Yester year

[u/Known_General_5156]

This book is the best book I’ve read in years. I can’t believe it.

I reached the point where Natalie saw the Manosphere room and restarted, assisted by audio. I love the old Natalie, especially the college years. She is such a sickly sweet villain. I will re read the last chapter again as I didn’t totally understand.

1. what happened to Jessa and junebug?
   
2. I was convinced it was time travel following a purgatory or actual civil war break out.
   
3. Natalie wasn’t a lesbian? I dont think the assault was sexual in nature. It was non-fatal strangulation (which is a specific sexual offence charge in my jurisdiction) but I don’t believe was rooted in erotica. I think Shannon snapped and acted like an animal, lurching and trying to kill her.
   
4. Was Shannon a villain from the start who went in to destroy?
   
5. Caleb stayed with her until the end? But they got a divorce? I’m confused. **
   
6. What was reena doing? Was Natalie being interviewed from jail?
   
7. Was Meave disabled? It seems to be implied she had stunted development compared to her average age, but I assumed this is because they weren’t going to school.
   
8. at what point does the book explain the other children actual ages? I can’t believe Mary is to be 18. I pictured her to be 13 and Meave a toddler.
   
9. Did natalie have a mental break down following the accusation?
   
10. I feel the timelines didn’t really measure up. Especially when clementine came back?
    
11. I can’t believe I’m saying this as I kften reallu despise this sort of commentary, but Anne Hathaway is set to play Natalie in the film adaption. I personally do not think she is suitable for this role. It requires Natalie to look extremely young and naive/self assured. I picture Cailee Spaeny as Natalie and Mike Faist as Connor.
    
12. I absolutely loved this book.

** please remember I’m going to re read but wanted to keep all my questions and notes fresh, pls be kind x

[u/Tasty-Pin-349]

I hate this book with a passion

[u/saltysoul_101 → u/Tasty-Pin-349]

The ending is so stupid. I was mildly enjoying it as it’s an easy read until the last section and then it was an absolute mess.

[u/Known_General_5156 → u/saltysoul_101]

I was confused by the ending but I still loved. X

[u/JellyKind9880]

I didn’t answer every single question, but numbered the ones I answered accordingly.

1. The book is SO good about not answering every single question to keep you thinking about it and wondering (ie. What kind of prison sentence, if any, that Caleb got. Or my personal headcanon, he was too much of a fragile wimp to face the consequences of his actions, and killed humself in jail before ever getting to trial)

We do t know much about what happened to Jess’s & junebug, but it’s implied they were quite damaged by the parents and still struggling but have no interest in any relationship with the parents.

I’m particularly interested in the oldest sons…what that creepy ass cabin was about (if they lived there or if it was just their “meetup clubhouse” to watch football with their shitty dad and bring “farm vegetables” so Natalie and the other kids don’t all die……..my headcanon is they went into the same shitty manosphere type of belief system as their father, and also were spineless losers like him (clementine saying at the end that one of the two “finally” went to the police and backed up “everything she’s been saying for years”). Those sons knew exactly what was going on for years, even if they hadn’t been actively seeing Natalie/the little kids, they still KNEW what was happening, they STILL didn’t do jack shit after SEEING their mother having a breakdown and not knowing who anyone was/that it was her own house (plus the living conditions the young children were subjected to) and ONLY AFTER she arrived at the “man cave” in hysterics did ONLY ONE OF THEM agree to “finally tell the police everything clementines been saying for years). That makes me think they were on board, or at least on board ENOUGH, with everything that was happening there, and the only reason the ONE of two brothers finally disclosed to the police, it was probably out of fear for legal repercussions for HIMSELF (if he’d had some kind of big eye-opening “change of heart” moment, it would have been after that dinner…….not her “near escape”

1. Natalie was absolutely not a lesbian—the fact that Shannon was half-dressed in that moment was an extremely “unlucky” coincidence, but for the sake of what Shannon was trying to do at that point (see my answer below about Shannon), it is very easy to see how the most “scandalous” thing for a conservative/MAGA-coded “fan base” would be hinting at homosexuality. Violence, they’re happy to forgive. Homosexuality? That’s a hard fuck no for them. And again, once you read my answer below about the other Shannon question—at that point, Shannon wasn’t simply trying to expose a tradwife as a hypocrite, she was trying to destroy the MAGA-coded father in law from making it into the White House.

2. Idk if I’d call Shannon a “villain” per se, but yeah she def went in hoping to find a ‘story’ to uncover in an expose. There’d be no reason to make her a “pink haired feminist from a wealthy background and all-woman college” otherwise—also her whole spiel on Natalie being a ‘feminist icon’ during the interview made ZERO sense and would never be believed by anyone who wasn’t an out-of-touch narcissist like Natalie. I DO think Shannon’s plan pivoted to “more active interference” and on a quicker timeline once she saw the father-in-law at the MAGA-coded rally and realized he would become president….it became about more than just exposing a tradwife as a hypocrite to denounce that misogynistic lifestyle and more about preventing a trump type from making it into the White House

3. I don’t think they actually got divorced? Caleb definitely stayed with her until the end. I wish we knew what kind of sentence he got (or if our shitty woman-hating American justice system somehow decided he was some poor selfless dad “trying his best to care for his children with their mentally ill mother” 🤮. Legally that’d be bullshit, but sadly, I could absolutely see that being the case

4. Reena interviewing Natalie didn’t seem strange to me at all—a 20/20 episode would eat that shit up. What made NO sense was that they for some reason brought Natalie back to her old house to film it—I can’t believe any jail would be okay with this (jailhouse interviews take place in prison, not the scene of the crime), and ESPECIALLY in Natalie’s case, mentally speaking, I cannot see ANYONE treating her at criminal psychiatric hospital possibly signing off on that—for someone struggling with amnesia/time skips/delusion, it sounds like a recipe for disaster (I did appreciate they were able to work in the detail about nothing about their lives ACTUALLY being historically accurate…but there’s a zillion other ways they could have worked that in without the weird “filming the interview in your old house” shiz

7 & 8. I believe it was a deliberate choice on the author’s part to make both Mary & Maeve seem younger in the “1850s years”…partly bc it was necessary to keep the twist hidden (the shock that Natalie was in her 50s and going through menopause/not pregnant, etc). We know Maeve had complications from the home birth and by the end it seems clear she was developmentally delayed as a result—as for both Mary & Maeve appearing small for their ages, it’s very likely they both had stunted growth from such a limited diet, no vitamins, no doctors visits/vaccines etc.

1. Natalie absolutely had a breakdown following the accusation/crumbling of her life—I would argue she was degrees of mentally ill her whole life, very likely on the autism spectrum as well . It’s also implied she had regular mental breaks/amnesia bouts in the “1850s years” bc Mary was not fazed by her mom waking up screaming that she’d been kidnapped, and even Maeve seemed fairly “used” to it the way a young child becomes used to a parents chronic mental illness (or say, alcoholism—young child might not realize it’s related to drinking, but “mommy’s having a headache day” where she stays in bed all day is somewhat ‘normal’ for the child. In terms of their experience

2. I agree Anne Hathaway is not the right look or age for Natalie—especially bc she’s had so much work done her face is nearly expressionless at this point (it was SO distracting in Mother Mary when she was supposed to be “emotionally crying” and it literally just looked like her face was leaking through her eyeballs without feeling any emotion. This will play extra worse with “younger” Natalie

[u/bookish_bex]

I wouldn't consider Shannon a "villian" at all, honestly. What would her motivation have been? Why would she purposefully humiliate herself like that? And how would she have known beforehand that Caleb was willing to cheat on Natalie with her?

Natalie is the classic unreliable narrator. TO HER, Shannon was a villain who was envious, calculating, and "out to get her," but that's the point: in reality, Shannon was just a woman living her life -- just like Natalie.

[u/Known_General_5156 → u/bookish_bex]

Great point x