The Stranger in the Mirror (Unabridged) [Audio Download]

I was given this book as a present, because it's about middle age. I think I am its target reader.

It wasn't an easy read. I don't mean that in the sense that James Joyce isn't an easy read, or even in the sense that Lolita isn't. It's not the subject matter (I am probably not alone in finding material that so nearly reflects my own situation fascinating) nor the style or structure that's challenging, it's more how much, and how little, she describes of herself.

A review in Mslexia Magazine commented that the book was too objective and impersonal. I disagree. The style is rather distancing, certainly, prone to metaphor and at times an affected. Describing the years 20 to 50, she writes: "Time passes, the seasons turn, the river flows idly; distracted by duty and business we fail to remark a quickening of the current...Then we look up and see that the landscape has altered...the tide has swept us downstream."

But the way she rails at her poor singleton son at his lax approach to his orthodontistry, admitting her continuing sense of ownership over his body; her shame and titillation at the prospect of being taken seriously as a sexual partner; her solipsistic observations on how and why she remains single, are unbearably exposing, and through her courage we are ambushed into a reflection of these same questions in our own lives.

Shilling isn't likeable in this book. She expects uncomfortably much from her son; she moans on about the drudgery of housework - that's fair enough, none of us actually like it, but with Shilling, not liking housework becomes pathological. "Angry reproaches fell from my lips like the toads and serpents from the mouth of the wicked sister in the Grimms' fairy tale. And I blamed my son for this, as well. I wasn't a harridan by nature, I screamed. It was he who was turning me into one with his contempt for my standards, my wish to live with a degree of grace, to keep our small shared space clean and orderly." But it's impossible not to admire the degree to which she allows herself to be unlikeable.

It's difficult to have sympathy with her self-professed feminism too. She reports having delivered "a stinging feminist lecture on the exploitation of women" and then "picking up one [her son's] lads' mags and discovered that half these semi-naked girls were enthusiastic volunteers, rather than professional glamour models. So now I wasn't quite so sure of my position on naked breasts, especially not the ones belonging to Readers' Girlfriends". Let me get this right - glamour models posing in magazines in return for money - bad; readers bragging pictures of their girlfriends, for free, good. Really?

As I said, it's a book that is sometimes hard to read, but it takes off and justifies itself in the last couple of chapters. Shilling's columnist contract has ended, she hasn't made financial provision, she is a fifty year old woman with the best part of her working life behind her, she doesn't know where to go, what to do next, and her son is still her dependent. Now the crisis of middle age is given meaning; as her place in the grand scheme makes her invisible, so she must get out there,; when her biology suggests it's time to quieten down, worldly necessity thrusts her back into the maelstrom. She puts a sweetly brave face on it, chin-up she tells herself, as she contemplates her melancholy calculation. "Time passes no more swiftly than it did when I was young, but I am haunted by the sense of how little of it is left." That's it, that's the point.

I found this book gave an amazing insight into the mind of a woman of my age and helped me to come to terms with a number of issues. I particularly found Jane's changing relationship with her son useful as I have two sons of my own. As other readers have found Jane does 'jump' about but I found reading a chapter at a time rather than trying to read it in one marathon session made it easier to absorb.

I am absolutely loving this book. I've already been back to the beginning and started again, so densely packed is the writing that, if you are just reading to turn the page, you miss an awful lot.

Jane's writing is pure mental nourishment, (hence the title of my review). Unlike all the flakey articles about aging gracefully, applying face creams, and the inevitable Botox, Jane tells it as it is, but in the most incredible detail. She spends whole pages analysing her reactions to things, which, as I am about the same age, and have a similar educational background, are just meat and drink to me.

Jane has already saved my marriage. She writes that a "Happiness is a gift, but composure can be learned." Remembering this, I exercised the composure muscles, and defused a potentially marriage-wrecking row, by remaining calm.

This is such a refreshing change from most women's writing. For example, unlike the classic ghastly feminists, Germaine Greer and Simone de Beauvoir to name but two, Jane has actually had a child, and brought him up alone, successfully.

She doesn't moan much (probably because she has never had to live with a husband).

She does go on about clothes a little bit too long (a whole chapter). Clothes have never interested me that much, but I do remember her lovely articles in The Times on the subject, so I realise it is one very dear to her.

A great read, albeit quite highbrow. (I had to get out my Oxford English Dictionary at one point!)