Who Are You?

On narrative obsessions, the creation and invention of the self, and 2024 in books

In literature, one of the core types of conflict is known as “man vs. self”, where the protagonist struggles to reconcile their idea of themselves with the person they’re becoming. I’ve long been fascinated with the concept of the self and the performance of it: on TikTok, I’ve talked about reality tv and the Johari Window, Goffman and The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, and the way celebrities craft narratives to brand themselves for audience consumption.

We all have our narrative obsessions. I love thinking about truth and artifice, and the way people skirt the line when interacting, or behaving badly, or performing. I think that’s why reality television has such a hold on me: combining the front stage with the backstage, the performance of the self as a character versus the person behind the mask, and the inevitable slipping of the two. 

(It’s interesting that I don’t love Batman more as a character when historically that’s his whole thing, the not so hidden truth that Batman is the true self and Bruce Wayne is the mask.)

When tallying my favorite books of the year so far, I noticed a theme: many of the books were about characters undergoing journeys not only to discover themselves, but to create themselves. 

In Splinters, Leslie Jamison explores her divorce and early motherhood during lockdown through a series of vignettes. She keeps her narrative gaze focused on her thoughts, her mind, her actions, as well as her crumbling inner and outer worlds. The book returns to one theme over and over, self-referentially acknowledging the retreading: Jamison thought that a life spent chasing recklessly after bad men meant she would never do so again. Instead, the last third of the book is spent fighting with the knowledge that after her divorce, despite bad man after bad man after bad man, the one she craved the most was an unemployed drifting musician who didn’t see himself as a stepfather. The adoption of new selves, be they wife, mother, maker of good decisions, person who knows better, are shed. Jamison is who she is. If a life unexamined isn’t worth living, then it seems a life that’s been examined endlessly isn’t necessarily more fun. The adoption of a new self (in crisis, under duress) ultimately does not prevent pain.

Victim introduces us to Javi, a slick grifter from The Bronx (lfg) who wields his identity as a weapon. He infiltrates a Cornell dupe by exaggerating his biography, playing up the tragic backstory white liberals in the scholarship department already expect (father gunned down due to gang violence, raised by a single mother in the hood, classmates in jail, etc.). At college, Javi begins writing about race exclusively, and the second half of the book transports us to the New York media scene during the Buzzfeed era, where clicks on stories about Black and Brown trauma were plentiful and lucrative. 

Javi understands that his identity is malleable, unfixed. The markers once used to condemn (where did you grow up? What does your father do for work? Where did you go to high school?) become his salvation. Through writing, he becomes someone else: a new self born from the debris of the old. One can always transform, but is the end result worth it? 

Annie Bot is much more transparent in its messaging about constructing the self. A feminist allegory about leaving an abusive relationship hidden in the skin of a sci-fi novel, Annie Bot is about a robot built for male companionship (a literal object) gaining sentience. While reviews of this book are mixed, I was locked in: my favorite episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is about a robot built for male companionship struggling to reconcile her place in the world when her owner discards her.

Annie learns about jealousy, lust, control, and power and while the novel is slow to get to its feminist conclusion, it mirrors the process of awakening for victims. It’s jarring to realize the person you love the most in the world is your captor and abuser, and when they’re the only thing you’ve ever known, leaving isn’t always the first choice. Who is she outside of her relationship? What does she want? Annie’s identity is crafted from stimuli and inputs, but that doesn’t make her journey any less powerful.

The Husbands externalizes the issue: what does one truly want when every option is available to them? Protagonist Lauren discovers that her attic is conjuring husbands and decides to ride the wave, meeting doctors, lawyers, botanists, assholes, bullies, friends, and exes along the way. Each time she sends a husband up to the attic and another comes down, her life shifts dramatically. In some lives she is wealthy, in others she is decidedly not. In some, she stayed with an ex who emotionally abused her. In others, she’s married to perfectly nice (if unbearably dull) men. She has to decide what her morals are by choosing the life that fits: a sort of Sliding Doors for the Tinder age. Despite the lives being different, Lauren finds ways to make choices to reaffirm and reify her selfhood, preventing the zany mechanics of the situation she finds herself in from controlling her. I thought this book would be fun (and I famously love alternate universes of all kinds) but the beating heart and relatable analysis paralysis really affected me. 

As someone who still battles discomfort when calling myself a writer out loud, Housemates moved me. Bernie and Leah (a photographer and writer, respectively) create a new world for themselves by embarking on a road trip. The attention and devotion to their craft elevated the (already gorgeous) writing. Being visibly queer (Bernie) or visibly fat (Leah) forces these characters to live in shades of otherness, constantly being defined by what they are or aren’t. For many queer people, defining yourself— outside of the paradigms placed upon you by the dominant culture— is the most radical thing you can do, and often the first step to living a truthful life. 

This idea is echoed in Bad Habit, a novel that dug its way into my subconscious. Focusing on the trans experience of a woman in Spain, the novel is a coming-of-age tale that hones in on how emulating the people in your life can be a form of reverence. Identity isn’t a part of this book, it makes up the bulk of it: the unnamed protagonist learns to be a woman by watching television and pretending to be Madonna, looking for deities among the long-suffering women in her orbit. Heroin is destroying her working class neighborhood, but there’s still beauty to be found in the steel spines and proud dispositions of the women in Madrid. When she finally meets her queer elders, sex workers who haunt the gayborhood, the protagonist fully begins to absorb the parts she most admires, becoming a chimera of all the women she has known and loved. 

Neat Little Morality Slogans

• I also loved All Fours and Anyone’s Ghost. All Fours is about a woman in her forties undergoing a sexual awakening, while Anyone’s Ghost is a coming-of-age about a bisexual boy and his friendship/obsession with an older boy he meets when he’s 15. I loved this too— we need more books about people who party. Full reviews on my Goodreads or Instagram (I need to update my StoryGraph as I do love the app!)

• TtB Book Club: online meeting is on 7/28, irl on 7/31.

• Thematic connections! Here are two pieces about invention and reinvention. One is about trying to reinvent yourself as someone who’s recovered from their trauma, while the other is about growing up, taking oneself seriously, and cementing your identity through art.

  • As usual, Taffy Brodesser-Akner slays. This piece about the trauma endured by a kidnapping victim in 1974 (and how the kidnapping still haunts him to this day) destroyed me. Akner’s trick involves weaving her own story into the stories she covers— learning about her own trauma unmoored me. I’m someone who grew up with Caribbean parents— pain is never to be performed, you put your head down and keep going— and spent my twenties freaking out, and it’s looking like the trauma girlies are going to win this round. Some things are truly indelible, some things simply cannot be gotten over or muscled through. This is absolutely terrifying to me as someone obsessed with therapy and Moving On!!!

  • Lena Dunham’s Change of Pace: I’m excited for her new book, I’m excited for her new show, and I won’t lie about it!