Aftermath: On Marriage and Separation by Rachel Cusk

Now, I love Rachel Cusk and have hoovered up a lot of her work. This one is more of a memoir than some of the other Rachel Cusk stuff I’ve read. It’s great, but I think I’m still more in love with the more novelised side of her work.

Regardless, it’s a very raw and powerful book. This is very reminiscent of Deborah Levy and her living memoir trilogy.

The descriptions of Rachel trying to protect and love children through this very difficult time are very moving. As are her musings on her old life and her negotiations with her new life. She’s a great observer of the big, knotty, and complicated emotions of separation and divorce.

The ambiguity she feels towards her “old life” and some of her feminist observations are fiercely intelligent. There’s a lot of hard truths here, married with Rachel’s unique subjectivity.

There’s a lot of imagery, symbolic language, and metaphor in this book. It’s not an explicit or clear narrative, it’s not a documentary nor is it salacious, so there’s lots of intriguing black holes. It’s very compelling as a trauma narrative.

A good descriptor: brittle.