We need to talk about Kevin

After several years of should I? Shouldn’t I? I finally caved and read We need to talk about Kevin by Lionel Shriver. I had read several stunning reviews and heard lots of people say it really gets under your skin but to be honest, the story didn’t appeal to me so I kept putting it off. Now that the movie will be released next month, I thought it’s as good as a time as ever if I’m ever going to read this controversial novel.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the novel, it’s about a woman (Eva) whose son has killed several people in his high school. In a series of letters to her estranged husband, she tries to come to terms with the events as well as the fact that she never really liked her son to begin with, opening the whole nature versus nurture debate. Was she to blame? Was her son just a troubled kid? Who’s to say?

To be honest, I never liked epistolary novels so the idea of writing to your ex bugged me from the get go. It’s perfect if you want portray someone’s psyche, which Shriver clearly intended, but the result of this in-depth portrait is that the novel lacks pace and direction,. Eva simply reminisces about her marriage, Kevin’s childhood and her present life in which she has become a social pariah. It was interesting, but seeing as that’s all the entire novel has going for itself; it became a bit tedious and could easily have been 100 pages shorter although the pace did pick up in the end.

Eva admits that she had her son to please her husband and struggled to bond with her child which isn’t out of the ordinary. I personally know several women who love their child but don’t particularly like them at times. Now one of the reasons the novel intrigued me was that it was labeled as horrifying and shocking but sadly it failed to deliver. Maybe I’m just blasé but there was nothing I hadn’t read or seen before in this media obsessed world we live in. I wasn’t particularly shocked by Kevin’s actions but by the way society responded to them really: 7 years in prison for killing 10 people? I doubt that will put youngsters off in the future.

Is Kevin evil? Who knows because sadly not much is said about the boy’s thoughts or feelings seeing as Eva is doing all the talking, creating a one-dimensional portrait. Did Eva ruin her son by being a cold mother? I sincerely doubt it. I personally don’t believe in the supposed goodness of mankind. Call me a cynic, but I think everyone is capable of horrendous things, depending on your perspective and situation. If the “right” buttons are pushed and if you mix that with some psychological / social issues, all bets are off. Illustrated by this passage:

"I hate you, you stupid creep!" she screamed. "I hope you fry! I hope they shoot you full of poison and I get to watch you die!" It was a rapid conversation. Only one month before, she'd written an impassioned essay denouncing capital punishment.

We need to talk about Kevin gives us a clear and interesting look into the psyche of a woman who is filled with doubt, regret and above all guilt. Who is to blame in such circumstances? Biology or society? In an age where kids are being saturated from an early age by violence, drugs and radical thinking on TV, the internet and in schools, it’s not that farfetched to say they go hand in hand, making the end not all surprising. Society just nudged biology in the wrong direction.