Parade is a return to the kind of writing that made Cusk famous in the Outline trilogy, after the (wonderful) departure that was Second Place; this is to say, Parade is a little bit opaque, but I love it nonetheless. The comparisons between Cusk's writing in Outline and the work of W. G. Sebald have been made before and to great effect: she certainly writes in the tradition of Sebald's logic of coincidence and the transparency of his narrators (the latter conceit being sort of the entire purpose of the Outline trilogy). The narrator(s) of Parade are actually even more transparent, and what could be conceived of as a 'gap' in this regard is filled by the really rich fictionalized retellings of the lives of various artists.

Structurally, Parade is split into four parts, each with a focus on a different artist, all of them given only the initial G. This is a really good structural trick: it adds a haziness to the novel that I like a lot. (It also accounts for at least a degree of the fictionalization involved, since I recognized some of the artists—there's a brief interlude on Louise Bourgeois in “The Stuntman”, whose name obviously does not start with that letter.) The first of these, "The Stuntman," is available online (in a slightly altered form) at The New Yorker, where I had originally read it, and where I learned via Cusk's interview that the artist described is based on the painter Georg Baselitz, who painted upside down. The Stuntman is also the only one of the set (I think) to feature more than one artist; I believe three are mentioned.

The artists described are only lightly-fictionalized as far as I can tell; the only one in the novel that I was familiar with is the last, the filmmaker Éric Rohmer in the final section, and even then I am not so familiar with his life that it’s easy for me to tell. But the focus on obviously real figures brings a new degree of similarity with Sebald for Cusk, I think, the former of whose work is so concerned with the blurring between fact and fiction and often takes on an essayistic or biographical character. I enjoyed these sections a lot, and on the whole found them to be the best parts of the novel: my only complaint, which isn't even much of one, is that sometimes the first-person segments end up sounding very much like Outline, so the biographical sections were a little more exciting; the first-person segment in the third section of the novel could easily have taken place in the trilogy. But Outline is brilliant, so it’s hard to complain, and the fact of the matter is that Cusk is an intellectual force, and the density and electricity of her prose is enough to draw me to anything that she writes. It was really fascinating to read this back-to-back with Second Place, which is so radically different in prose style; I think that gave me a new appreciation of her work.

Interspersed with these accounts of the lives of artists are first-person accounts of the life of the narrator(s). The most compelling of these is the first, about a woman who is attacked by another woman in the middle of the street in broad daylight, but all four of them are good, and the alternating sections give a nice balance to the narrative. The narrator of “The Stuntman” is the most clearly drawn and thus has the strongest personality, which is I think what makes her story stick with me the most; she’s also the only one to use the first-person singular. All of the others speak in first-person plural. In “The Midwife,” the narrator appears to be one half of a couple going to visit a farm for what seems to be an artist residency—but the notion that they are a couple and not just two people is just my speculation. The narrator(s) are most the most invisible in “The Diver,” about a dinner party—they are almost entirely invisible except for observations about the scene. The final section is very different, and raises some interesting questions about point-of-view, since the personal pronoun feels unstable—at times it seems to refer to a single person referring to themselves in the plural and at other times it clearly refers collectively to a group, of which the narrator is a part. I look forward to seeing write-ups on this final section of the novel, which is definitely the most enigmatic.

Already in my write-up of this I’m potentially cutting against the most obvious reading: it’s entirely possible that the first-person narrator is meant to be constant, i.e. the same person, throughout. I think, though, that the ambiguity—whether or not this is four unrelated stories, four unrelated narrators, or the same person—is part of the novel’s goal: for one, it’s a natural extension of the kind of plotless, characterless literature Cusk discusses attempting to explore via the Outline trilogy. More saliently, though, the potential ambiguity of the narrators—there is no evidence that they aren’t the same, since they all operate as first-person narrators and very little detail is given about their lives—is brought into brilliant juxtaposition with the lives of the artists, who are so obviously different people but all captured under the same initial, G.; it’s like two parallel and inverted processes giving rise to questions about identity and inviting the reader to draw parallels between the various sections and lives described. This is very brilliant and one of the novel’s great successes.

Like Outline before it, Parade trades in a web of coincidences and recurring themes: the dominion of husbands over wives, the viability of being an artist and a mother, the possibility of female artistry, the disintegration of marriages, the pain of losing a parent, among other things (fans of the trilogy will be pleased to find there are plenty of mentions of dogs, some more symbolically-weighted than others). These questions about gender, sex, and artistry are clearly the questions that animate Cusk as a writer and it strikes me that she's been writing about them at such length and manages not to sound stagnant. It's been a couple of years since I read the Outline trilogy, but my impression is that the level of abstraction is higher in Parade. It's refreshing to see a writer of contemporary fiction so willing to get abstract—there is no pandering to the reader with regard to philosophical thought here. (The important qualification in this entire discussion is of course that Cusk's abstraction serves actual thought; clearly it is very possible to write needless abstraction that is belied by its emptiness.) I think that speaks to a trust in her readership, because it's easy to criticize intellectually dense writing—think of the recent reactions, mostly on the right, to the philosopher Judith Butler's work, decried as unreadable (it is not) for its complexity. I'm happy for Cusk's willingness to explore the kind of murk of philosophically-inflected writing because it makes the book so much richer.

Parade is Rachel Cusk at her best, plumbing the depths of the great question of gender and, I think, what it is to be an individual, and thus limited in the shape of one’s life. It is a brilliant novel; I think it’s worth your time.

my first rachel cusk book and i am simply blown away.

this book may be short, but it is not meant to be read out of pure simple enjoyment. it is intended to be absorbed and comprehended to fully grasp several societal issues that were delved here. the riveting writing also raises staggering questions that brings forth engrossing opinions from the reader.

i paused from time to time so i could digest every prose written as it tackles many of societal topics such as motherhood, gender stereotypes and conventional society norms — all of which are timely and relevant. in line with this, i find this book challenging because i think every part has to be dissected so one could understand it deeply. overall, this novel is thought-provoking which will leave an indelible impact on the readers.

parade will be out on june 18, 2024.

thank you netgalley, farrar, straus and giroux, and rachel cusk for the advanced reader's copy in exchange for an honest review.

I've loved everything I've read by Cusk, the recurring themes she explores in her work really hit me. Parade takes many of these themes even further by playing with form and narrative in such a way that the many of the narrators and subjects form a chorus, though each section is unique and tells a distinct story or stories about separate characters.

Art, womanhood, creativity, the parent/child relationship, identity, anonymity... so much is explored over a relatively short span of pages. Parade is thought provoking and philosophical without being dense, at turns absurd and profound, with a fresh narrative structure that creates echoes within its own conversation.

I noticed many similarities/references between this and her previous work, but Parade doesn't feel like a repetition of anything else Cusk has written, despite the similar subjects and themes. Instead, it feels like it builds on her previous work in a meaningful way, an echo not unlike the echoes occurring within Parade's four sections-- an added perspective that contributes to our understanding of the whole.

I'm definitely not doing it justice with this description but I'll be thinking of this book for some while and can't wait to get a physical copy when its released on June 18.

Thanks to FSG and Netgalley, who gave me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you #NetGalley and #FarrerStrausAndGiroux for the opportunity to read this deeply intelligent and unique novel by Rachel Cusk. I would just as easily rated #Parade FIVE stars based on its creativity, the depth of material, and quality of writing alone but it took me some time to get through the initial section (which was admittedly over my head without multiple rereads). I eventually found an audio option on my iPhone so I could better comprehend the material (audio + electronic). At its base, this novel is about the lives of artists (anonymous versions of "G" - male, female, black, white, using varied media) so easing into a "story" was problematic for me.

It wasn't until the "Midwife" section that something resembling a story fell into place but aspects of this section DID inform the previous (and subsequent) sections and the topics of gender, power, parenting, and what defines love were all woven throughout. Some parts of this book were so brilliant, I found myself relating parts to my husband and my own enthusiasm was obvious. So many intriguing storylines ensue from that point and especially brilliant moments involved the sacrifices of motherhood vs. career (art), the selfishness of broken people, the natural order of "males" as artists and creators, and the legacy of family pain.

"Our children taught us how to love, and slowly we began to understand the extent of what we ourselves had not received."

Without going too deeply into specific areas and details, or quoting uncorrected source material, I can wholeheartedly confirm that this is a MUST READ book for fans of Cusk (or if any of the other themes listed above are of interest). I have extreme admiration and respect for excellent writers, and Cusk is one for sure.

the most challenging rachel cusk ive read so far!!! really deeply layered and academic almost compared to second place, which i enjoyed a lot more as a whole. a lot of examining gender roles and who gets to make what art and why.

Rachel Cusk is an extraordinary writer whose books I have adored over the years and “Parade” is no exception to this! A fascinating novel about art and artists; painters, film makers and writers all referred to as G. I definitely feel the need to go back and reread this novel soon as I don’t feel like I fully understood and absorbed every detail of these stories, the switching between characters and the similarities between them had me a bit lost at times, but I really enjoyed the deconstruction of the traditional form of a novel through this exploration of looking at art through a new lens. I do at times feel not smart enough to read Cusk and don’t understand all her references but overall I really enjoyed this book and I will never get over how beautifully constructed her sentences and characters are. If you enjoyed Cusk’s Outline trilogy I definitely think you will devour this book and appreciate it’s gorgeous prose and structure! A big thanks to publishers F S & G and Netgalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for this honest review.

Rachel Cusk is a unique talent of our generation. Her ability to craft beautiful sentences into beautiful prose once again shows in Parade. I didn’t enjoy this as much as the Outline trilogy, perhaps because I have been reading much more intense novels recently and it was hard to switch gears to a more quiet book, but I can tell it is an achievement regardless.

I really wanted to love Parade, but reading this book felt like a marathon. I am not an english major and reading is simply a hobby, but this book felt like a chore and honestly gave me flash backs to sophomore english class. I am thankful I read this on a Kindle due to the amount of unknown words that I had to look up. While I am not asking the author to dumb down their writing for me, I am simply perplexed at how challenging this book was for me when I love litfic and am a ferocious reader. The story was truly not memorable and I was only able to make it to the 80% mark. It might have been a case of right book wrong time, but I will not be trying to read this book again. Due to the fact I could not finish, I will not be rating on Goodreads or Amazon and have marked this book as “DNF” on Netgalley.

Thank you for the opportunity to read this book. While it was not for me, I have a friend I know that will enjoy this book and make sure to recommend it to them when it releases.

Rachel Cusk is the master of shaking up perspective. Going into any Cusk novel I expect to fully surrender to the unknown. Parade was no exception. Told in four parts, typical Cusk themes of art, gender, permission, reality, and family (or more deeply, parenthood/motherhood) lead the narrative.

The first part felt so familiar I wondered where I had read it before, only to discover that it was a minor adaptation of a Cusk story that first appeared in the New Yorker. I went back and read the story there to discover minimal changes. In this first story, our main character G is male and a painter. And yet within this story and the others, perspective shifts. We have an omniscient narrator. We have G's wife who was much more interesting to me than the G of the first story. We have G resurfacing in different genders, races, and artistic mediums. And yet the story is not so much about G-- similarly to Cusk's Outline trilogy in which we see very little of our narrator outright and instead learn who she is as an outline that becomes more clear in each interaction with another. It's about these larger questions of who has permission to be an artist. How does gender play into the experience of the artist? Can an artist be a mother?

It's hard to summarize this book. I also found it hard to be satisfied with it because I wanted more. And yet with time, I find that this book is staying with me which is a good sign. I can't wait to read it again and uncover something new.

Thanks to Net Galley and FS&G for the ARC.

got 20% into this and it's not going to be for me unfortunately. cusk endeavors to tell too many different weirdly extrapolated upon vignettes at the same time, switching paragraph to paragraph, and using the same pseudonym of "G"in each of the stories for different characters. i found the stories to run together so incredibly; and none are distinct enough to warrant even a perseverance purely on one's behalf.
I think people who enjoy deeply convoluted storytelling might like this, but for me it felt needlessly complicated and incongruous! cusks writing is quite beautiful, but i do not think her style lends to this formatting

Wasn't for me, but had a real mastery of language like few books I've read before. Rachel Cusk in general has been on my TBR for a while, and I'm thinking this probably wasn't the one I should've started with, but I'll happily give her another try because I can see myself getting really sucked in by her.

One for the literary lovers!

I'm not sure how to capture my reading experience appropriately...
in a way, it felt like studying paintings in an art gallery, while hearing the conversations of others, all the while trying to make sense out of all of it at once.
This was challenging, but not inaccessible. I never felt like I "didn't get it," yet I'm not sure if I did. I suppose Cusk has somehow allowed the reader a moment to reflect before heading into the next wing-- again, I can't explain it.
The novel is philosophical, with elegant yet straight-forward prose, episodic in approach.
The connecting thread of these vignettes (which normally isn't my thing) appears to be incarnations of an artist named G (who is a different person in each section) and themes of art, motherhood, marriage, identity, violence etc
This isn't so much a book about characters or plot, but of Moments and The Things That Happen To Us, and what all of that may mean-- but don't expect the answers.

It's rather abstract (are we at a dinner party, is it an essay, are any of these Cusk herself...) and a bit detached, but I enjoyed the experience I took from it, even if I don't fully know what she was intending.

In her latest endeavor, Rachel Cusk boldly challenges conventional novel structures, urging readers to perceive her collection as a cohesive entity intertwined by its diverse explorations of art. Rather than focusing solely on artists or their creations, the narrative centers on those in their orbit, examining the profound impact of love, whether present or absent, especially within parent-child relationships. Cusk's adept deconstruction of traditional narrative conventions culminates in a masterful piece of literature, where the interconnectedness of characters and themes creates a compelling and thought-provoking narrative tapestry.

A distillation of Cusk at her best. While more episodic than her previous novels, it is equally sharp and elegantly philosophical.

This novel contains four parts touching on very Cuskian themes: truth, art, reality, morality, motherhood, freedom, the self. It lets the reader in on feasible situations, scenes, or conversations where seemingly straightforward circumstances complexly illuminate and question what people appear to know about themselves.

At first, I was afraid I stood at a distance but soon realized I had been tingling with Cusk’s perceptiveness all along. I was relieved to surrender to her signature incisiveness, sophistication, and interiority.

Parade made me feel a heightened suspicion towards humanity and somehow more compassionate at the same time. Cusk’s writing reminds me that what we pursue, as well as what we concretely refrain from, inevitably reveals what we think life is about. It destabilizes the notion of an identity since we might see who we are from the sum of our actions, responses, and restraints.

Thank you to FSG for the ARC.

I’ve tried so hard to get into this book. It should be one I would enjoy, but I cannot hang it together in my head. I’ve read and enjoyed this author before, but this one is for other readers.
Thanks Netgalley and the publisher for giving me access to this novel.

It has been a long time since I felt quite so challenged—indeed, often stumped—by a work of fiction. Since a book so thought-provoking and strange left me at a loss to articulate quite what it was that made it so. I will get back to this question in a moment.

“Parade” is a series of tenuously linked vignettes, most involving different artists named G. Some of these vignettes are paused and picked up later, as if the narrative itself were drifting in and out of consciousness. Some are told in the first person; a few appear as stories told by a group of dinner companions, in a manner reminiscent of both Cusk herself (as in the amazing “Outline” trilogy) and maybe even “Decameron.” It then crescendoes in a visceral concluding “we” section, immediately calling to mind Annie Ernaux.

What links these disparate parts together is not so much a voice—because the voices here are many—but preoccupations: with the meaning of perspective in art, as in marriage, as in parenthood, as in the embodied living itself. There is a faint call-and-response pattern between how these preoccupations are explored across the various sections, but nothing ever adds up to a pocketable, proclaimable manifesto.

And that brings me back to what makes this work so challenging to sum up. As so many great works of art, it defies summation: instead, it provokes the mind to arrange and rearrange the parts—here, the stories—until a new meaning emerges, which the mind can then accept or reject, before embarking on a still new search. In a way, the writer’s contribution is to make space for the reader’s own creative process, to anoint the reader as a creator of meanings in her own right.

One final word: none of this should obscure how amazing Cusk’s writing is. The final section in particular is staggering in its beauty, wrenching in its ardor.

As always huge thanks to the ever-generous Farrar, Straus and Giroux for an ARC of a book that will not be lacking in enthusiastic readers and animated reviewers.

A novel that commands and demands your attention. Clear your mind, get ready to concentrate, and follow along as you encounter a series of Gs and explore themes of creation, gender, ambition, violence, motherhood, marriage.

Like a work of art hanging in a gallery, Parade invites you to take a close look and feel (and interpret as you wish).

Thank you very much to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and NetGalley for the opportunity to read a copy.

Rachel Cusk continues to deconstruct the traditional form of a novel, daring the reader to regard this collection as a single work unified by explorations of art in many forms. The central characters are not necessarily the artists, or their work, but those surrounding or attendant to them. The effect of love, either its reality or its lack, is paramount, even that between parent and child. A masterwork.

In 2018 Rachel Cusk famously noted “I don’t think character exists anymore.” In Parade, she explores the multitudes of identity and myriad forms artists take in their lives and in the world. In a painfully short, dizzyingly beautiful episodic novel, Cusk again and again proves to be a master of her craft and a truly singular voice in contemporary fiction, A stunning achievement.

It’s hard to claim that Parade is a novel. It’s part essay, part novel, part semi-autobiography (she draws from some real life experiences) and thoroughly non-conventional and experimental. The one thing I can say about the book is that it is not one to be lightly approached and is probably not very accessible to the average reader. For anyone who has read her previous works, you already know what you’re getting into when you purchase one of her books. For those new to the author, this is not the sort of book you pick up for a casual, plot-driven easy read.

The book is hard to adequately capture in a brief book review. The themes are various and rather complicated. This is a book about art (in various forms) and creation, identity and motherhood, truth and reality, and gender and the female artistic experience.

Parade is broken into 4 chapters or sections. Sections 1, 2, and 4 are told with alternating narratives. Chapter 3 is a single narrative and seemingly stand alone story about a dinner party where the various parties discuss art, gender, and the condition of the female artist. For me, chapters 1 and 4 contain large chunks that read more like a blend of philosophical musings, art history, and feminist essays than a traditional novel. They require that you pay attention and I mean PAY ATTENTION. I learned (after the fact) that the first section was based on a lecture she gave and a version was subsequently published as a standalone New Yorker piece..

Each section is connected to others in theme or content but the narrators and artists at the center of the narratives are different despite almost all of them being given the name of “G”. The reader is never quite sure who is “G” although those who have done their research have been quick to make links to real artists. Art in all its forms are tackled. I had to do significant research to learn about the inspirations behind several of these “G”s. Section one includes the stories of a male painter (of course named G) who others have identified at George Baselitz and a female sculptor (also named G) who draws inspiration from Loiuse Bourgeois (see the video below about her work to get a flavor why why Cusk uses her as one of the many inspirations for this novel).

The final section was published as a piece in Harper’s Magazine and thus returns to a format similar to the first section – blend of essay and fictionalized accounts.

Admittedly, I have the attentional capacity of a squirrel and these sorts of experimental books are often challenging for me. I read the first section full of rage at the author for making me work so hard. I then re-evaluated my approach to the book and slowed down my pace and added research to my reading — I looked up the artists referenced, I watched videos of their lives and works and I paused after each section to reflect on what I had read. And there are so many gems in this book. Cusk is clearly a brilliantly intelligent writer and she is challenging to read (I do actually have an advanced degree, just not in literature or art).

Once I had changed my approach to this book (and I should have learned by now since I’ve read her other work and had similar reactions), I felt greatly impacted. Some of her reflections on motherhood and the links between motherhood, creation, and identity were fascinating and will likely stay with me for some time. The day before I had finished the novel I had gone to lunch with a friend and we discussed the decision to have children (she decided not have children and I have a daughter). So I related to Cusk’s reflections on motherhood and the complexity of feelings related to motherhood (both being a mother and having a mother), self and professional identify, in a way that felt very personal.

So, ultimately it’s hard to review this book. I think it’s fascinating, beautifully written, and dazzlingly brilliant, but it’s also not very accessible to the average reader. The sorts of readers who will enjoy this novel are those who like experimental work, those who are have the time and intellectual interest in art, feminism, psychology of art, motherhood, and philosophy. I loved it but I also had moments of hatred and resentment because she put me through the wringer trying to understand the book and I left it feeling like I understood about 25% of what she was trying to convey. If you like Rachel Cusk, you will love this book. If you are looking for a fast-paced, plot driving novel, you will hate it. If you are a novice to the art world, you will likely need to do some research to fully benefit from reading this.