The Stepdaughter
Astringent ... There is a surprising and inspired pivot from aristocratic buffoonery to familial pathos as J’s disgust turns increasingly inward. Sometimes the viper’s fangs sink into itself.
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Gritty, nasty, and rooted in the delirious gossip of Blackwood’s own salacious life, The Stepdaughter is the perfect book for people who find Joan Didion too even-keeled, Renata Adler too fair-minded ... She uses short declarative sentences as a way of locating a mind trapped in a small space ... With its letter-never-sent scheme and its claustrophobic style, The Stepdaughter is an innovative text that works. In its own way, it’s a perfect novel, if a small and mean one, a savvy artistic choice and a match for Blackwood’s talents.
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The apartment is a metonym for her mind: the claustrophobia of her thoughts, the suffocating sameness of her psyche ... The cruelty played out in The Stepdaughter is familiar territory. The stepmother, always heartless, self-interested, is a reliable stock figure.
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