Such a Fun Age (by Kiley Reid)

(Amazon UK link)

I had never heard of Kiley Reid, and probably would never have come across her novel ‘Such a fun age’ if it had not been allocated as the book for this month’s local reading group. We’ve had a few rather heavy books recently, so it was good to have something a bit lighter, with characters I could relate to.

Emira is the main character in the story. She’s twenty-five, black - this is significant to the storyline - and works in a couple of different jobs in Philadelphia, in the United States. One of the jobs involves typing, which she’s pretty good at, and the other is looking after an almost-three-year-old white girl called Briar. Emira is clearly a natural with children, and has very good rapport with Briar.

We first meet her at a party with her friends, when she takes a phone call from Briar’s mother, Alix Chamberlain. Alix apologises for the late hour and offers double rate if Emira can take Briar out for an hour or so. It’s well past Briar’s bedtime, but there has been an emergency. It’s not clear until later what the problem is. However Emira immediately comes across as a caring person, willing to give up time with her friends to look after a small child. It's also clear that she struggles financially, since the extra pay is very welcome.

Emira takes Briar to a supermarket where they’ve been before, but she’s wearing party clothes and it’s very late for a small child. So it’s perhaps not surprising that she’s asked some questions by a security guard as she is obviously not Briar’s mother. Emira comes across well, although she’s not happy that a young man is filming the encounter on his phone. Once everything is sorted out, he suggests she use the film to shame the store and possibly get the security guard fired, but she doesn’t want to do that. She’s a generous person and just relieved that everything turned out well, without Briar being taken away from her.

This incident is the catalyst for Alix to start trying to get to know Emira a bit better. Alix used to work in New York, where she had an active social life and a burgeoning career. She’s struggling to get much done in Philadelphia, but her husband Peter earns plenty, and is very good-natured. And Alex has a young baby, Catherine, so she spends a lot of her time looking after her.

Some of the story is told from Alix’s viewpoint. She is eager to make amends for the store interrogation, and to become more friendly with Emira, but early on in the book I felt that something isn’t quite right about her. It’s not just that she keeps procrastinating about her writing, spending her time drinking coffee or browsing the Internet; it’s not even that she isn’t really paying much attention to Briar, who is an interesting, curious and friendly child. It’s more that she develops an unhealthy obsession about Emira, wanting to swamp her with affection and gifts.

Meanwhile Emira has started dating a white man seven years older than she is, and they seem to get along very well. But as quickly becomes clear from the dual viewpoint, he and Alix have a history, albeit over a decade earlier. The story unfolds from one perspective and then the other; it’s clear that they had quite a traumatic break-up, but it’s not certain until towards the end of the book what actually happened.

I found the writing style engaging, despite more bad language than I’m comfortable with, and some slang which I didn’t quite understand. There are several underlying themes relating to racism - not in an abusive, obvious way, but with the way that apparently some white people can go overboard to try to accommodate those who are not white. This can feel intrusive in a way I hadn't really appreciated before. I found this theme very thought-provoking.

I loved the relationship between Emira and Briar, and thought both were extremely well-drawn characters. Briar’s conversation, interests and affection for her babysitter feel very realistic. I found Emira to be kind, empathetic, and delightfully uninvolved in the online world. She has a phone, of course, and uses email, but she's not on Instagram although all her friends are, and she leaves her phone charging while she's babysitting. She's perhaps over-naive for someone in their mid-twenties but I thought it quite an endearing trait.

I was a bit puzzled that so many people in the novel seemed to think that being a babysitter - or even a nanny - was not an appropriate job for someone in their mid-twenties. Emira admits, early in the book, to being reasonably good at several things, at ‘not minding’ various jobs, but she is not really career-minded. I could relate strongly to that, and was a bit disappointed that so many people seemed to consider her job just a temporary one.

Having said that, I could understand that she needed something full-time, that would give her health insurance and benefits. This is the US, with no national health system, and once she has her 26th birthday she can no longer be on her parents’ policy.

There’s quite a dramatic climax to the book, with decisions being made on the spur of the moment; I could see why the ending was written the way it was, but felt a bit sad for Emira, although it would be a spoiler to say what happens, and what decisions she has to make.

But overall I liked the book very much, and would recommend it to anyone wanting to know a bit more about racial tensions in the United States even in the 21st century, in the context of an enjoyable novel.

Review copyright 2021 Sue's Book Reviews