Review by lidia7 - All Fours

lidia7 's review for:

All Fours by Miranda July

adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I read it in a day, 2 sittings, highlighted a bunch.

First half of the book was magical. It felt like I was reading something... profound and holy. Like I was facing a potential self I'm stifling. Or had embodied for a while and then abandoned. I think I would've preferred that part of the book to be its own separate thing. It was exquisite to read and a wild ride. I wonder how their relationship would've looked, if it could've survived the day to day life, how it would've changed. I'm guessing it would lose that magic but who knows? Anyway, the identity crisis was extremely relatable.

Also, why not post the picture of the chair instead of the provocative dance lol

The book kind of lost me in the second half. Maybe because I am not yet the age where I could relate as much. It also got more and more unhinged and that felt increasingly uncomfortable and scary... It's like seeing the type of person I might become if I ever let go of my inhibitions. At this point in my life that seems impossible, more off-putting than tempting. Is it the patriarchal heteronormativity that's making me feel this way or is this a core self thing? Not sure... I'm not sure if I'll ever be ready to reckon with that.

This book is very graphic (in all sorts of ways but sexually the most often), can be very gross and often casually mentions or even explores deeply taboo things. I've seen a lot of people talk about this book but I don't recall anyone mentioning this... There's some things that are so casually mentioned like they're not a big deal and I'm over here clutching my pearls, deeply concerned. I'll give some graphic examples, none of which spoil the plot.

Bathing with your 7 y. o. child seems weird but I don't have children so what do I know. But as a former child, that feels messed up. There's literally a one liner about the narrator's friend who had a dog lick, you can fill in the blanks... The narrator and Harris neglecting their dog so much that there's a literal shit catastrophe, etc etc.)

I know this is a work of fiction but it seems like the author has a lot of similarities to this narrator so I'm wondering how much of it is autobiographical. I don't usually care about that but idk, it's kind of giving me an icky feeling. I can see how the bathing thing is used as a metaphor and also is similar to another parent child relationship like

Davey's mother crossing boundaries.

. The dog shit situation shows that they were not ready to have a dog, but also serves to bring two characters closer together, working as a team again. Anyway, I guess I'm trying to say I hope that stuff is completely fictional and in the book as literary device.

Overall, I'd recommend this to anyone (but women especially) who feels like they can't be their true self, don't know what would even look like, whose lives feel like a simulacrum. Again, a very graphic book with some taboo and heavy topics

Content Warnings