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A review by casskrug
Banal Nightmare by Halle Butler
3.0
this book wins the award for most accurate title. banal nightmare follows a cast of characters in the midwestern town of x, at the center of which is the eccentric, sometimes off-putting moddie. moddie moves back to x after a stint in chicago that ended in a bad breakup and the loss of all her friends in the city. we see her try to reintegrate herself into the social scene of her hometown, which is made up of many unhappy couples working at the local university. all of these characters are pretty much embodiments of the “i’m actually at capacity" meme.
butler is poking fun at the ways that the modern age has twisted our interactions with each other into fake shows of compassion, both for our so-called friends and for political/social causes. i get what she’s doing, it’s funny at times, but ultimately it grated on me and made my reading experience drag on for much longer than it should have. it took me almost 2 weeks to get to the halfway point and once i got there, i knew i needed to dedicate an entire morning to just finishing it, or else it would’ve taken another 2 weeks.
i think halle butler does the weird, deranged woman trope really skillfully. she did a great job of it in the new me (which i enjoyed immensely) and moddie similarly invokes both cringe and pity in the reader. butler knows how to make her characters subvert typical social cues and opt for the most bizarre interactions. we also get some deeper moments exploring moddie’s heartbreak and trauma, and you can see how both of those things have caused her to spiral. it’s dark but done really effectively.
i also admire butler for taking on a cast of characters in the third person here. the easy thing to do would’ve been to write this in the first person from moddie’s perspective only. although some of the characters blurred into each other at times, i think getting all of their perspectives gave this book something different from its contemporaries.
overall, i see the vision. i think butler is trying to push the “depressed woman moving” genre into new, more expansive and satirical territory. but you really have to be in a certain mindset to take on the banality of it all.
butler is poking fun at the ways that the modern age has twisted our interactions with each other into fake shows of compassion, both for our so-called friends and for political/social causes. i get what she’s doing, it’s funny at times, but ultimately it grated on me and made my reading experience drag on for much longer than it should have. it took me almost 2 weeks to get to the halfway point and once i got there, i knew i needed to dedicate an entire morning to just finishing it, or else it would’ve taken another 2 weeks.
i think halle butler does the weird, deranged woman trope really skillfully. she did a great job of it in the new me (which i enjoyed immensely) and moddie similarly invokes both cringe and pity in the reader. butler knows how to make her characters subvert typical social cues and opt for the most bizarre interactions. we also get some deeper moments exploring moddie’s heartbreak and trauma, and you can see how both of those things have caused her to spiral. it’s dark but done really effectively.
i also admire butler for taking on a cast of characters in the third person here. the easy thing to do would’ve been to write this in the first person from moddie’s perspective only. although some of the characters blurred into each other at times, i think getting all of their perspectives gave this book something different from its contemporaries.
overall, i see the vision. i think butler is trying to push the “depressed woman moving” genre into new, more expansive and satirical territory. but you really have to be in a certain mindset to take on the banality of it all.