Exit Zero by Marie-Helen Bertino
Many thanks to Farrar, Straus, and Giroux and NetGalley for
providing me with an advanced copy of Marie-Helene Bertino’s excellent new
collection of short stories Exit Zero. I was so excited to see this
title since, as anyone who lives in the Philadelphia area knows from visits
down the shore, Exit Zero is Cape May, or it could also be a pathway to
Rio Grande, where the main characters from the titular story goes to sort out
her recently deceased father’s affairs and makes a startling and magical
discovery about his life, from which she was largely absent. This story, like many
of the others, features characters who experience both loss and an extraordinary
event, often one following the other. In some ways, these stories have a
similar feel to Bertino’s amazing book Beautyland, which was another reason
I was so excited to read these stories. I haven’t read anything else by Bertino,
but I have been meaning to. Beautyland was rightly heralded as one of
the best books of 2024, and I absolutely loved the book. Not only is it a great
book that takes place for part of the time in Philly (and Wildwood, which is the
exit before Exit Zero), but it also speaks to those who always feel a sense of
difference, and how they make meaning in a world that doesn’t always accept
them. It’s also an incredible story about friendships, relationships, and loss.
With the first few stories in this collection, I initially felt like the tone
was a little darker and there was more of an emphasis on loss and splits, as
death, estrangement, and divorce all feature into these stories. Yet, when I
think back about Beautyland, there were similar themes and events that
Adina dealt with in her experiences observing and reporting on human behavior.
I think she just tried to experience it from such an objective perspective that
it created this incredible view that enabled me to reflect and think about my
own interactions and expectations for relationships.
While the characters in Exit Zero are not aliens, one
character, Viola, from “Viola in Midwinter”, transcends her humanity, yet
experiences the kind of sadness and loneliness that she probably didn’t
anticipate when she befriended Samara at the factory. This story is the last one
in the collection and puts a creative spin on a more common type of horror
story, one that considers the implications of loneliness and the kind of
solitary existence that might come with living forever. It’s a really cool and
unique take, and despite being filled with a kind of sorrow and longing for connection,
I really enjoyed it, and it also reminded me of those themes from Beautyland—the
desire to connect, observing others from a distance, and being equally intrigued
and repulsed by their behavior.
The first two stories, “Marry the Sea” and “Edna in Rain”, seemed
a little more like experiments than stories. They are both brief and surreal. “Marry
the Sea” had some delightful images and word play, and it will be a story I
need to revisit to further understand and make meaning from. “Edna in Rain” was
another brief story about a woman who envisions her ex-boyfriends raining down
outside. It has one of my favorite lines from the book too, “Sometimes I feel
like God’s favorite sitcom.” There are other great lines and descriptions
throughout the book that just made me stop and highlight it, and think more
about its meaning and how I never heard something like this before. At first,
the story reminded me of one from Ling Ma’s collection Bliss Montage,
where she lives with all of her ex-boyfriends in a house or something, but
Bertino’s story has fewer interactions with the exes. It seems like they go
back further and further in her consciousness to include boys with whom she
interacted, until it gets to her second grade boyfriend. It’s a surprising
ending that I won’t ruin here, but the story ends with a sadness that comes
from young revelations. It’s a stunning story for being so short and kind of
magical in the beginning.
“Exit Zero” is the third story, and I can see why it bears
the book’s title as well. It’s a great story about Jo, an event planner living
in Brooklyn, whose estranged father passes away. She must go to Rio Grande, amazingly
described as a one-strip-mall town” known for its fish tacos. I spent many
summers in Cape May at my grandmom’s house, and I can remember taking trips
over to Rio Grande, to go to the K-Mart or see a moving that was playing on
Beach Drive’s theater. It always seemed like a reprieve from the shore to a
kind of non-vacation world. Nevertheless, Jo’s experience in Rio Grande,
sorting through the remains of her father’s life takes an unexpected turn when
she discovers a unicorn in the backyard that her father had been caring for. This
story is wonderful and heartbreaking as Jo tries to care for and understand the
unicorn, and these steps she makes to care for this magical living creature
also, in some ways, bring her closer to understanding her father. If you’ve ever
experienced loss, only to question how things ended and what could have changed
things, this story may appeal to you. Also, if you’ve ever been to Cape May,
Wildwood, or Rio Grande, it should appeal to you as well, as well as several other
stories—“Flowers and Their Meanings” and I think “Lottie Woodside and the
Diamond Dust Cher” mentions Higbee Beach. I’m definitely going to recommend
this book to all my family that spends the summer in Cape May.
“Can Only Houses Be Haunted?” is another interesting story
that details the moment the narrator viewed her marriage as breaking. It’s also
a kind of humorous ghost story that I would love to see turned into a short
film or maybe a chapter in some kind of anthology movie. The child ghost in the
story is pretty creepy, but the way that they expel the ghost is pretty funny. “Lottie
Woodside and the Diamond Dust Cher” also details the end of a marriage, so this
was when I started to notice the theme of loss, especially a kind of loss in
relationships. This story follows a woman who, on the day of finalizing her
divorce, decides to splurge on a cab ride, but ends up in a cab with another woman,
and they both are involved in an accident. As a result, Lottie ends up with the
woman’s package, which ends up being a fancy portrait of Cher. She tries to deliver
the portrait to an art gallery, but never ends up getting to see the curator. I
loved the scenes in the gallery. It reminded me of Otessa Moshfegh’s skewering of
art in My Year of Rest and Relaxation. Even more absurd is how Lottie
ends up wandering around NY with this large portrait of Cher when all she wants
to do is go home and rearrange her apartment to start her life anew. I wasn’t
sure if this was some kind of reference to turning back time, since it seems that
Lottie ends up reflecting on how her marriage slowly disintegrated, and how her
indifference may have contributed to it. Although both of these stories deal
with divorce, I found them to also be absurd and funny, to a certain extent. If
anything, the characters have unreal events that help them understand more
about their situations and maybe allow them to gain new perspectives on their
loss and how to move ahead.
“The Ecstasy of Sam Malone” is another surreal and absurd
story where the main character ends up trapped in an episode of Cheers.
She seems to want to escape her real life, abandoning her studies to drink at bars,
only to wake up one night and exit to the bar where everyone knows your name. I
loved how this story veers between recalling plotlines of episodes and the
recurring gags and jokes, and how the narrator really tries to escape through
Melville’s. Interestingly, a stranger enters the bar, explaining that he wants
to have a drink while he waits for his wife’s surgery. No one at the bar
believes him; they all think he’s been sent by the rival bar to get revenge for
beating them in a sports contest. I wondered if this was also a kind of message
about loss and grief, and how even where everyone knows your name, they might
not really believe these kinds of challenging feelings and emotions. Rather
than confront them, they want to keep up the jokes and the façade of life that
allows us to keep laughing. I would love to include these stories in a book
club discussion to see what others think. The magic and absurdity of these
stories adds to the depth and ambiguity in their message and meaning.
I also really loved “The Night Gardener” about a woman who gardens
at night, but begins to receive messages from balloons. She begins to
communicate with them, and they respond. Claudia, the night gardener, has an
admirer from work, but she doesn’t really reciprocate his feelings. He brings
over flowers, and she ends up texting her sister asking about the flowers. While
Claudia has someone who is interested in her and wants to talk to her, she
spends more time with the balloons and texting her sister. The story culminates
with Claudia preparing her garden for a gardening contest in the city. I loved
the mysterious communication and some of the insights we gain about Claudia and
why she keeps texting her sister. It’s another great story about loss and the
things we hold on to. “Kathleen in Light Colors” is a story about a couple that
discover there is something between them that ultimately keeps them apart. It
is never named, but it also ends up bringing them to other people. It’s a
shorter story, but again, it is one of the more profound reflections on loss
and relationships ending. “Every Forest, Every Film” is about a film critic who
ends up filling in for another critic (who just so happens to be named Jude Law,
like the actor) at a new hot show that she is supposed to have heard or read
about, but didn’t really know. It’s called The Cab and is kind of like
an interactive, immersive cab ride that ultimately disorients the critic, but
also that amazes her. The critic is recently divorced, and her father ends up
sending her a package that he seems nervous about its arrival. His explanation
at the end of the story makes more sense, and I think it also speaks to the
challenges of how loved ones navigate divorces of those they care about. Although
he has good intentions, it also seemed kind of an odd choice to send. The other
element of this story I loved was the aura and setting of The Cab. Bertino
describes the workers in a hilarious way. This is another story I will need to
revisit, and one that I would love to hear discussed in a book club. I’m still
trying to make sense of the different parts that come together in this story,
but I think that is what makes this story so great.
“In the Basement of Saint John the Divine” was both sad and
strange, and I loved the ending of this story. The story focuses on James, a
younger boy who only recently had his sight restored. His dad decides to have
him spend the night at a kind of medieval sleepover, where the participants act
as knights. His mom is returning to stand up comedy, but is nervous about
allowing her recently sighted son to spend the night out. Even though this story
is more about gaining than loss, James still loses something as he gains sight,
and the story also focuses on what role parents play in the growth and
development of their children, and James’ parents feel like maybe with his
sight restored, they are no longer necessary to help shape his world. It’s a
powerful story about taking steps where you may not feel comfortable and being
willing to take those kinds of risks to discover what you are really capable
of. “Flowers and Their Meanings” is also about parent-child relationships, and
specifically focuses on a narrator who as a late teen ends up taking care of her
mother while she recovers from surgery. During this summer, the narrator works
at a local clothing shop, and I imagined that this story also took place in Rio
Grande from her description. There is also a tiger on the lose from the “tiny
shore-town zoo”, so I immediately thought of the Cape May Zoo, which is
actually a great zoo. We see the narrator care for others as well—whether it is
a customer stuck in a dress or deciding not to further confront the family of a
man who harassed her while they are having a meal. It’s an interesting story
where we see how she remains responsible and caring, despite or maybe in spite
of all the bad events taking place in other families.
I couldn’t put this book down, reading several stories at a
time. As I mentioned, I can’t wait to tell my cousins and relatives who
regularly spend their summers in Cape May about Exit Zero and Beautyland.
I’ve been meaning to tell my sister about Beautyland because it’s
such a beautiful story, and these stories in Exit Zero also serve as a
great entry point to further enjoy Beautyland. I loved how they traverse
some familiar terrain, but ask us to look at emotions and tragic events like
death, divorce, loss from a different perspective, often trying to find the
humor, magic, or surrealness in them. This is how we can manage to get through
these situations and find meaning. I highly recommend this collection, and need
to make sure I pick up Bertino’s other collections and books.
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