#BookReview: Mrs. Fletcher by Tom Perrotta

Should've DNF'd this one . . .

Mrs. Fletcher by Tom Perrotta
Fiction, Released July 2017
Amazon ♦ Goodreads

From the bestselling author of The Leftovers and Little Children comes a penetrating and hilarious new novel about sex, love, and identity on the frontlines of America’s culture wars.

Eve Fletcher is trying to figure out what comes next. A forty-six-year-old divorcee whose beloved only child has just left for college, Eve is struggling to adjust to her empty nest when one night her phone lights up with a text message. Sent from an anonymous number, the mysterious sender tells Eve, “U R my MILF!” Over the months that follow, that message comes to obsess Eve. While leading her all-too-placid life—serving as Executive Director of the local senior center by day and taking a community college course on Gender and Society at night—Eve can’t curtail her own interest in a porn website called MILFateria.com, which features the erotic exploits of ordinary, middle-aged women like herself. Before long, Eve’s online fixations begin to spill over into real life, revealing new romantic possibilities that threaten to upend her quiet suburban existence.

Meanwhile, miles away at the state college, Eve’s son Brendan—a jock and aspiring frat boy—discovers that his new campus isn’t nearly as welcoming to his hard-partying lifestyle as he had imagined. Only a few weeks into his freshman year, Brendan is floundering in a college environment that challenges his white-dude privilege and shames him for his outmoded, chauvinistic ideas of sex. As the New England autumn turns cold, both mother and son find themselves enmeshed in morally fraught situations that come to a head on one fateful November night.

Sharp, witty, and provocative, Mrs. Fletcher is a timeless examination of sexuality, identity, parenthood, and the big clarifying mistakes people can make when they’re no longer sure of who they are or where they belong.

My Thoughts:

Hmm, what is there to say about this one? I read it, all of it, and I wasn’t tempted to DNF it even though I found it a wee bit plotless and a little too over-stuffed with issues. I can’t say that I’ll remember much about it in a few days so I better spit this out now.

Eve is a divorcee who, when the book begins, is sending her only son off to college. She’s not dealing well with this turn of events even though her son is a selfish son-of-a-B (if you ask me). She loves him all the same. They say love is blind and they are not kidding. She overhears him say something dreadful to his booty call before he leaves but she doesn’t address it, not wanting to stir the hornets nest and all. Personally, were it me, I’d be glad to have his rude, lazy butt out of the house! But she’s sad and she misses her boy. She even blames many of his shortcomings on herself because of the divorce and all.

I can’t remember the kids name but he has his own point of view, along with Eve and it’s almost always obnoxious. I didn’t like him and though he had a few brief moments of almost decency, I didn’t want to spend any time in his head. He also didn’t do a lot of growing up over the course of the novel but I suppose that may have been the point?

Now about Eve. She starts to fill her time watching MILF porn after she receives a text saying she’s a MILF. Apparently, she was living under a rock and had to look up the term on the internets and instead of immediately seeing the definition she finds MILF porn instead and she is hooked. In between porn viewings she signs up for a class, makes some new friends and has a wee little moment of sexual experimentation. I will not lie, those bits were interesting BUT inserted into this story were issues heaped upon issues about struggles with aging, sexual identity, younger lovers, autism, wannabe frat-life and so many more that I felt like I was reading a lesson in what it feels like to be all these types of people and the lack of focus started to hurt my head. Sadly, none of it was particularly amusing but yet I kept reading . . .

I’ll give it a three because I guess it could’ve contained even more issues. There were no foot fetishes, cannibalism or bestiality struggles at least.

I received a copy of this from Netgalley and this review is super late. Sorry Netgalley & Scribner!