Envy

...by Kathryn Harrison. That's the title of the mystery novel. Envy. This is a freaky book; I can't think of any other succinct description. Harrison goes inside the head of Will Moreland, a forty-something psychoanalyst who is himself dealing with: the death of his young son, sexual unease between him and his wife, an absentee twin, a sex-crazed patient, his twenty-fifth college reunion, his father's new art career and new mistress, and surprising news from an old lover. And boy, it all fits together with quite a bang.

It's a bit much really, but she ties Will's life together so neatly that it's hard to begrudge Harrison her fun.

A couple quotes:

Will pondering: "I worry that my tendency to insist upon connections leads me to find significance where there isn't any. Create meanings that don't exist outside of my consciousness."

On his father: "Every once in a while his father makes an observation meant to prove he's not out of touch, leaving Will feeling less impressed than protective of whatever inspires this earnestness, because this is the quality that's most palpable when his father produces what he believes to be evidence of his being hip ... and it's the same quality that insures he'll never be hip."

In my last post, I spoke about how the novel was both cerebral and sexy. The sexiness also has a very creepy edge to it. So it's a dark book, but then again, envy is a dark emotion. And the envy that turns out to be the driving force behind this plot is as dark as it gets.