All’s Well
Awad set out to create a book that is every genre at once and it somehow works.
If you have chronic pain, be prepared for an excellent and excruciating enunciation of the main character living with pain in her back and hips. I think I had so much empathy for Miranda’s pain that it made my own chronic pain worse. Mona Awad is such a talented writer, that I think it was worth it in the end.
I am already a devoted fan of Bunny so I was intrigued when I found out Awad had published another book. This could almost be classed as a dark academia since it is in an academic setting and deals with very dark subject matter, as well as close study of Shakespeare. Miranda was once a stage actress but had to leave the stage after a bad fall while playing Lady Macbeth and is now the director for students’ theater at a small university with a badly-funded and anemically staffed theater department. The theater students wish to put on Macbeth this season, but Miranda has decided to stage All’s Well That Ends Well instead and is met with mutiny. The mutiny and frustration takes its toll on Miranda and her worsening chronic pain in her hips and back, which endangers her position at the university. The actual plot is peppered with visceral descriptions of back, hip, and leg pain and is followed by the obstinate incredulity of everyone in her life about the pain. Awad’s descriptions are relatable to anyone who has had their medical problems dismissed by professionals.
“Some tell you, “Oh, whatever feels good”. But nothing ever feels good, does it?”
In a fog of pain meds, Miranda meets a group of men who promise to help her stage All’s Well and cure the chronic pain from which she suffers. What follows is a lengthy manic episode as Miranda tries to recapture her pre-accident life, including living through the new production of All’s Well that Ends Well. The mania brings a science fiction flavor to the plot and the reader is left wondering what is real and what is not. I finished the book wanting to restart it in order to go through everything again with a fine-toothed comb. Soon.
