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42 of 46 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
She Knows a Lot, 12 April 2003
For those like me who religiously read Zoe Heller's Saturday column in the Daily Telegraph, they may long since have come to the conclusion that she would make the perfect girlfriend: intelligent, funny, erudite and attractive with vaguely raunchy undercurrents. Her serious writing doesn't disappoint either and only adds to her considerable appeal. Too bad she's now firmly tucked away in New York: definitely our loss.The story of EverythingYou Know carries some of the macabre fascination of a car crash and one which assaults the reader on two fronts: the (almost) hopeless doom of Willy Muller, its main protagonist, combined with the unbearable tragedy of his younger daughter's suicide and his irreparable estrangement from her elder sister. These themes are cleverly slanted so that on the one hand the suicide has already taken place before the book begins, and on the other his first daughter comes across as a truly hideous individual. I was only trying to scrape up some sympathy for her because, thinking of myself as being a compassionate person, I knew I should – dysfunctional childhoods, and all that. Heller's grasp of all her characters is as sure-footed as a deceptively delicate mountain goat and if at times you want her to maybe just turn the volume down a little bit, she clearly relishes her cast with a tangible mirth. But it's her acute observation of everyday detail that wins the day, and I can only recall Paul Theroux doing it as well as she does (see Hotel Honolulu, for example); whether it's the way certain women walk or speak, or the exact manner in which another takes her knickers off, Heller's power of description is superlative and often unforgettable. But maybe none of this would be over-remarkable in itself were it not for this wonderful writer's underlying compassion and clear sensitivity. One always feels that however ghastly her characters' behaviour, the ghastliness is informed and mitigated by a very human, and often very raw, vulnerability. It seems that Zoe Heller knows deep inside about these things. Her next book is due shortly. We'll know more about her then, and I for one can't wait for that. Meanwhile I'm already scheming about how she's going to become my girlfriend in another life . . .
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