A novel of family dynamics set in MAINE
Coming-of-age novel set in CHIVASSO (Northern Italy)
20th August 2024
I’ll Look For you, Everywhere by Cameron Capello, coming-of-age novel set in CHIVASSO.
#audiobook
Magdalen (pronounced maudlin, perhaps pertinent given the withdrawing nature of the character) is studying at Oxford and she has come out for the Summer to be with her best friend and her family in Chivasso. Her best friend has a brother, Theo, who has been off the scene, living in New York for several years, due to family dynamics; but he is back and finds himself drawn to his sister’s friend. They are in Chivasso for a family wedding and it is natural that they would hang out together, because their families are very close.
Maggie is incredibly inexperienced when it comes to sex and matters of the heart. He, in contrast, has a wealth of sexual conquests under his belt and therefore they are already a mismatch. His family members are very much aware of his proclivities. A pivotal moment comes when they are at a tennis-cum-disco when Maggie sustains an injury and Theo has to patch her up and catches sight of her breasts. Embarrassment ensues all round but Theo can handle it, Magdalen struggles with the impropriety of their encounter.
Run a mile, I would say, if any lothario calls the target of his advances ‘baby girl‘, ‘good girl’ or ‘sweet girl’ but Magdalen’s attraction to Theo is starting to run deep. A quick fumble up a back alley in Turin shifts the situation up into the next gear. There is much verbal sparring to cover up vulnerabilities as things evolve. The dialogue and embarrassment, the interchanges, the agony and the ecstasy bubble away, and the body language of the two people is acutely well observed and feels almost palpable against this sweltering summer backdrop of Northern Italy. There are plenty of snippets of Italian which are threaded through the narrative, handled in a cohesive way, adding texture and atmosphere to the text.
We learn of family discord and dynamics, with backstories and archaeology (the Egyptian Museum in Turin gets a good look-in because Chivasso is not far from that city), all offering a rounded story of two young people trying to work out what they feel and what they want. In different ways, they are both incredibly smitten. They are in their early twenties and it is the will they, won’t they drama of a sexually repressed woman (who is seemingly up for a sexual awakening) sliding into the predatory (could one call it that?) orbit of a sexually fluent man, that keeps the story going. Their getting together is described in overly minute detail and generally the pacing is much too slow – pages of interminable foreplay, sucking and slurping. I still had 4 hours to go on the audiobook and I was longing for them to move past the flirting and fingering stage to the actual intercourse, which at that point already felt inevitable, and then on to the post-coital dynamic – will they make a go of it longer term or not? Despite the slow pace and interminable sexual navel gazing, this novel does actually have something about it …..
This kind of burgeoning, angsty relationship is of course all-consuming for the pair involved but less so for someone looking in on their mutual self absorption, although overall it makes for a rounded, nuanced and well-observed read. And the novel is very well-written so I will be interested to see where this author goes next.
Tina for the TripFiction Team
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