Tale pushes beyond thriller tropes
Novel features world of manipulating, gaslighting we think we know
From a cursory reading of the fly-leaf of “Hysteria,” the second novel from St. John’s writer Elisabeth de Mariaffi, readers might think they know what to expect. Focused on young mother Heike, the jacket copy hints at an idyllic life, with the “easy routine of caring for her young son Daniel,” and references to a summer house and “clinking glasses.” There are, of course, portents of trouble ahead, especially with Heike’s husband Eric “becoming increasingly controlling.” With the untrustworthy spouse and the references to a child in peril, we seem to be firmly in the increasingly familiar world of the contemporary domestic thriller.
But de Mariaffi has something altogether different in store. “Hysteria” is a powerful piece of fictional misdirection, of establishing readerly expectations and upending them, repeatedly, to tremendous effect. It is at once thought-provoking, tautly suspenseful and genuinely surprising.
The expectations raised by the book’s fly-leaf are overturned immediately with the novel’s opening pages. Set in 1945, the prologue follows Heike, little more than a child, as she flees from Dresden through the dense forest, suffering perils and traumas, including the loss of her sister.
The novel then jumps more than a decade. Heike has taken up residence in a summer house in upstate New York with Daniel and Eric, a psychiatric researcher who works nearby. Heike and Daniel have bucolic summer days to explore the adjoining forest, with its lakes and streams. She seems recovered from her traumatic past, rescued, in some way, by Eric, who was her doctor before he was her husband.
Of course, it’s not that simple. Eric has a dominant streak, cruel and manipulative, which Heike seems unable or unwilling to recognize. Eric is firmly in control, always willing to provide a tonic for her trauma, gaslighting her at every turn. Then there’s the small cabin Heike discovers nearby, well-loved but clearly abandoned, and the porcelain doll she steals that seems to disappear and reappear almost of its own volition. And what of the mysterious girl who appears when she is swimming with Daniel, who seems to have designs upon her son?
Threaded through with elements of psychoanalysis, fairy tales and pop culture (there is a character based on Rod Serling, creator of “The Twilight Zone”), “Hysteria” is a deeply unsettling read that grips the reader from its opening pages. In Heike, de Mariaffi — whose collection of short stories, “How To Get Along with Women,” was longlisted for the Giller Prize in 2013 — has created a complex and realistic character, even when her grip on the reality around her — past and present — seems to slip and twist.
Most crucially, de Mariaffi is skilled at playing with the tropes and conventions of various genres to generate continual surprise and increased complexity. Readers will almost immediately recognize, for example, Eric’s manipulations and halftruths. That sort of spousal questioning and unreliability is a hallmark of the contemporary domestic thriller, but it usually takes longer to develop: the writer creates a sense of trust, which they undermine with a twist later. The fact that Eric’s manipulations are so transparent (to the reader, not to Heike) is deliberate: the reader thinks they know what’s going on, and has a general notion of what is likely to happen. As a result, the twist comes not with a revelation of subterfuge, but by overturning the trope. Yes, Eric is gaslighting Heike. But there’s so much more going on.
De Mariaffi takes a similar approach to other genre tropes and elements. From centuries of folklore and fiction to modernday film, we’re all familiar with haunted houses, creepy porcelain dolls and mysterious children trying to lure a human child. De Mariaffi uses that familiarity to lull the reader into a false sense of security: We think we know what’s happening. She doesn’t subvert the conventions so much as embrace them wholly, then, at a crucial moment, explode past them by reaching deeper: Why are houses haunted? Why does a little girl rise from the depths? Pushing through the conventions and readerly expectations, de Mariaffi is able to create a fresh sense of suspense, building toward a climax that is breathtaking in its originality and vitality. It’s a bravura performance, and one well worthy of attention.