Family Blog [Paperback]

This is the basic premise behind Clary Antome's hilariously cynical debut novel: the blandly but perfectly titled Family Blog. Family Blog follows a family of three daughters and their two parents, who, in this technophilic new society, have all decided to start up their own online journals without anyone else knowing. What do they talk about? Why, each other, of course! And through this expose their own shame, self-lies, conceits and dreams. And that's where the fun comes in. In fact, that's where the whole novel comes in, as this is the premise that carries all 330 pages of this family drama.

Though about a year of blog updates we follow family D. (the last name is kept obscure by everyone, presumably so the others won't find their blogs), as all their dirty laundry is aired (in secret) to us who have the pleasure of reading all their blogs:

Lou: The middle daughter, has shut herself in her room for almost the entirety of the book writing about her distaste for humanity and her family. She invents a fantastic life to relay to the rest of her family, because that's what they want to hear, meanwhile tearing them (and anyone else she has the displeasure of meeting) apart to their self-delusional, superficial core.

Jo: The youngest child, has been a casual-to-heavy drug user who, like her sisters, employs the guise of 'going to university' to milk money and understanding from her parents to propel her own personal agenda. But soon the drugs, the free rent and long-term junkie boyfriend no longer cut it and Jo dives head first into a firestorm of drug use, prostitution, denial, rehab and then back again, milking her family's money and (overly) good will all the way.

Bea: The eldest child, the family goody-two-shoes, kindly criticizes her siblings for being aloof and directionless. Holding herself up as the only rational sister, Bea insists on seeing everything in a positive light. But Bea hasn't fallen too far from the tree herself. With the end of her master's research stretching into oblivion, Bea's own life is as equally rootless and fancy-induced as she spends all her time in front of the computer, never an unsafe distance from her parents, updating the world with the banal details of her life.

Alda: The matron of D., stuck in her past, uses her blog as an exercise in romanticizing the past and reinventing the history surrounding her experiences with the Angolan revolution, her and her husband's attempts to build a new, better Angola, and their inevitable escape from the war-torn country to Portugal.

And finally we have Martin, who has pulled away from the entire family and, to a certain degree, his past. Instead he comforts himself in a shopping addiction, and posts his hilariously bland, know-it-all posts about topics such as remote controlled toys, fishing and two stroke engines.

Family Blog has only the thinnest of plots. Plenty of stuff happens, from prostitution, drug use, cheating, squandering of savings, arrests, family dinners, passive agressive emails and more but it doesn't follow a particular storyline, events rather just unfold as they might in life. Frankly, I found this approach quite satisfying as it's the character's interpretations of these events that are the real enjoyment of the novel, not where it goes, and this style helps to bolster the 'real' feel of the novel.

Family Blog is really about navigating life, through the lies we tell ourselves and the lies we tell others and to that end Antome keeps the plot haphazard but entertaining. I'm always impressed with writing that can survive (even thrive, as this one does) without anything really happening. Antome manages to keep it up until about the last 30 pages. Family Blog reads quickly and easily, without the self-love you find in most acanemic and pop-lit books on the shelves these days. The wit is sharp, the characters interesting and, frankly, I didn't care where Ms. Antome was taking me. By the time I was a quarter through the book I was ready to go anywhere she wanted. Though the book eventually starts to drag (these people and all their problems are only so interesting for so long), but by the time it does you're already at the end anyway.

Perhaps what's most remarkable about family blog is Ms. Antome's ability to write! Most readers, who aren't writers, probably won't appreciate all the craft this book exudes, but the author's ability to portray her characters, and their many varied and complex interactions, is impressive. Not only do the characters seem very real, but every aspect of this 5-way dynamic fits. You can even see characteristics of the parents in each child, and how this all interplays into a ridiculous life-drama that, in the end, really goes nowhere. Rather like an unsolvable puzzle. You can see how all the pieces fit, but will never be able to figure it out. Nobody learns anything, nobody changes. The characters change their lives around, but ultimately still rearrange the world around themselves.

I'm not sure what misfortune has led to this book being clearly self-published (we all know the many reasons this happens!), but it's really too bad. Not too bad for literature, because it's not a surprise that the literary establishment would pass over a book this original. Frankly, considering their track record, they don't deserve the success. And it's not too bad for Ms. Antome, as she's managed to put out a great book, which is all an author can hope for in the end. But it's too bad for the book and the overall reading public because Family Blog deserves a wider audience than it will probably get. But I suppose that's what's called 'cred' in the outsider writer circles.

Anyway, I'm not sure how many copies are around, but I'd recommend you get yours soon. Family Blog is easily one of the best books (indie or otherwise) I have read this year.

One of the earliest novels, "Pamela or Virtue Rewarded" was penned by Samuel Richardson in the form of "Familiar Letters" and published in 1740. This technique of using documents to tell a story can be a useful conceit. Novels written in such a way are called epistolary novels. With the Age of the Internet upon us, an epistolary novel written as a series of blogs is more or less inevitable, and with Clary Antome's "Family Blog" with have such a novel.

Antome tells the story of a Portuguese dysfunctional family not from one blog point of view but from five. They are first the three sisters, Lou, the cynic who is nominally going to school in England; Bea, who prefers not to see the dysfunction too clearly; and Jo, who escapes into drugs and sex. The mother Alda longs for her youth in Angola where she imagines she was helping to create a world where black and white would live in harmony as the colony broke away from Portuguese rule. And Martin the father fills his blogs with his expertise on mechanical matters that of course are of no interest to the other members of the family.

Antome writes very well and her characters are vivid. I particularly liked Lou's unabashed cynicism about everything and everybody, and just cracked up on her desire to not get out of bed--ever. The problem with the novel--and this is often a problem with self-published or small press novels--is that there is no rising tension in the novel, and so after awhile the reader begins to feel that nothing is happening. I think all aspiring novelists need to realize one thing: nobody will care about your beautifully and truly wrought characters unless you put them into a plot in which there is some kind of tension that needs resolving. Without this a novel is "flat."

Another problem is that compared to Lou's blog and the delusive misadventures related by Jo, the other blogs are a bit boring. In Lou, Antome has an authentic voice with which readers can identify. If all the blogs were written by her, I think the novel would appeal to a wider readership.