Friends and Strangers, J. Courtney Sullivan, author; Kate Rudd, narrator
The author has a gift of getting into her character’s heads and opening them up for the reader to explore. There are two major characters, both female. One is a young college student, Samantha, from a modest background, and the other is an older mom, Elizabeth, who employs Samantha as a nanny for her infant son Gilbert.
Elizabeth comes from a very wealthy background, but does not advertise it. Her fathers’ abominable behavior has caused an estrangement, and she refuses any monetary help from him. She manages on her salary as a journalist and author, and her husband’s, although he has recently quit his job to become an inventor.
Elizabeth and her husband Andrew have recently moved from a trendy Brooklyn New York neighborhood, where she loved the atmosphere and the activity, to the suburbs where she finds it hard to fit in and make friends. She is lonely and a bit bored, although very much in love and devoted to her son Gil. She believes this area is a better place to raise a child. Unbeknownst to Andrew, Elizabeth has loaned the entirety of their savings to a no-account sister. When his parents experience hard times, they are unable to help them keep their home. Andrew’s father George was forced out of his limousine service by the success of UBER.
This book is a subtle, but very obvious primer presenting the problems the country is facing today, absent the pandemic because it was written before it began. The main theme seems to be an idea presented by Andrew’s dad, called The Hollow Tree. It seems to indicate that the emperor has no clothes, and our problems are not being addressed by the authorities. There is an elite class of people who get ahead, not because of what they know, but because of what they have and who they know. Influence peddling is a larger than life theme in the book. Often, the results of using influence cause rifts that are beyond repair between friends and relatives.
Each of the characters seems to have a flaw, but it is not fatal. Many times, although well intentioned, their efforts to help each other, betrays their friends instead. There are also some who truly do not present an honest effort, but rather pull the wool over the eyes of the well-intentioned that help them, cheating them in the process. Because of that, their efforts are wasted or unappreciated. The characters are very immature and really represent the populace today, which serves their own needs first, most often at the expense of others. It is apparent today as we see secrets and lies in our government, the radical and violent behavior of our citizens, and the absence of responsible behavior in general, that we are failing in many ways to achieve an equitable society.
The author is very intuitive and insightful about people’s thoughts, reactions, interpretations and misinterpretations, white privilege, entitlements, behavior and attitudes, secrets and lies, as she accurately describes the thought processes that many of us have experienced at times, regarding child rearing, achievements, mistakes and failures. The characters, similar to those in real life, often do not appreciate when someone is kind to them because they resent the reason, question the motive, and disregard the altruistic, original intent. Resentment for those with more, regardless of how it was achieved and holding grudges against those more successful who seem to flaunt what they have, is growing as a common source of anger. Even the characters that seemed nice, harbored desires to do things that were unsavory, like snooping, lying, cheating and behaving irresponsibly.
Most of the females seemed lonely, unfulfilled, and morally shallow. Even when they achieved deserved recognition, they were unsatisfied. They portrayed the men as predators who preyed upon them. The women seemed frivolous as they surfed and worshiped their social media sites looking for information and guidance. Their bitterness, immaturity and irresponsibility seemed to be the result of a of lack dealing with the reality and facing the fact that their plight in life was a result of their own failed choices.
As worldly as some of the characters were, and as immature and naïve as others were, they all seemed to make the same mistakes. Social media was often the tool that destroyed their good intentions as the achieved results were different than their expectations.
Overall, the author has examined relationships in the context of current events with all the problems of the issues, like gender, parenting, education, marriage, and social interaction that we face today. Sex is a major issue with women who seem starved for affection and eager to please a mate in order to get it. There are role reversals with men doing traditionally female jobs and women doing male chores, showing how life and culture has changed over a period of several generations. It is about friendship, entitlement, arrogance, class distinctions, immigration, equal rights, civil rights, quality education, and fidelity, among other issues that the current society is dealing with because of widely progressive views. It is done well, but the hammer exposes the liberal failures of society.
The time line is not straight and the story plays out as the character’s reveal the pattern and secrets of their lives. The overall message is that the elitists have the power and they screw the little man, keeping him in his bubble.
Sam makes the ultimate discovery that “wealth is not only about what you possess in material things, but who and what you can influence to get your way”.