Grown Ups by Marie Aubert
Review by Hannah Clark
Grown Ups is tiny but mighty. At 154 pages, it will take up very little space on your overstuffed bookshelf, but don’t be fooled: this novel, for all that it is lightly handled by Marie Aubert, hits hard, and it stays with you.
The story is set in the Norwegian countryside, at a cabin on the shore of a lake in summer. Ida is a successful architect, but her achievements in life have begun to sour next to the fact that she is forty-years old, single, and childless. Having made the decision to investigate the possibility of freezing her eggs to prolong her chances of starting a family, Ida travels to the cabin where she and her younger sister, Marthe, and Marthe’s husband and step-daughter, are gathering to celebrate her mother’s 65th birthday. The novel takes place over a long-weekend and from the moment Ida arrives at the cabin, tensions rise and resentments, new and old, begin to simmer.
The central relationship within the novel is that of Ida and Marthe, and the tangled complexity of love that exists between siblings, particularly sisters. Ida considers Marthe, who has been struggling with infertility for three years, to be weak for being so entirely consumed by her desire for motherhood. As the story progresses, we see more of the painful and difficult experiences that have shaped their present day relationship and the conflict it causes. Although the story is told from Ida’s perspective, it does not side with her — there is no good versus bad in this novel, only clash after painful clash of human fragility that leaves both sides weary and battle-scarred.
A weekend away with family in a remote spot with few distractions, and the inevitable flashpoints caused by such close confines, is hardly a new concept in literature. But Aubert uses this well worn set-up entirely to her advantage. With little in the way of exposition, she plunges the reader head-first into Ida’s cutting observations of her family and the lives they are all leading. To this end, Aubert is fearless and, at times, ruthless in her open portrayal of the petty jealousies, spiteful thoughts, and long-held resentments that dwell within all of us, but are normally kept buried deep.
Grown Ups is Aubert’s debut novel, and it is also her first literary work to be translated from the original Norwegian into English, though I hold out hope that if Grown Ups is as successful as it deserves to be, her 2016 collection of short stories Can I come home with you? might too be translated and those of us who are English speaking and unilingual will have the opportunity to experience more of Aubert’s singular aptitude for presenting the difficulties of being human with grace and sensitivity, and her unerring ability to find humour in the darkest corners.
Grown Up is published by Pushkin Press, 3rd June 2021