In her debut novel, “The Coast of Akron,” Adrienne Miller has built a deliciously absurd tale around lies and those who live them. An artist, his former wife, their daughter and his current boyfriend are all victims of a sort, though most victims cooperate less willingly with their fate.
It is a small miracle that Merit Haven Ash isn’t more confused than she is. The daughter of world-famous painter Lowell Haven, Merit was raised singlehandedly by her mother, Jenny, after they left the splendid comforts of a faux Tudor mansion on the outskirts of Akron, Ohio. She is now married to Wyatt, a compulsively ordered man, and stepmother to 13-year-old Caroline. And except for an excessive need to please, she has pretty well left the past in its place. Until, that is, the day her mother receives an invitation, from Mr. and Mr. Lowell Haven, to a costume ball.
Jenny is, to say the least, not pleased by news of the party. Merit finds her pitching old journals at a tire, a piece of playground equipment mounted across the street from her house. The journals go back to 1976, the year Jenny spent in England studying to become a painter. It was there she met Lowell, it was there the two decided to marry. It was also there that Lowell first met Fergus Goodwyn, Jenny’s closest friend and now the second Mr. Haven of the invitation.
“The Coast of Akron” unfolds in three narratives: a third-person strand that follows Merit; excerpts from Jenny’s journals; and Fergus’ first-person narrative, a memorable addition to the pantheon of drama queens. Lowell’s is the single missing voice. He is, instead, viewed through the eyes of those who’ve been host to his parasitic behavior.
Each life touched by Lowell is a study in falling apart. Jenny sacrificed her dreams of becoming an artist and now supervises children’s activities in an art museum. Merit is juggling work and home, selling ad space in a magazine while trying to satisfy her statistician husband’s need for control and predictability.
The most outrageous voice, though, belongs to Fergus, the man who is keeping Lowell in a manner to which he’s become quite accustomed. Fergus has money, the result of selling his father’s land for shopping malls.
But for all that Fergus is in a position to buy affection, he’s very much alone. And he is getting pretty fed up with being taken advantage of by Lowell.
Handsome, charismatic Lowell is a human magic mirror, a man who makes his followers feel special and cherished by simply allowing them to bask in the light of his talented presence. It’s been five years since he’s created one of the self-portraits that brought him renown, but he doesn’t seem bothered by the lack of production. In fact, it only adds to a mysterious persona, a quality he carefully cultivates.
But Lowell’s fame is built on a house of cards, and as the party draws near, it becomes clear that there will be a reckoning. Fergus is looking to unmask Lowell, but he needs the man’s co-conspirators to cooperate. But for others to throw off a mantle that was cheerfully adopted would mean admitting that they, too, had been duped. It’s hard to persuade someone to tell the truth if a lie has become comfortable in its familiarity.
Miller writes in a breezy tone, easily read. One would not necessarily describe “The Coast of Akron” as a comedy, but it is imbued with a flip absurdity that breeds more than the occasional smile. The very idea of creating an “ill-conceived Tudor mansion on the coast of Akron Ohio” as some kind of artist’s salon, and then filling it with over-the-top characters, is deliciously out of synch with the landlocked Midwestern city’s blue-collar roots.
The novel is easily worth the time just for the opportunity to meet its cast of larger-than-life characters. Each one is a bit too: too funny, too smooth, too dramatic or too desperate. If this collection were a real gathering of family, they’d have to be taken with a grain of salt or a dose of antacid. As it is, they spice a delightfully irreverent mix in which turned pages reveal unanticipated turns of events, and they reinforce the maxim that revenge is indeed a dish best served cold, but also one that should be prepared with careful calculation.
Robin Vidimos is a freelance writer who reviews books for The Denver Post and Buzz in the ‘Burbs.
The Coast of Akron
By Adrienne Miller
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 400 pages, $25
