The Paper Wasp: A Novel

What an odd little book. It tells a story about Abby and Elise, who were best friends as children growing up in small-town Michigan. Smart, creative Abby wrote stories and directed beautiful, charismatic Elise in playing them out. Together, they discover the movies of Auguste Perren, an Ingmar Bergman-esque European experimental director. But then Elise starts pursuing an actual acting career in middle school, and by the time they graduate they're estranged. By the time the ten-year reunion rolls around, Elise is an up-and-coming starlet...but Abby has stagnated, and she's working at a local supermarket chain. When they cross paths at the reunion, Elise is genuinely excited to see her long-lost bestie again and casually invites Abby to call if she ever finds herself in LA. Abby, driven by her vivid dreams and sense of destiny, seizes on the opportunity and soon has ensconced herself into Elise's life as a personal assistant. Abby's ambitions, though, range far beyond what Elise could have imagined. This book exemplified something I try to describe when I talk about what I look for in a book: characters that are compelling, which does not mean I have to like them. Abby thinks of herself as superior to other people, uses them, is false and devious. But she was, to me at least, interesting in the way that she manipulates people and the way she teeters between sanity and breakdown. I found the way she was written to be a fairly straightforward portrait of undiagnosed bipolar disorder, with its deep lows plunging Abby into despair but also manic highs she uses to drive herself forward towards her increasingly outlandish goals. I found the plot propulsive, it kept me genuinely engaged in and uncertain about what might happen next. The writing style, first person but addressed as a monologue to Elise as “you”, was unusual and well-deployed. A sense of overhanging doom builds throughout the narrative. Not everything worked: some characters were obvious plot devices, some developments seemed to only happen because they needed to in order to set up the next bit, the ending left me with questions, but it was an intriguing, unusual read and I'll be looking for more by Lauren Acampora.