Rachel Cusk, Life of M

- This new novel by Rachel Cusk is both brilliant and sort of annoying. As a reader who loved many of her previous books I was constantly befuddled by the lack of clarity in this one. Who is the narrator - a woman or a man? Who is 'we' - one person or a couple? We are thrust into confusing and unreal worlds.   

- Cusk wrestles with the concept of 'reality' and its distortions. Of course movie scenes are fake, and acting is fake. The narrator and the actress are both constructing fictional worlds. 

- Cusk has no doubt based the character 'M' on the celebrated actress Natalie Portman. The unnamed films she refers to are Portman classics: Leon: The Professional (1994) and Black Swan (2010) for which she won an Oscar. Portman has apparently complained about how M was portrayed by Cusk, which is a little unfair as M in the novel is highly likeable, generous, grounded and approachable. 'She is unable to see selfishness as anything other than the product of stupidity'. 

- Cusk may be examining unreality but she also details the real world in numerous chapters. 'We’ describe the city and countryside they walk in (unnamed but Paris and its surrounds no doubt) and visit a museum and a bakery. They reflect on garbage collectors, bodies, tourists, the river and its bridges, the homeless and their strewn rubbish, dogs, pigeons, their parents’ house, and their domestic staff. 

- M's real world is luxurious: her mansion and its furniture, the spa, sauna and pool on top of a tall building, the principal actors room in a theatre, the fashion cocktail event which will be filmed. (Portman represents Dior in real life). M feels like an alien in this terrestrial scene. She avoids the city's famous and elaborate restaurants. 

- As the book proceeds M is seen as mature and wise. She understands stuff and can manage her career's ups and downs. 

- An excellent chapter towards the end describes M’s interview with a respected journalist. She finds him very attractive. At one point they discuss sex scenes in movies old and new. She feels lost. 

- And the final chapter is a sort of reckoning. The author visits M who tells her she doesn’t like the way the author's portrayed her. ‘Actually, it’s hurtful’, she says, and then she asks 'Are you a guy or a girl?' They are the last words in the novel. And they are quite meaningful given all her experiences of male behaviour, both good and bad, in her career. 

- So is this novel worth reading? Absolutely.