“Good Company” by Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney: Book Review
“She had given over a piece of her soul… to the story that was Flora and Julian and their unassailable marriage.”
Preparing for her daughter’s high school graduation, Flora Mancini stumbles across her husband’s wedding ring stuffed in an envelope in storage, forcing her to reevaluate the meaning and state of her marriage. Good Company is an exploration of marriage, friendship, and the stories we tell about ourselves.
This is really a pretty sad story of disillusionment, told in the setting of perky, superficial lives. The light tone could almost pass for a summer romance if you’re not paying attention to content. Good Company is interesting as a commentary on modern society, but I didn’t find it particularly enjoyable to read.
Summary
Flora Mancini has finally built herself and her family a good life. Settled in LA, with stable acting work, she and her husband aren’t wealthy but they’re comfortable. Their daughter, Ruby, is an impressively self-possessed high school senior who has chosen to pursue math and science when most of her peers dream of Hollywood fame.
Flora herself has always had to work for what she wants. Pretty, but a little shorter and curvier than she’d like, her moderate success as an actor is hard-won. Likewise, disconcertingly, is her marriage: During repeated breakups and reconciliations in their early courtship twenty years ago, her future husband said, “I don’t know why I’m so ambivalent about you.” Seriously?
Back then, Flora and Julian – dubbed “Florian” – were both struggling actors in New York, and Julian finally decided to marry because he felt a desire for a traditional, stable life. For a while, they scraped by in a tiny Greenwich Village apartment, basically happy but never thriving. Life improves when Julian lands a steady job and they move to LA. Flora too finds a long-term job as a voice over actress, and Ruby gains confidence in her new surroundings.
When we meet Flora, she’s preparing for Ruby’s high school graduation. Searching for an old snapshot, she discovers her husband’s wedding ring tucked away in storage. Flora knows immediately that the ring, which Julian had said he lost years before, means a dark cloud on their marriage. She begins a search for answers, leading her to reevaluate much about her marriage and her life for the last 20 years.
Meanwhile, Flora’s best friend, Margot, is a foil. Leggy and blonde, she’s the type for whom life comes easily, and Flora marvels that they became friends at all. Now, Margot is a successful, well-paid TV star. She insists on sharing luxuries with Flora that Flora couldn’t afford herself, creating an asymmetrical relationship. But even Margot’s life isn’t picture-perfect, and we gradually see that she struggles with relationships and self-worth too.
Review
Flora grapples with complicated questions about her marriage, amidst events and conversations that are often superficial – “50 shades of café au lait,” as Flora describes Margot’s mansion. There is certainly depth to the topics Good Company explores. Flora realizes “she had formed herself in the image of her union with Julian,” and part of her struggle is that she doesn’t know who she is independent of the story she’s told herself about their marriage. Relationships influence our identity, especially for women, and it’s unnerving to think about who we are without them. As Flora reflects on the last 20 years, she realizes that her circle of friends has dubbed her and Julian the perfect couple. Is Flora willing to let go of that perception?
While these are very real dilemmas, their presentation in Good Company falls flat. I’m not sure if the tone is jaded or simply superficial, but it seems to dismiss the emotional challenges the characters face. Even the characters themselves don’t always take their emotions seriously, gliding on to the next social event or topic.
While I found the overall story lacking, some scenes painted a wonderfully on-point picture of human inconsistency. During a European vacation with her boyfriend’s family, daughter Ruby plans to break up with her boyfriend in the airport when they part ways. When he beats her to it, dumping her in the airport, she’s crushed. In another funny and totally realistic moment, Flora visits her old New York neighborhood and accosts her former therapist in a fit of anger.
Good Company begins to address complex topics and offers a commentary on glamorous Hollywood and the performative age of social media. But it never engages those topics deeply. It creates a light, carefree setting of life in LA, an enjoyable backdrop for a summer read. But it has too much darkness to be enjoyed as a light read. To me at least, this landed as an awkward in-between, disappointing because it never fully committed to a direction.
Rating
Overall: 3. This was fine to listen to, pulling me along in the story. But what’s the point? This didn’t hit home for me as either a complex emotional tale or a fun, light read.
Audiobook: 4. Narrator Marin Ireland does a very nice job making this story engaging.
About the author: Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney
Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney is the bestselling author of The Nest, another tale about the complexity of relationships. She lives in Los Angeles.
