The Life and Death of Sophie Stark is the second novel by young American journalist Anna North, a graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop (also attended by Eleanor Catton).
It circles around independent film-maker Sophie as she rises in fame, and the turmoil she creates in her own life and in the lives of those close to her.
The premise is that her ambition blocks her social ability, but it becomes clear that really Sophie is deeply troubled and her films are as messy as her own reality.
North's narrative technique is interesting and works well as the novel's backbone.
Sophie's one-time girlfriend, husband, brother and several others each have segments in which to recount their interactions with her through young childhood and into her early rise to fame, of sorts.
Each has been deeply hurt by her, yet, contrarily, a loyal advocate until the end.
These accounts are conversational and confessional, the aim being to portray Sophie as evasive and out-of-reach for she never speaks for herself.
While the prose is perceptive, intimate and revealing, the characterisation of each narrator is rather loosely grasped, and a satisfyingly three-dimensional main character does not emerge.
There is a lot of content in this novel, and it does at times become overwhelmingly melodramatic, on account of the women's flooding emotional recounts being deeply real.
Amongst the angst, the contribution by Sophie's brother is refreshing for its rationality.
This is not a highly challenging read but ultimately poignant and enjoyable. North has produced an earnest outpouring of human complications, told sensitively.
• Jessie Neilson is a University of Otago library assistant.
