A chilling commentary on cloning the dying Patty Rhule
In ‘And Again,’ being born again comes with baggage
Just in time for the annual rite of New Year’s rejuvenation comes
And Again (Touchstone, 303 pp., stars out of four), the haunting first novel by Jessica Chiarella.
Imagine waking in up a body that has never inhaled cigarette smoke, been basted in baby oil and fried in the sun, never downed one too many dirty martinis. Four incurably ill people are selected for an experimental FDA program called SUBlife that allows them to shuck their dying bodies and be cloned. We meet them as they have just awoken in their pristine new bodies.
The SUBlifers meet weekly for therapy, a requirement of the program, to share their experiences as clones. They have the muscle memory of newborns, find they are repulsed by meat (too close to home?), can’t stomach spicy food and can no longer dream.
Hannah is a painter whose engagement to journalist Sam has been on hold since her cancer diagnosis. David is a somewhat clichéd Republican congressman with a brain tumor who vows his new body will make him a new man, and he’ll be faithful to Stepford-perfect wife Beth. Linda, a mother of two, has been paralyzed from the neck down for seven years after a car accident. Connie is a once — and through SUBlife, again — stunning actress whose career crumpled with her AIDS diagnosis.
As with a New Year’s resolution that is forgotten by February, the SUBlifers soon revert to bad habits. To punish Sam for his mysterious absence from her bedside, Hannah is drawn to David, even though his politics repulse her. Linda returns home to find her family has carried on without her and numbs herself with daytime soaps. Connie returns to Hollywood and finds the casting couch still beckons.
Hannah is the most completely realized and compelling character. Sam was once her sister’s boyfriend, and she is tortured by the thought that Sam longs for Lucy. Her signature tattoos are gone, and Hannah finds her paintings have lost their soul.
David makes a deal with the devil — in this case, a billionaire campaign funder — that could imperil the SUBs.
Chiarella’s characters are well drawn, and their anguishes ring true. Do the people who love us in sickness and health really love us, or do they act out of a sense of duty? The SUBS have gotten a reprieve; what will they do with their second chance? Chiarella expresses their deep desires and yearnings with poetic compassion.
And Again glosses over the science of the SUBs, but no matter. It is their humanity that lingers.