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A review by kristinana
A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore
4.0
Like other reviewers here, I am more familiar with Moore’s short stories, which I absolutely adore. Ultimately, I found the book to have the same brilliance and razor-sharp wit of the short stories even though I found it uneven.
At first, I was disappointed by this novel and found it difficult to get into because Moore was making what seemed like a series of rookie mistakes. (God, does it make me sound like an asshole to say that or what?) The first problem for me was that Moore didn’t give us enough information about the narrator before putting her into the situation of being interviewed for a job by the other main character in the book. So what happens is, we then get a rumination or further explanation from the narrator after every interview question the employer asks. The problem with this is twofold: it disrupts the flow of the conversation, and it means that we are thrust too quickly into a situation where the stakes could be high for the protagonist but we don’t yet know what those stakes are, because we don’t know the protagonist well enough. So, for example, if we had known Tassie’s background as the daughter of a potato farmer before the conversation begins, then when Sarah gets excited about the potatoes (yes, she gets excited about potatoes), it would make so much more sense and would allow us to feel something along with Tassie. Instead, we simply learn more about Tassie’s opinions on her father and the potatoes (really this does make sense in the novel) THROUGH the conversation, which maybe sounds like a good idea, but it just slows down the conversation itself and makes it hard to see how Tassie is interacting with Sarah in the moment, which should be the important thing. Then, right after that, Tassie goes home for Christmas, which has the weird effect of making you feel like Moore is stalling something. I have mixed feelings about that one, because I do understand the importance of having her go home, but it made the whole thing a little harder than it should have been to get hooked.
BUT, once I did get hooked, I was REALLY hooked! The bizarre and hilarious and poignant interviews with pregnant mothers, the critiques of the adoption industry, the commentary on America’s particular brand of racism—these were all provocative and insightful and certainly as darkly witty as any of Moore’s short stories. She does try to pack a great deal into a very short book, so in some ways it feels like the story of Tassie’s job as a nanny and the utterly tragic and heartbreaking victimization of her young charge does not gel with the story of Tassie’s family and her brother’s decision to join the army. And for me, since the story of Tassie being a nanny was so incredibly interesting, I just wanted more about that and less of the other part. But at the same time, this is a coming-of-age story, and in a sense, the story of Tassie’s brother runs parallel to Tassie’s story. Not understanding the world and not knowing what they want their place in it to be, they both enter into it with a kind of oblivious trust and optimism, to disastrous results.
This novel gets a bonus star for some nicely-done, quasi-subtle references to Jane Eyre. (The use of “quasi” in that sentence is my own reference to A Gate.)
At first, I was disappointed by this novel and found it difficult to get into because Moore was making what seemed like a series of rookie mistakes. (God, does it make me sound like an asshole to say that or what?) The first problem for me was that Moore didn’t give us enough information about the narrator before putting her into the situation of being interviewed for a job by the other main character in the book. So what happens is, we then get a rumination or further explanation from the narrator after every interview question the employer asks. The problem with this is twofold: it disrupts the flow of the conversation, and it means that we are thrust too quickly into a situation where the stakes could be high for the protagonist but we don’t yet know what those stakes are, because we don’t know the protagonist well enough. So, for example, if we had known Tassie’s background as the daughter of a potato farmer before the conversation begins, then when Sarah gets excited about the potatoes (yes, she gets excited about potatoes), it would make so much more sense and would allow us to feel something along with Tassie. Instead, we simply learn more about Tassie’s opinions on her father and the potatoes (really this does make sense in the novel) THROUGH the conversation, which maybe sounds like a good idea, but it just slows down the conversation itself and makes it hard to see how Tassie is interacting with Sarah in the moment, which should be the important thing. Then, right after that, Tassie goes home for Christmas, which has the weird effect of making you feel like Moore is stalling something. I have mixed feelings about that one, because I do understand the importance of having her go home, but it made the whole thing a little harder than it should have been to get hooked.
BUT, once I did get hooked, I was REALLY hooked! The bizarre and hilarious and poignant interviews with pregnant mothers, the critiques of the adoption industry, the commentary on America’s particular brand of racism—these were all provocative and insightful and certainly as darkly witty as any of Moore’s short stories. She does try to pack a great deal into a very short book, so in some ways it feels like the story of Tassie’s job as a nanny and the utterly tragic and heartbreaking victimization of her young charge does not gel with the story of Tassie’s family and her brother’s decision to join the army. And for me, since the story of Tassie being a nanny was so incredibly interesting, I just wanted more about that and less of the other part. But at the same time, this is a coming-of-age story, and in a sense, the story of Tassie’s brother runs parallel to Tassie’s story. Not understanding the world and not knowing what they want their place in it to be, they both enter into it with a kind of oblivious trust and optimism, to disastrous results.
This novel gets a bonus star for some nicely-done, quasi-subtle references to Jane Eyre. (The use of “quasi” in that sentence is my own reference to A Gate.)