Fates and furies, by Lauren Groff

Fates and furies, by Lauren Groff

Lancelot, son of Gawain and Antoinette, is born during a storm in the “eye of a hurricane,” and his life reflects both his calm and stormy beginning.  A golden child (his mother had been a mermaid – well, not a real one), his idyllic wealthy life in Florida comes to an abrupt end when his father dies and he is sent north to expensive private schools.  He fails to fit in, but finds his gift in acting and soon becomes irresistible to practically everyone, including his friend Chollie’s twin, Gwennie.  His philandering comes to an end when he spots Mathilde across a crowded room and somehow he knows….  A couple of weeks later, they are married.  Cut off by Muvva, as he calls Antoinette, the young couple struggle through the lean years as Lotto, as he is known, fails to win the acting lottery and Matilde supports them by returning to the art gallery where she had worked throughout her college years.  Finally, Lotto hits his theatrical stride, but as a playwright not an actor, drawing on his own life experiences.  The novel is the story of their marriage and divided into two parts.  In the first, we get to know Lotto well, but it is the second half, when the surprising early life of Mathilde is revealed, where the reader really becomes engaged in their story.  With the title referencing the Greeks, and the names Lancelot, Gawain, and Gwendolyn (Guinevere?), not to mention mermaids and evil parents abandoning a child, pointing other ways, it is an intriguing novel.  Supposedly Barack Obama’s favorite book this year, and I’m puzzling over what, if anything, this means for the country. 400 pp.