I just finished Yesteryear. It's a very interesting read, and Caro Claire Burke's written it in this propulsive, immediate manner that really draws you in. However, while the book is really worth reading once, it left me with so many questions, and so much irritation at what could have been and was not.
First, Caleb gets off easy. So easy. I read an interview by Burke where she mentions 'my toxic trait is that I love him. He could've just been a schoolteacher.' Yeah, that's true, but in the book itself, Caleb is utterly vile, a rapist and abuser who drugs his wife and slaps her around. She writes intitially about the dichotomy between him and Natalie, how he's a man with some stereotypically feminine traits, who wants to do yoga and be a kindergarten teacher. Which is all fine, but that doesn't absolve him from what he does later, and it's like when men are passed off as 'simple' and 'stupid' , 'under the influence of a bad woman'. There is nothing endearing in this character, no modicum of decency, which his creator seems to find.
Second, why is she so obsessed with putting Natalie in a place where she's abused? It's not enough that she's now in a poverty stricken household, having to do stuff she could afford help for, before. There's an element of 'haha, serves her right' about it which feels unempathetic and frankly jarring to me. What does her abuse add to the plot?
by VolatileGoddess
4 Comments
the author’s interview comments are wild – saying your toxic trait is loving a character who’s literally an abuser just feels tone deaf. like you created him that way, you don’t have to defend his actions
and yeah the whole “poor little rich girl gets what’s coming to her” vibe with natalie is gross, especially when the abuse doesn’t even serve the story beyond punishment porn
sounds like a wild read with some serious flaws. burke’s take on caleb is frustrating for sure, and it’s a bummer when a book relies on such tired tropes of abuse without giving it the depth it deserves. for real, it shouldn’t feel like punishment for the character just because of her past choices.
You almost got it.
I enjoyed the book – very readable – and Natalie’s inner monologue is funny and acerbic. I do think however it needed another round of redrafting to really interrogate its subjects and pull together thematically.
For example, I’ve no issue with Natalie being an arrogant piece of work, but she also has no religious or spiritual life? It doesn’t motivate her at all despite wanting to be a theologian. These trad women, and the women they speak to, are often sincerely religious.
And agree, Caleb is rather too hapless, especially given the power imbalance in their respective class and influence.