All not what it seems with 'typical' family

WE ARE WATER<br><b>Wally Lamb</b><br><i>HarperCollins</i>
WE ARE WATER<br><b>Wally Lamb</b><br><i>HarperCollins</i>
In this book, Wally Lamb writes of an apparently typical present-day, reasonably successful American family: father, mother, two daughters and a son.

The prologue is spoken by an ageing art connoisseur, reminiscing about an African-American primitive painter, and his sad fate in the 1950s. This painter will play a part in the story and is a major theme of the book.

From near the beginning it is clear in this family, all is not what it seems. It is a wedding day, but the couple have divorced, and the wife is remarrying, to her lesbian lover.

Each chapter has the voice of one character, beginning with the divorced wife, Annie. This works well, as the story develops from different points of view, a style which could be disruptive but flows smoothly.

The story that emerges is of the marriage, with an overworked husband in a helping profession, and an increasingly angry and distressed wife, who finds relief in the making of her own strange art. Art is a means of expression of the saddest abusive pasts in this story. The children speak from their adult selves, remembering their childhood and their mother's rages.

Nonetheless, there is love and connectedness in this family, and hiding secrets is part of that. A final, fateful figure emerges on the wedding day, and all the secrets tumble out.

There is a message in the book about the danger of unacknowledged trauma, and its effects in the following generation. But it is subtly allowed to emerge, and does not prevent the enjoyment of this beautifully written story.

- Margaret Bannister is a retired Dunedin psychotherapist and science teacher.

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