book will know what “3 and 15” or “snap” or “scrimmage” or “third down sweep” means? I guess for those of us that don’t speak Football, it doesn’t really matter if we can picture how the game is going down.
The author did do a good job of describing the hits and trash-talk, which I suppose was the important aspect of childish midnight football league.
Now for the women. The women of Little Children are the stronger characters. I wonder if Perrotta planned it this way to flow with the recurrent theme of feminism in the book. Or perhaps it’s just art imitating life. I mean, really – if there is any doubt as to which is the weaker sex, just compare the behaviour of a sick man to that of a sick woman.
Sarah Pierce
I identify with Sarah the most, and not just because of her frizzy hair.
Sometimes I feel like I’m not living the life I could have lived. I’m not a stay-at-home mom like she is, but I do feel I’m ‘wasting’ my talent at my present day job – it’s just a way to pay the bills. I do have my aromatherapy business, but that doesn’t bring in anywhere close to the money my day job does, plus there are no health benefits for a self-employed small business owner.
Unlike Sarah, though, I truly love my partner and I never feel that he is the cause of what is lacking in my life. He is also not a panty-sniffing cheater, as far as I know. And I’ve no desire to cheat, since my man is already the hottest dad on the playground.
At the end of the novel, when Todd doesn’t show up for their meeting, she doesn’t break down or start wondering, “Why, God?! Why ME?!” She takes it on the chin and just moves on with her life. I can almost picture her shrugging her shoulders and saying, “Eh, well.” She immediately turns her focus to where it probably should have been all along: raising her daughter the best she can. Sarah redeems herself in the end, the only character in the book that does.
{I feel that Kate Winslet, as fabulous as she is, was miscast for this role. She is far too beautiful for me to imagine as the plain-Jane Sarah.}
Kathy
Even though she is repeatedly described as being absolutely gorgeous, she has pretty much no self esteem. How do I know this? Because after she finds out her husband is having sex with another woman, that he may possibly love this other woman, her response it to try to win him back with a romantic second honeymoon weekend.
Many people may think the opposite. That this is not a sign of low confidence, but a sign of strength – she refuses to let her man go without a fight! I’ll tell you what, honey – that’s a bunch of bullshit women have picked up from watching too much The Bachelor. A real woman doesn’t have to fight for a man. You either want me, or you don’t, but I ain’t gonna stick around here waiting for you to make your decision.
Mary Ann
I know a million women just like her. Girls who married young to pretty much the first guy they ever fucked and then spend the next ten years of their life being jealous and judgmental of their peers who actually got to live life a little before getting married. You know what? Every single one of those women were divorced by the age of 30. Also, I’m pretty sure her husband, Lewis, is gay.
A Discovery of Witches: A Novel by Deborah Harkness
