Published 3rd September 2020 by riverrun/Quercus Books.
From the cover of the book:
While Hank struggles with his lack of professional success, his wife Jenny, feeling stuck and beset by an urge to do good, becomes ensnared in a dangerous correspondence with a prison inmate called John. Letter by letter, John pinches Jenny awake from the "marshmallow numbness" of her life. The children, meanwhile, unwittingly disturb the foundations of their home life with forays into the dark net and strange geological experiments.Jenny's bid for freedom takes a sour turn when she becomes the go-between for John and his wife, and develops an unnatural obsession for the orange glue that seals his letters...
Love Orange throws open the blinds of American life, showing a family facing up to the modern age, from the ascendancy of technology, the predicaments of masculinity, the pathologising of children, the epidemic of opioid addiction and the tyranny of the WhatsApp Gods.
The first novel by the acclaimed translator is a comic cocktail, an exuberant skewering of contemporary anxieties and prejudices.
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Welcome to Love Orange - Natasha Randall's State of the Union address about the reality of life in modern day USA!
This is the story of the Tinkley family: to all intents and purposes a typical white, American middle class Mom, Pop and two children set-up, and a shining example of the ideal cutesy apple-pie image that harkens back to the 1950's nostalgia they all hold so dear. But practically everything we see on the surface is as artificial as the plastic beams that make up their "Arts and Crafts Style" home, and it is not long before the cracks start to show.
Our pop, Hank Tinkley, is struggling with the role he feels he should be projecting as the head of the household, and his need to be true to the Viking blood that runs in his veins, but he is floundering, even if he cannot admit this to his wife. He feels that the only way to be a strong father and husband is to stamp his authority on his family, save them from the dark underbelly of real life, and force his boys to develop the manly side of their characters at the expense of any softer feelings, although he likes to kid himself that he is really a 'modern man' with new age ideas. His brand of masculinity is misguided and toxic and his insistence that weakness, and "wrong behaviours" are unacceptable is causing his wife and children much unhappiness - as is his smug concept of a smart home that will surely take the strain off his wife, despite her feelings in the matter.
Our mom, of the piece, Jenny Tinkley has fallen into marriage with a man she hoped would be a good provider for her and their children, but she is disenchanted with her lot, lonely and torn between the fierce protectiveness she feels for her boys and a yearning for something more. Her husband takes her for granted, assuming that the home he has provided is everything she needs to make her life easier, but in reality she feels like she has lost control of her own domain. She feels, worthless and disconnected, like an empty shell and has resorted to finding comfort, quite literally, in a correspondence with a prison inmate, who she feels will be sympathetic to her feeling of being trapped.
Then we have our two boys: Jesse the burgeoning teenager, full of angst and conflicting emotions with no idea of how to balance these emerging sides of himself - and without the kind of role model of a father he really needs; and lovely, sweet, inquisitive Luke, with his quirky ways and total bewilderment at what is expected of him - and his need to hide away somewhere safe.
This is a family tearing itself apart at the seams, with a total inability to sit down and really talk to each other, and as the book progresses Natasha Randall takes us cleverly into their heads so we feel like voyeurs watching on as their family unit disintegrates. Hank can't seem to stop himself from doing wrong in failing to understand his family, especially with his boys, who end up feeling inadequate and not quite up to the mark, and Jenny becomes more and more isolated and dependent on the mysterious sweet orange glue that seals the envelopes of her prison pen pal.
This may sound like pretty heavy stuff that will break your heart, and you would be right, especially when it comes to Jesse and Luke, but it is also the warts and all picture of the kind of dysfunctional family that I fear is all too common. However, there is also a lot of humour to be found in these pages from the absurd situations that arise and some of it is totally laugh out loud funny, and this serves to break up the novel nicely and make it surprisingly easy to read.
There are some complex themes here that are artfully explored by Natasha Randall, which is very impressive for a debut author. Obviously, the most apparent ones are social disconnection and isolation, brought on by the stresses and strains of modern life. Our author does not really offer up any answers to the questions she poses, other than the implicit suggestion that communication is to be advised, and it is easy to conclude that humans are in need of some form of "pain relief" to get through it - whether this be chemical, or technological. This makes this book an absolute corker of a choice for a book club read, or in my own case, as a buddy read, because there is so much to discuss.
One of my favourite take aways from this book is that technology has a lot to answer for in terms of removing the face-to-face contact, and sense of purpose that humans need to function, and proving an appropriate outlet for working out our emotions, and Natasha Randall works this theme all the way through the novel to great effect.
This is a book that provokes strong emotions in its reader and I found this highly enjoyable - although perhaps enjoyable is not the right word to describe many of the feelings it elicits - in any case, this is an experience of a book that will set you thinking some deep, deep thoughts. It's brilliant.... read it!
Thank you to Natasha Randall and riverrun for gifting me a copy of this book in return for an honest review, and for inviting me to be part of this wonderful buddy read adventure!
About the author:
Natasha Randall is a literary translator whose translations include Notes from an Underground by Dostoyevsky, A Hero of Our Time by Lermontov, and We by Zamyatin. She has edited a volume of Gogol for riverrun, Quercus. Her articles and reviews have appeared in the TLS, LA Review and the NYT. She lives in London with her husband and young children.
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