Even Wallace remains silent, refusing to unveil his history of abuse, retreating behind his introversion and withdrawn disposition.Ī sense of alienation pervades the novel, as Wallace struggles to overcome his tormented past and find contentment. His friends remain silent in the face of overt racism. His parents remained silent throughout his years of abuse. Real Life is a candid meditation on the effects of grief, loneliness and the layers of silence that run through the tendrils of Wallace’s life. Perpetually seeking solitude, Wallace deems himself incapable of merging seamlessly with the world around him. He doesn’t know how to grieve for a father he didn’t love.Ĭonstructing his prose in a cold, muted manner, Taylor dissects Wallace’s psychological and emotional turmoil, as he comes to terms with his father’s death and his growing discontent with the world around him. Strangely indifferent to his father’s death, it becomes clear from the outset that their relationship was a distant and relatively unloving one.

He had concealed this news, even failed to attend the funeral. Over the next few days, Wallace becomes ensnared in a number of confrontations, which weigh heavily upon him, as he retreats further into himself, willingly disengaging from the world around him.Īt the beginning of the narrative, Wallace’s friends discover that his father had passed away a few weeks prior. Having spent his entire summer working in the lab, the novel commences with the revelation that his experiment has been contaminated To his dismay, he must start again. Wallace, a gay Black student from Alabama, is currently studying biochemistry in a predominantly white doctoral programme. Set over the span of just a few days, Taylor saturates his prose with empathetic and nuanced insights on race, sexuality and abuse. “It was a cool evening in late summer when Wallace, his father dead for several weeks, decided that he would meet his friends at the pier after all.”īrandon Taylor’s debut novel, Real Life, is a precise and intimate narrative about coping with childhood trauma.

Real life by brandon taylor