Chrysalis

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Over time, we come to see several different points of origin for the woman’s drive to metamorphosis.

It’s about the different forms of isolation and the effects that come from it, including loneliness, solitude and sometimes, independence.

Additional star is for making me realize that off days are meltdown days and that these are ridiculous if seen from far enough. An oblique, intimate novel told in lucid, beguiling prose, Chrysalis a story about solitude and selfhood, and about the blurred line between self-care and narcissism. The novel charts her physical and mental change into a new person who eschews many societal norms and finds meaning in making meditation and fitness videos online, attracting a huge following. I was so struck by the strange loneliness of being in our own heads--this journey to selfhood as a complete internalization, without much interest in a relational existence, except inasmuch as it fosters that transformation. Elliot, a recluse who notices her at the gym, witnesses her physical evolution and becomes her first acolyte.

Her journey is narrated from the perspectives of three different people in her life, never her own, so we, the reader, are as intrigued as they are by her singular drive to transform. The success of the novel hinges on the reader engaging with the mysterious aspects of the central character; there’s no plot as such, and we’re told up front about the influencer she becomes, and so the only thing really driving the narrative is the details we’re given gradually about her past and the way she acts. I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, and consider to be richly deserving of the accolade, and I look forward to seeing what else she will produce in future. of a woman from who she was onto who she wants to be through sheer strength and the building of that strength of body and mind.Elliot is a freelancer and his “big jobs” define him, but the passages describing his work habits make no direct reference to what he does. Everybody knew Simon, he was that good-looking—one of those people who might accidentally become famous at any moment.

It's an easy read that made me think about many assumptions I and society hold about relationships and how we live out lives (easy to read with deep complex themes). In the end, our main character decides to cut out all relationships and focuses on not just slow living but slow moving; she is able to hold a yoga pose for hours on end. THAT BEING SAID I don’t think I liked any aspect of the plot, not a single character, and found the prose grating at times. But she’s confused too about her daughter’s mercurial qualities and capacity for reinvention, as well as what either of them actually wants from each other.What she means to each of them may seem subjective but the experiences and their transformations are real. This is a difficult book to distil, and I don’t know that I have actually understood its meaning or taken away its essence. Metcalfe is insightful about the world of contemporary influencers, voyeurism and the rise of narcissism, but it’s hard to warm to her aloof heroine. It’s trying really hard to be a book that makes you think but in the course it doesn’t actually say anything at all.