The secret lives of liars
Rachel Cline's My Liar investigates a friendship built on a façade
By Robyn Detterline
Published: March 3rd, 2008 | 10:10am
Rachel Cline’s second novel, My Liar, turns dishonesty, the greatest of all Hollywood blemishes, inward on its two main characters to create an entertaining, but not fully-realized, read. Laura Katz is a burgeoning director, both captivating and craving of attention; Annabeth Jensen is a plain Jane from the Midwest and a passive editor desperate to be noticed. When the two women meet at a party, Annabeth buys into the Hollywood fantasy and is smitten with Laura’s splendor. Laura, happy to find someone envious of her, compulsively tries to impress her new adoring friend. Both women lie to each other, as well as to themselves, in order to protect their fragile egos.
As their friendship gets off to a dysfunctional start, the women struggle with their romantic relationships. Laura’s husband has an unquenchable lust for women, and while she is aware of his infidelities, she wants desperately to keep him. Annabeth is in a new relationship with David, an aspiring DJ. While David is supportive and besotted, cynical Annabeth looks for reasons to clash with him. Just a few weeks into their liaison, she actively searches for “the characteristics that will one day upend the relationship.”
Within the exploration of these various relations, frustration is born. Laura treats Annabeth with little concern and no respect. Then, when Annabeth tries to impress Laura by finding ways to improve the film on which they are working, Laura, paranoid about losing the place on her pedestal, decides Annabeth is a “passive-aggressive cunt” and second-guesses her decision to hire her. At this point in the novel, it becomes clear that these characters are mirror images of each other: Laura is outwardly cocky while secretly insecure, and Annabeth depicts an image of insecurity to mask her cocky streak.
In My Liar, Cline effectively portrays an interesting weave of two narcissistic women’s psychologies. Where the novel greatly disappoints, however, is in the lack of grounding for these psychologies. The reader does not gain a glimpse into Annabeth’s troubled childhood until late in the novel, and when this information does appear it is quick and unsatisfying. The reader never receives an explanation for Laura’s conduct, and so the novel presents a plethora of behaviors but no underlying reasons for them. In the end, it is difficult to relate with, and therefore admire, either woman. The only character the reader can root for is David, but we know from the story’s prologue that he is doomed.
It is a testament to Cline’s abilities as an author that these characters elicit such strong reactions from the reader, even if the reactions are frustration, disgust, and even offense. Perhaps these are appropriate emotional responses to a novel about Hollywood and its charlatans, but this compassionate reader tries hard to empathize with every character, and when she does not receive an adequate set of detective’s tools to uncover a protagonist’s integrity, she cannot help but close the book feeling somewhat unfulfilled.
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ABOUT THE BOOK
My Liar (Random House)
By Rachel Cline
272 pages
List Price: $23.00
Issue #23
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