The Double Bind

SPOILER WARNING: I have just finished reading The Double Bind by Chris Bohjailian. I did not anticipate the ending. In fact, I felt betrayed by the ending. It really focuses me on the question: Can the point of view character's report of the action and interpretation of events be trusted?

To some extent, I play with this in my own writing, but I'm writing SF and from an alien's perspective. Its self-reporting and evaluation of human thought and action is suspect and the alien narrator even admits it may not truly understand what is going on. However, totally fictitious characters, conversations and events are chronicled and then explained away by retroactively defining the POV character as mentally ill. Although this happens in real life, I don't care for this treatment of the reader nor as a narrative device.

Another question the novel raises is victimization and how we treat other people. Characters who are important to the POV character and who care about her treat her as a child. She resists this categorization. Later, we learn that she is having a psychotic episode. Does this make her friends' and family's responses acceptable or could they have handled things differently--more like the adult she is?

On the whole, I can recommend the read because it prompts these questions.