16. Her Fearful Symmetry

by Audrey Niffenegger

Niffenegger exploded into the literature scene with her first novel The Time Traveler's Wife which my dad lent me after he read it himself. This first novel was remarkable but not for the reasons that many people thought. The idea was not terribly unique nor was the specific premise a new take on it. What it was was a story that was told on its own terms. The author got out of the way and was a vehicle for a story that was both a tragedy and a representation of human mortality. Its strangeness was its beauty and it ended the only way it could. The exquisiteness of the emotion of the characters were never forced and I don't know a single person who read the book and had a single negative thing to say about it.

That's a rare thing. We humans love to criticize things.

It's not the kind of thing that is easy to follow up. In fact, I will even go so far as to say that it is impossible to follow it up. The Time Traveler's Wife is a masterpiece of literature. So, when Her Fearful Symmetry was published, I expected the backlash that the book received. It's not as good as her first novel. It's just not. However, it does not deserve the panning its received by many readers.

Here is the book I would have expected to see from Niffenegger first and if it had been published first, it would probably have been received well. Is it flawed? Absolutely, but not as badly as so many think.

Her Fearful Symmetry focuses on the sometimes eerie relationship between identical twins. It's clear from the novel that Niffenegger had a clear vision of her six main characters and the central secret behind their sometimes bizarre interactions. It's also pretty clear that Niffenegger had difficulty finding an ending. The resolution that she provides does feel forced, as many people noted. It's not a horrible ending, it's just not the poetic beauty her readers came to expect after first book.

However, the characters are wonderful and enticing. Even though they have faults, I genuinely liked them all. I watched the tragedy build and it felt right that these people would set themselves up like that. While I agree the story took a wrong turn about two thirds through, Niffenegger did not make the mistake of trying to 'save' her characters from themselves. If anything, she envisioned a resolution that was even more grim then it needed to be. This, I feel, is a much more forgivable error to make.

Despite the flaws, this is a book well worth reading.