A review by kaitisbooknook
Vladimir by Julia May Jonas

dark emotional reflective tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

The story follows an English professor in her fifties whose husband, a fellow professor at the same liberal arts college, is embroiled in scandal after several former students write a group letter putting him for having inappropriate relationships with students. The couple has had a years-long understanding about extramarital pursuits, and given that all the women involved were adults, consenting, and that the affairs occurred before the school outlawed student/professor relationship, we are immediately caught in a dicey morally grey area. 
As her husband is on leave pending a hearing, a new young(er) professor, Vladimir, and his wife, a fellow adjunct with a tragic backstory, come to the college to fill in. Our narrator quickly describes herself as “obsessed” with him, hatching a months long plan filled out salacious fantasies to finally get him alone.
I enjoyed the parallel of our narrators intended affair with the investigation of her husband, and how she chooses to reconcile her own feelings about their marriage along with how public perception of her own character alters the longer she chooses to remain at his side. The anticipation of the fulfillment of her affair kept me turning the pages, but I found myself struggling to actually see where her obsession was stemming from, and if there was truly any chemistry between the two characters. Without giving it away, there is a plot twist at the end that, like the narrator often jokes, is a little heavy handed with symbolism, and I felt myself become very detached from the plot. There were also a couple of characters, including Vladimir’s wife and our narrator’s favorite student, who seem to disappear from the plot, which was disappointing as I found them both intriguing. 
Overall, I found this to be incredibly readable and thought-provoking in regards to how we think about consent and relationships in general.
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