A review by rainbowfishy
Troubling Love by Elena Ferrante

4.5

this book admittedly took a while to get into. Ferrante’s prose, so polished and engaging and flowing in her other works, is more stilted here. more awkward, a little clunky. it’s clear she hasn’t quite yet found her authorial voice. but as it goes on and Delia slowly pieces together what her Mother’s last days were like, the pressure only builds and builds. the sickening climax, the reveal of the traumatic act that haunts Delia and her family’s narrative, had me grimacing away from the page in shock. it’s interesting that this book is often rated so unfavorably compared to her others… i agree that the characters here aren’t as substantiated as in other works (really who can top the Quartet), but they aren’t too thin outlines to be ineffective at all. Ferrante explores themes that recur in later works: complicated relationships and the anxiety of fusing identities between Lenu/Immacolata in Quartet and Giovanna/Vittoria in Lying Life are reminiscent of Delia/Amalia here. domestic abuse is continuously brought up. Neapolitan vulgarity certainly persists - but Troubling Love pushes it to the max, as the men are all relentless harassers. the fear, the claustrophobia, the fever-pitch of agitation creates an atmosphere that really drives home the message of how deep rooted misogyny is in Neapolitan culture. i squirmed, i recoiled, i found it very effective. for me, Ferrante will never miss.