Indelicacy is a new novel written by Amina Cain. I've never read any of her works before, but I thoroughly enjoyed this book of hers. As I read through certain parts of the book, I was reminded of The Awakening by Kate Chopin that I read in January. What makes them so similar is that they're both physiological fiction and they both address the same themes. They both tell the stories of women navigating through gender and class roles to empower themselves and do what they enjoy. These themes are easily noticeable throughout both books and I enjoyed both of them immensely.
Indelicacy tells the story of Vitória who works as a cleaning lady in an art museum with the desire to one day become a writer. After an unexpected marriage, she struggles with the transition from cleaning lady to the lady of her house. Her marriage was not made out of love and she barely knows the man she married. As time continues, she begins fighting with her maid, leading her to find activities to keep her out of the house. As she searches for hobbies and activities, she finds friends. As her relationship with her husband continues to deteriorate, her friends and her writing are the only things keeping her together. Her friends encourage her to find a way to divorce her husband, while still keeping some of his money. She wants to live in the country and find things to write about on her own, in the end, that's exactly what she does.
When the book first started with Vitória working in the museum with her only friend, Antionette, I picked up some subtext that led me to believe that something would happen between the two. Though that wasn't the case with them. This strongly reminded me of the relationship between Edna and Adele in The Awakening. Though there is nothing confirmed about either relationship, there is a subtle amount of subtext that some readers pick up on and think that something is going to happen, but that isn't the case with both books.
Cain explored Vitória's character and one concept that I loved was Vitória's concept of selfishness. She had doubts that her thoughts of selfishness weren't valid when they were things about her not working and instead of partaking in dance classes. But, her husband validates this and says that since she has been working since she was a child it makes sense for her to want to explore hobbies that she never got to join in when she was younger. I love that this concept, in general, was explored because usually, selfishness is a concept that people want to avoid with their characters just because it's generally looked down upon. But with the way that Cain has written Vitória's character, it makes sense that she would feel this way, and the fact that her husband validates this fact was just overall a nice change to see in a female character.
Another thing that I loved that Cain included in her novel was the portrayal of female friendship. Vitória's relationships with her friends were never shown as unnecessary and it showed the difference between her relationship with her husband and her friends. With her friends, they supported her through every one her decisions and they understand the reasoning behind them and what she was thinking. With her husband, he didn't support every one of her decisions and he's shown questioning her a lot, especially towards the end of their marriage. I also loved that her friends were with her when she was having thoughts of leaving her husband and instead of trying to convince her to stay with him, they began scheming to find ways for her to leave him while keeping some of his money. Just, this portrayal of friendship was so important to me because I don't see it that often in books that I read and it was just refreshing to read about healthy female friendships that are full of support.
Cain presented the idea that the reasoning behind Vitória marrying her husband wasn't because it was a marriage of love or convenience or even for his money. But that Vitória did it for the experience of having a marriage and having been with a man in that way. It was just an interesting thing to see about marriage in the Victorian era because I've never thought of marriages of the Victorian era like that, I've always seen them presented as for money or convenience. Another thing that I think made this idea so interesting is that it was the thought of a woman. I've never really read anything that talked about a woman's thoughts on marriage in that era and if I did, it was never about the experience. It was an interesting idea that Cain presented and it was just a thing for me to think about.
A part of the book that I loved is the little montage of chapters of Vitória finding hobbies of things that she's never done before and just her searching for something that would interest and keep her occupied and it was just a cute thing that I'm glad was included. Another part of the book that I loved was Cain included snippets of Vitória's writing and I think that it helped readers to see more of her character and how she thinks of the things around her and how she sees them.
I suggest this book, it's very well written and I loved reading Vitória's thoughts and reading her interactions with everything and one around her. If you've ever read The Awakening and loved it then I suggest this. The stories and the struggles of the characters are similar. After I finished the book I immediately recommended it to my friend who also loved reading The Awakening. I'm also strongly considering emailing my English teachers and telling them about it just to see what their thoughts are on the story and the characters. Check out Amina Cain's website here.
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