Madonna in a Fur Coat: A Novel

A case of hurt people hurting people! Okay, I finished this book in one sitting. The writing, yes, is exquisite. The story is engaging and the conversations are thoughtful and evocative. What bothered me, though, is how much the book leans into sympathizing with and even romanticizing the protagonist’s pain and longing. Very little attention is given to the damage he causes to the people around him, especially his family. His wife and children appear only briefly, and those few paragraphs mostly gloss over their situation, even implying that they simply didn’t care enough to know him emotionally. But the reality is that this man is the source of much of their suffering, and he doesn’t seem to care much about them either. He doesn’t really get to complain that no one cares about him when he knowingly marries a woman while still in love with someone else and leaves her to spend her life slaving away serving him and his extended family. That’s not tragic, it’s just deeply unfair. I found it hard to admire the supposed depth of his love when it never seems to extend beyond himself. I almost wish the book had spent a little more on that side of the story, at least a footnote to the people he sacrificed in the name of lost love. The novel is so perceptive when it comes to longing and memory, but the cost of those feelings on other people feels underexplored.

I enjoyed this...a sad and beautiful tale of unrequited love, full of prose like lamentations and "what ifs" as well as the enduring feelings of infatuation and romanticism that one often associates with first-time love and loss therein...the art meets life character of Maria Pruder has a timeless quality...