PAPER BAGS

In this novel, an affair prompts a woman to look back on her life.

As McDonald’s story opens, middle-aged food writer and nutritionist Kat McNeil is living with her dog, Q, in a trailer in the Florida Keys. She’s in the process of ending her marriage of over 30 years, and she’s feeling aimless and unloved. She spots trailer-park neighbor Sal diving in the ocean, and the two tentatively begin getting to know each other. After showing readers glimpses of Sal—and Kat’s obsession with him—the tale takes a lengthy detour into a flashback, telling the story of the protagonist’s life from her childhood in the 1950s as one of five children in a suburban Roman Catholic family. Kat herself is the narrator of her past, and through her point of view, readers learn about the beatings she suffered at her father’s hands and her mother’s seemingly harsh indifference. “At seventeen,” Kat confesses, “I couldn’t care less about going to college. What I want is The Boy, the dream, a loving family.” The tale skillfully moves on to Kat’s own later married life—the brusque, uncaring husband; the daughter who seeks therapy as soon as she can—and to the adult lives of her kin, including her beloved doctor brother, Joey, who dies of an overdose. The story also deftly discloses the family’s discovery that Kat’s father was a lifelong, secret alcoholic and explores her own burgeoning life as a writer. It’s only after a hundred pages of this intriguing tale that the narrative returns to the story of Kat and Sal. Unfortunately, readers will find it difficult to remain interested in present-day, sad-sack Kat. She’s a morose complainer and a lightning rod for bad or pathetic luck. She gets sick from a tick bite; she puts a wet suit on backward; and everything is always her fault. By the time a deeply disturbing secret about Sal is revealed, some readers may be put off by the melodrama.

An intriguing but uneven tale of obsession.