A Review of Liz Nugent’s “Unraveling Oliver”
Daddy Issues
You have pretty big cojones as a womanly writer when the first sentence of your novel, written from a male’s perspective, goes something like this: “I expected more of a reaction the first time I hit her.” And so begins Liz Nugent’s terrific novel Unraveling Oliver. It was originally published in Ireland in 2014, but has only now made its way to Canada. It is a dizzying psychological thriller, told from various character viewpoints (a little like Rashomon), about a successful children’s author named Oliver Ryan (who writes under the pen name Vincent Dax) who beats his illustrator wife Alice one evening to the point where she is sent into a coma. The book looks back on how someone of such prestige and respect could be harbouring the traits of a sociopath.
Unraveling Oliver, then, is all backstory, going back decades to recount how Oliver came to be a wife beater. As an indictment against spousal abuse, the novel excels. We may be mortified by Oliver’s actions, but — as much as he may be a monster — he is presented as being flawed and human. To that end, he’s an interesting and even a somewhat likable and charming character — at least at first. You may not exactly be rooting for him, but you’ll come to understand why he is the way he is. And a lot of it has to do with having a father that essentially disowned him from birth. This volume, then, is a look at the relationship between the sexes viewed through the lens of paternal support or the lack thereof. But is it a riveting page-turner? You bet!
What makes this novel stand out is the fact that the multiple viewpoint angle is extremely well-done, with each character having their distinctive voice that sets them apart from the others. You have Barney, who was Alice’s poverty-row boyfriend until Oliver spirited her away. You have Michael, a gay man who had designs on Oliver at a young age and whose sister Laura is also madly in love with Oliver. You even have the perspective of Eugene, Alice’s mentally disabled brother. Each of them tells their side of the tale, which slowly unravels like an orange being peeled. The only voice that is absent is the victim’s, but that’s, alas, to be expected.
The novel whizzes along to its already-known conclusion, and the psychology of Oliver’s character begins to be revealed. Having had no parental contact or affection from a young age, Oliver turns into a cheating womanizer, and much, much worse. One is hesitant about saying too much about this novel as it may give away salient plot points. This book is best for the ignorant. The less you know, the more likely you are to be surprised and amazed at the outcome of the story.
Unraveling Oliver has won its share of acclaim already in its Irish homeland. It has won the Irish Book Award for Best Crime Novel, and has since gone on to be translated into eight languages (and I would suspect that more are on the horizon, based on the quality of the tale). As much as it is a book that has earned its share of laurels, it also is a novel about the writer’s craft — how much suffering goes into forming a perfect sentence, what constitutes as theft or plagiarism, and what sort of lives public personas (that is, successful writers) are expected to lead.
There are few faults to pick at with Unraveling Oliver. However, there is a gaping plot hole of sorts towards the book’s conclusion where one character doesn’t recognize Oliver’s work as potentially belonging to someone else. The plot hole comes from the fact that Oliver’s children's novels have been adapted into Hollywood films and stage musicals. Surely, this person would have stumbled upon the work and recognized the possible deceit earlier in the plot’s timeline. It’d be like encountering someone who hasn’t at least heard of Harry Potter or The Hunger Games. This I found to be slightly unbelievable. There’s little explanation for this other than the character is childless and has no interest in children’s literature. But surely this person would have encountered a movie poster.
The children’s stories element, though, is quite fantastic, both in the literal and figurative sense. I’m sort of hoping that someone writes the children’s books that Oliver Ryan as Vincent Dax put to paper as they sound absolutely marvelous. There’s a little bit of Jonathan Carroll-esque surrealism to their plots, and — had Unraveling Oliver had any speculative fiction elements to it aside from this — I’d say that the novel feels a lot like Carroll’s: refined and elegant in its choice of images and words.
All in all, Unraveling Oliver is a marvelous work of psychological suspense. There is enough tragedy and nail biting to keep readers glued to their seats beyond what we initially know about the double life of Oliver Ryan. It may tackle the unsavoury subject of spousal abuse (and more), but it is a delight to read to figure out just what makes Ryan tick. That so much enjoyment and entertainment can come from watching the spectacle of a celebrity crash and burn is probably apropos for this season of life, perhaps even more so than when the novel first appeared in Ireland four years ago.
There’s a lot to unravel with Unraveling Oliver, much in the way of symbolism and analogy, but it also reads well as a straight-up thriller, even if we already pretty much know what the outcome of it is. This is a wild rollercoaster ride of a novel, an intricate pleasure that unveils as it sometimes simultaneously conceals, and everything is perfected plotted to maximize your enjoyment of this book. So hang onto your hats, and climb aboard a flying chair, as Unraveling Oliver is a sheer delight. It all begins with one knock-out of a sentence, one that that will absolutely floor you and keep you there until the book cover closes for the final time.
Liz Nugent’s Unraveling Oliver was published by Simon and Schuster Canada on February 6, 2018.
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