I had been meaning to read Bound for several months, but it was always checked out at the library, or I was sidetracked by other titles for my book groups, etc. This Memorial Day weekend, I finally had the book in my hands, and I read all 229 pages within one day (mostly outside at the park).
Bound is the first thing I've ever read by Antonya Nelson, who has written several well-reviewed novels and short story collections, including Talking In Bed. I will definitely be reading more of this woman's work.
I had one major reservation going into Bound, from reading the book jacket and some online reviews. Although the premise was intriguing, there seemed to be a lot of characters, and I wasn't sure how Nelson could do them all justice in the course of such a relatively small novel. But justice is served, and this is one first-rate cast of characters.
The novel opens with a car crash and a dog's point of view, if you can imagine such a combination. Misty and her dog Max have just plunged over a cliff in Colorado, and Misty is dead on impact. The first chapter is told from Max's point of view, as she tries to decide between watching over her owner's body and taking off into the wild. Eventually, the call of the wild proves too strong, and Max takes off, only to be found by Elise and her slacker boyfriend Lance.
We then move on to the heart of the story, set in Wichita, Kansas. The primary characters are Oliver and Catherine Desplaines, a wealthy couple. Oliver is 70, and Catherine is in her early 40s. She is his third wife, and with each marriage, he has "traded up" for a younger woman. Now, he is having an affair with a woman even younger than Catherine, referred to only as The Sweetheart. Catherine is oblivious to his affair, busy as she is attending to her mother Grace, who is residing in a nursing home after suffering a stroke. And into this setting comes a bombshell: Catherine has just been named the legal guardian of fifteen year old Cattie, the daughter of her best friend from high school who happened to be none other than Misty who was just killed in a car accident in far off Colorado!
Bound centers around this revelation, but there are so many offshoots and subplots that are given almost equal space and attention. For instance, while Catherine learns of her new ward, alternating chapters focus on Cattie as she learns of her mother's death and runs away from her posh East Coast boarding school, renting a room at the home of a classmate's sister and becoming involved with the mysterious Randall, who is also renting space in the same building. These scenes are a nice contrast to Oliver and Catherine's life in Wichita, and once again, dogs are involved.
As we go back and forth between Catherine the elder and Catherine/Cattie the younger, we are also treated to flashbacks via both characters. Catherine's flashbacks revolve around her friendship with Misty during their high school days, while Cattie's center on her life with Misty in Texas. Misty had a very rough childhood, and her friendship with the beautiful Catherine was a source of great pride to her. The stories of their past are rendered vividly, and when Catherine journeys to Texas to meet Cattie and see the home of her deceased former friend, she realizes that Misty had turned her life around dramatically, improved her appearance, become a successful real estate agent and a terrific mother. When Catherine sees what became of Misty's life, it's truly one of the most poignant passages in the book.
I've given you just the bare essentials of Bound's plot, but there's even more to feast on in this book! When Misty and Catherine were having their teenage adventures, a serial killer named the BTK (Bind, torture, kill) was on the loose in Wichita, and now, all these years later, he has resurfaced! If this seems a bit random at first, just let Nelson work her magic. She connects the dots in a masterful fashion, and the linking of past to present is never less than smooth, whether it's young Misty to adult Misty or the BTK's first reign of terror with his latest taunting. Nelson seems to be commenting on the strangeness of life and the various ways we are all connected, or "bound," by our pasts and presents. It's a testament to her skills as a narrator that things like the BTK and the dog subplot never seem like random, senseless plot points, but manage instead to gel as part of the larger picture.
There are some great supporting characters in this book, including Oliver's cast of past wives and daughters, particularly Miriam, his surly daughter from his second marriage. Miriam does not get a lot of air time in the book, but she emerges as a very vivid personality, and the scene in which she tells Oliver off as they journey to Texas to pick up a waylaid Cattie is one of the highlights of Bound (and had me laughing out loud for one of the few times in the book). Grace Harding, Catherine's mother, is another great character, a former professor who has recently been rendered mute by a stroke. Oliver never liked his mother-in-law, but when Catherine becomes sidelined by her new responsibilities, he starts making more of an effort. The bond that grows between he and Grace is another emotional high point of the novel.
As you can see, there is a lot going on in Bound. The plot is strong, the characters are very real, and the writing is superb. Nelson's writing style at times bears a resemblance to John Updike's, especially the long, luxuriant sentences that say so much even when they say very little. She is a great stylist, but it's all in the service of a plot that moves quite rapidly, and characters you will care about even if you can't always sympathize with them. Catherine, in particular, emerges as an extremely real presence on the page, and I think you'll find it difficult not to like her. Even Oliver, who is quite disgusting in his actions, is hard to dislike. Nelson gets inside these characters' heads and develops them quickly but thoroughly, while never losing sight of her plot.
I give very high marks to Bound. I won't quite put it at the level of Room or Swim Back To Me, two of the best books I've read this year (or any year). That having been said, let me say that Room is a book that comes along very rarely in one's life, and Swim Back To Me is a collection of stories, so it's not really fair to compare it to this novel. And let me also point out that I read Bound in 24 hours, which is the quickest I've read a novel in years. Granted, it was a sunny day off, but still ... something to be said for that.
This is another book that will stay with me. I've been thinking about it and talking about it quite a bit today. I hope you'll give it a shot ... there's a lot to like, and a lot to ponder.
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