Self-Portrait with Boy

'Tragedy is insignifigant, banal.'

Is it? Lu Rile is hungry, to be something in the art world, to make her mark no matter what. Art is to be seen, be it disturbing or not. Is it her fault if the photo that could make her career happens to be another woman’s all consumning tragedy? When she accidentally captures a young boy falling to his death in a photograph of herself, she has to decide whether betrayal is a worthy price to pay in the name of art. By chance, the boy lives in the same riverside warehouse she does, a place that smells of rat poisoning and turpentine, the only place she can afford in New York. Working in a health food store where she is treated poorly is the only way she can work on her picture a day plan, but time is of the essence, she has to be taken seriously if she will ever make a name for herself. When she forms an intensely close bond with Kate, Max’s greiving mother, the photo and the boy begin to haunt her, wreaking havoc on her sanity. This is her future, the gold, the meat and yet her love for Kate causes pause. She knows if she moves forward to show the photograph, it will be the ruin of everything she has built. There is a choice, or is there? Kate’s husband Steve is an artist, surely they understand art above all else belongs to the world? It cannot be denied that the photo is beautiful in it’s horror. It’s amazing what we convince ourselves of when it comes to our own wants.

Kate has taken Lu Rile into her home and heart, confiding the intimate struggles of her marriage, sharing the abyss of grief for her beloved,late gifted son Max, not once imagining Lu Rile is keeping the secret of her son’s final moments from her. That back in her own crummy apartment is a devastating photograph of his fall. Lu struggles just to survive, working in a health food store, her father depends on her and needs an expensive surgery, she simply is not making enough to maintain their lives. Kate knows the right people, everything is falling into place, this is the chance Lu must take, finally an oppurtunity to push her art out there. Can’t this be a blessing that blossoms out of grief and tragedy? Lu would be insane not to take advantage of the chances her friendship with Kate affords her. How much of her love and compassion, her tenderness for the deeply wounded, broken Kate is selfless? Can’t she take care of Kate but also look out for her own needs too? Why is it so wrong?

Who is this Lu? “There are so many people I had not yet become.” It seems there are so many versions of ourselves that haunt us, so many different people within us begging to be born. Is hunger and a drive to be someone reason enough to betray? Are there moral grounds that should never be tramped upon, even for the sake of art? It’s stunning the lengths people go to to make something of themselves, and what works wonderfully in this novel is the internal tug of war Lu is having within herself to do what is right, for her or for Kate, whom she’s come to love. How a novel can break your heart one moment and make you furious the next is a wonder.

I devoured this novel, it was ugly and beautiful, much like everything going on inside of Lu. It made me spitting mad at times too.

Publication Date: February 6, 2018

Scribner

Art is rooted in experience, and artists plumb their lives for their art. I think of F. Scott Fitzgerald and how he appropriated Zelda's letters and diaries and story for his work, or Thomas Wolfe whose first novel Look Homeward, Angel caused a ruckus in his hometown that was so thinly veiled in the book. And I think of Elizabeth Strout's recent novel My Name is Lucy Barton whose character is told she must be ruthless in her art. Artists are faced with telling the truth or protecting others.

On the first page of Self Portrait With Boy, we are told the main character, Lu Rile, was described as "ruthless," single minded. Lu, looking back on what happened twenty years previous, talks about the trauma behind the work that catapulted her into the limelight and tells us her story.


The novel begins with Lu admitting that at age twenty-six "there were so many people I had not yet become." I loved that line because it reflects how I have seen my life since I was a teenager: life is a continual process of growth and change, so that we become different people as we age.

Lu is a squatter in an old factory inhabited by artists. She works several low paying jobs and barely scraps by. Lu feels like an outsider, a girl who grew up poor and does not understand the world of the well-off and well-known artists around her.

Because she can not afford anything else, Lu becomes her own model and every day takes a self portrait. One day, she sets the timer on her camera and jumps, naked, in front of the large windows in her unheated apartment. When she develops the film she discovers that in the background she has captured the fatal fall of a child.

The child's parents become alienated in their grief, the successful artist father moving out while the mother, Kate, leans on Lu for support. It has been years since Lu had been close to anyone. She is unable to tell Kate about the photograph.

There are weird occurrences that make Lu believe the boy is haunting her and she becomes desperate to get rid of the photograph. Lu's father is in need of money for surgery, and she is pressured to join the others in the building in hiring a lawyer. Lu knows her photo is an amazing work and she struggles between success or the love she feels for Kate and the admiration for Steve.

Rachel Lyon's writing is amazing. I loved how she used sights, sounds, and aromas to make Lu's world real. This is her debut novel.

Lu Rile, a dirt poor twenty-six year old photographer, lived in an abandoned warehouse in Brooklyn, New York. The landlord allowed artists to squat in his cheap, ill-repaired lofts. Gentrification would eventually force apartment dwellers to accept buy-outs. Barren streets with crumbling sidewalks and unheated living space would be replaced by exclusive residences. For now though, Lu lived in a fourth floor loft. She worked part-time in Summerland, an upscale health food store in Brooklyn Heights. The wealthy clientele treated her like a non-existent entity. Her subsistence diet consisted of food she pocketed from Summerland.

Lu, a struggling photographer, needed a platform for change. She embarked upon a photographic exercise in the study of technique; shadows and depth perception. Every day, she staged her self portrait then critiqued the photo. Self-Portrait #400 was unique. Against the backdrop of the loft's large pane window, a nude Lu leaped up in the air from the right while a blur from the left descended, followed by screams and sirens. An accidental masterpiece. A falling boy (Max Schubert-Fine falling to his death) while Lu leaped in the air. A perfect photo of flying and falling. The photo could be transformative. It could be a career starter, a way to reach a wider audience. A moral dilemma ensued, a question of right or wrong.

Upon the death of nine year old Max, neighbors from the apartments came together and developed close friendships while insulating and protecting grieving mother Kate Fine. Lu Rile, lonely and friendless, became a close confident, a new experience for Lu. Although haunted by images of Max, Lu was propelled forward but wanted to get Kate's blessing and permission to show the photo. How could she even think of approaching Kate?

"Self-Portrait with Boy: A Novel" by Rachel Lyon is a study in morality. The emotional toll, the guilt and stress created by the accidental photo of Max's demise and Lu's potential rise cannot be understated. Ms. Lyon has created a powerful commentary on a photographer's quest for recognition and success.

Thank you Scribner and Net Galley for the opportunity to read and review "Self-Portrait with Boy: A Novel".

Rachel Lyon brings us an excellent novel set in NYC - actually in DUMBO, Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass, from 1991 (pre-gentrification) into more modern times. Lu Rile has graduated art school and done some graduate work, but spends most of her time taking and developing arty photos, and working at a small health food store in nearby Brooklyn Heights for minimum wage. In 1991 NYC, that was $3.80 an hour. She would not be able to stay in NYC if she didn't live in the abandoned neighborhood at 222 River Street under the bridge overpass. If she returned home to live with her Dad on the Massachusetts coast, she would never be recognized or respected as a serious artist.

Part of her daily routine included taking a self-portrait, usually an action shot or one defining herself or her community. On the 400th day's self-portrait fate or kismet interferes, resulting in a perfectly balanced, absolutely compelling photo. It is the best photo she has ever taken. It may be the best photo she will ever take. Unfortunately what makes the photo balanced and perfect is the upstairs neighbor's nine year old child free-falling to his death outside Lu's window. Of course she doesn't see the photo until several days after the accident, days spent consoling Kate, getting to know her better, becoming friends. And once Lu sees the developed proof, she realizes she must make a choice between being true to her friendship with Kate and destroying the negative, or beginning her career as a professional photographer by showing the print in a serious gallery. Or maybe there are other choices?

I received a free electronic copy of this novel from Netgalley, Rachel Lyon, and Scribner in exchange for an honest review. Thank you all for sharing your hard work with me.

I was immediately drawn to the provocative premise of this book. It's the late 1980s. Young, struggling female NYC photographer Lu Rile lives in a former warehouse; a crumbling, illegal building of lofts. Lu's latest project has been taking a self-portrait each day. So far the results have not been extraordinary...until one fateful day. Lu sets up her camera and strips bare. At the appropriate moment, she leaps forward aside her wall of windows as the shutter releases, capturing her image in flight. Whilst Lu was airborne, she heard the sound of something tap against her window. Now there were more sounds. Lu would never, ever forget the animalistic howl of agony from Steve Schubert, the artist upstairs. Within seconds, Steve and his wife Kate were pounding down the hallway stairs. An unspeakable tragedy had just taken place. Steve and Kate's only child Max had fallen off the roof, fatally landing into an air vent. Days later when Lu develops the film, she makes a heart-stopping discovery: "Self-Portrait #400" captured beautiful blond-haired Max Schubert-Fine tumbling downward in her left window pane in perfect symmetry with Lu leaping across the right pane. As startling and horrific this is to discover, Lu can't deny the reality that this is her long-awaited masterpiece.

Lu works three jobs simultaneously while pursuing the dream to have her photographs shown in a prestigious art gallery. She even steals food from the health food store she works at to survive financially. So, "Self-Portrait #400" is like a ticking time bomb as Lu deals with its implications. Although she never interacted with the Schubert-Fines prior to the tragedy occurring, Lu has now become quite close with Kate. How can Lu bring herself to tell Kate about the picture and ask for permission to have it shown as an art piece? This is the major conflict in the book.

The author chose an unorthodox method of conveying the conversations between people. She used absolutely no quotations around the dialogue, nor identified by name the person who spoke each line (example: said Kate). You are just supposed to discern the narrators once the stage is set with the characters. At first it looked clean, simple and straightforward, but sometimes I had difficulty assigning the dialogue.

I love reading about the art scene in New York City decades past, so this was right up my alley. It was a slow burn resolving that pivotal issue of publicizing the photo, but the author managed to keep the story interesting while it bore itself out. This was definitely a well-executed out-of-the-box (my favorite kind) story.

This was a very thought provoking book. I liked this book. Wasn't prepared for the ending ,however it made the book exactly what it is. Bravo!