A review by kaylielongley
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton

4.0

This darkly funny book made for light reading. After experiencing heart-wrenching tales from author Hamilton in the past, I did not know what to expect. This Wisconsin author has instead crafted a pseudo romance. It's almost a satire where a wife has engineered a romance between her husband and her role model, in the hope of collecting data for a book she's writing. The book is unafraid to be odd, with glimpses of aliens, a farm backdrop, and unashamed characters who don't quite know they're feminists and rebels yet live their lives, ignorant to the rest. Most of all, I liked Hamilton's observations of making idols out of people: both the husband and wife fall for the same person, one for her brain and the other for a presumed chemistry. Yet by turning a person into an idea, lust triumphs over love.