Michael Cunningham (still most famous for his novel about Virginia Woolf, The Hours, which was then turned into a film starring Nicole Kidman) is back with his first book in a decade and it is, as far as we’re concerned, something of a doozy.
What we have here is a game of three parts – all of the action takes part on the same day (5 April), albeit over a three year period (2019-2021), moving over the course of the novel from the morning through the afternoon to the evening.
Like a more contained version of Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Goon Squad, or a Franzen novel refracted through the lens of a writer like Michael Ondaatje, Day follows the fortunes of a relatively successful family (they live in a brownstone in Brooklyn): Isabel, the breadwinner (working at a magazine that has seen better days), Dan (the stay at home dad looking to revive his former dreams of rock’n’roll success), Isabel’s brother Robbie (a teacher, living in the loft when we first meet, sustaining his creativity by posting each day on Instagram about the life of a man he has made up), and the two kids, Nathan (a teenage boy making his first tentative steps into adulthood) and Violet (a five year old with a particularly acute outlook on the lives of those around her). We also hear from Dan’s brother Garth (an artist), and Chess (a woman who approached Garth thinking he would be the ideal sperm donor for her and only a little more – a relationship that becomes complicated as the novel progresses), and their child, Odin (yes, Odin).
Each of the characters are struggling with something (whether that is being a working mom, a failing marriage, lost dreams, lost love, growing up or just generally shifting fortunes) and Cunningham has a restless eye for how he chooses to share those intimacies with us (sometimes we occupy the people in the standard way you’d expect, other times we’re reading letters or emails or texts or Instagram posts).
There are frequent moments in Day where you find yourself reading a thought one of Cunningham’s characters has arrived at and you the reader may feel, yes, I have had that thought at times too. Which may feel banal but Cunningham has a shrewd acuity for landing a bon mot just so:
“They can go on being cordial and affectionate. They can worry together about the children. They can even desire happiness, each for the other, but they are no longer lovers, they are no longer married, which, by way of transition, is all the more final for having escaped their attention, for having occurred in increments, like a leak that goes undetected until the day it becomes apparent that the whole structure has become saturated, so full of moisture and mildew that it can no longer be repaired.”
As you’d expect from a novel that is impacted (like a boat foundering on an unexpected rock) by the pandemic, not everybody makes it from one side to the other but (as with life) terrible moments become part of the whole, become part of who you are. It’s a good novel, though. Satisfying, thoughtful and moving. We enjoyed the time we spent in the company of these people. Here’s hoping we don’t have to wait 10 years for Cunningham’s next book.
Any Cop?: If you dabbled with The Hours or wrestled with Specimen Days, and aren’t sure whether to try out Cunningham’s new book, we’d urge you to open your arms and treat yourself.
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