Review : Hausfrau by Jill Alexander Essbaum

Posted by Kay on April 22, 2015 2:22 am in 4.5 stars reads | 7 comments

Hausfrau by Jill Alexander Essbaum
Pages : 324
Genre : Literary Fiction
Stand alone
My Rating : 4.5/5

About the Book  :

My Thoughts :

Hausfrau left me in such a state, I wasn’t able to pick another novel for a few days after finishing it. Then I had to think about it some more before I could decide whether I liked it or not, and why, and how did I really feel about it.

First off, Hausfrau is beautifully written. It’s the author’s debut novel, but not her first published words as she’s published a lot of her poetry before. It was my first time reading her, but I immedietally connected to her writing. I loved every word of it. I was entralled by its poetry and spent a lot of time rereading passages that spoke to me. Maybe because I don’t read much literary fiction these days, but it had been a while since I related to an author’s writing in such a manner.

When it comes to relating to the character though, that’s a whole other story. Anna isn’t really likable, and I think many readers will absolutely hate her and her story. She’s a liar and a cheat, which isn’t something you’d want to say  “I really could relate to that!” And yet, because of Jill Alexander Essbaum’s writing and her acute perception of life, I found myself thinking exactly that. Not about Anna’s affairs of course, but about her general anxieties and questionings. It’s very human, certainly visceral, but in such a quiet way, too. A beautifully written depression.

The story is a slow moving one, but I couldn’t pull my eyes away – it’s very much like a trainwreck, but one that’s about to happen, and you only watch to see the big, final explosion. And when I finished it, I felt both heartbroken and shaken, but also weirdly satisfied. I thought it ended the way it should, considering everything and how sad it all was. There’s no way to tie this up with a neat little bow.

Would I recommend this book? Weirdly: not really. I loved it, and I still think a lot about it; yet the character and her actions are so unlikable, the pace is so slow, and the writing, while beautiful, might feel so overdone to some readers (lots and lots of metaphors and symbolism all along), that I would only recommend it with a word of caution. It’s an incredibly interesting novel wrapped in a gorgeous cover, but let’s just say that I am not surprised to see that many of my reader friends profoundly disliked it.

And on a final note: it seems that a lot of people don’t know what to do of this book. I’ve seen it announced as a Gone Girl meets Fifty Shades of Grey and Madame Bovary meets Fifty Shades of Grey… which is so weird to me. A sad housewife isn’t enough of a common point to make it a Gone Girl supplement, and crude sex scenes sprinkled through a book do not make an erotic novel. There’s so much sadness surrounding it all, that I think readers of Grey would probably be disappointed coming in expecting some of the same, with an added touch of mystery! I really don’t know what is up with these comparisons!