Lynn Steger Strong's Want reads like a highly personal confession of various wants: the want of money and stability in one’s life and career; the want of providing more stability for one’s children, as well as support—emotional, financial, and otherwise—for one’s spouse; and also the want of creating lasting ties and friendships amid a world where technology has made us feel that people are closer, and yet has instead created gaps and chasms among people, even, in the narrator’s case here, her oldest friend, Sasha.

The narrator of Want comes from a socioeconomically privileged background, with an Ivy League doctoral education to boot (Columbia is never named, but hinted at). With a husband following his fantasy of a dream job and two children to provide for, Steger Strong’s novel charts what it’s like to work at a charter high school in the Bronx—where the students are cattle-prodded into performing high on standardized testing rather than offered actual instruction or one-on-one time that would actually serve them—and also catalogues the increasing adjunctification of higher education in America. For those over-educated living in New York City, this is often paired with being over-worked and under-paid; this is the case of Steger Strong’s narrator in Want, and we witness how she attempts to balance her several jobs, declaring bankruptcy despite working nonstop, being a parent to her children and as much of a supportive wife to her husband as possible, all the while fantasizing about a friendship that fell off the tracks a decade ago—one that is only really continued on social media, in fits and starts.

There are a lot of interesting passages and sequences to mull over in Want, and the books the narrator teaches to her undergrads at night are both resonant of her own prose and also familiarly savory to fans of literary and translated fiction. There are echoes of Rachel Cusk here, too, while Steger Strong maintains her own voice: never once fearful of admitting privilege and its loss for her narrator, and never scared to shows the flaws in modern life in terms of how it affects family, finances, mental health, and one’s personal relations.

While there are many quotes I would love to pluck from the book, I’m respecting the do-not-quote mandate of the ARC I read—kindly provided by Henry Holt and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review—and urge those who are all too familiar with the over-educated and under-paid gap in America right now, especially those in education, to read this book when it’s published in July 2020.

4.5 stars ( )

This gentle novel puts the spotlight on a family in NYC that just cannot cut it financially nor stay afloat. Elizabeth, mother of two, drifts back into daydreaming about her best friend Sasha, with whom she has only sporadic contact since she married, and spies on via Facebook. There are intense lookbacks to Elizabeth and Sasha's girlhoods, their travels, boyfriends, suicide attempts, miscarriages, and abortions, and Elizabeth's realization that there's a missing piece in her puzzle and that Sasha is that piece. Elizabeth and her husband have an affectionate and supportive relationship, but with working three jobs as an adjunct and getting too emotionally involved with her students, she is exhausted and demoralized by her wealthy distant parents threatening to break up her family to save their granddaughters from penury. Her husband, a woodworker, is also struggling in his career, yet they stay intact despite the financial pressures of bankruptcy. There's no miracle or magic wand here - just a frank tale of modern day struggle and perseverance.

Quote: “My parents came from nothing and worked hard for their money, which means they thought anyone who was not also successful was not successful because they did not work hard enough. Love was wrapped up tight with winning and one’s value was variable and contingent and could fall short at any point.” ( )

I don't know why I read this. ( )

DNF. couldn’t get past 30 pages ( )

WOW. Just WOW! This book was simply intoxicating and left me almost speechless. It’s one I want to reread almost immediately so I can once again bask in the wonder of its words. I’ve already ordered a copy of my own so this can sit with pride on my bookshelf along with the rest of my collection.⁣
saw so much of myself in Elizabeth that at times I had to put the book down for a moment. It’s bewildering and yet almost satisfying to see what you felt were unique thoughts and feelings spoken by a fictional character. The reveal of what untethered Elizabeth’s and Sasha’s friendship caused me to deeply reflect on my own culpability in strained friendships like no book or movie has ever done before. ⁣
This book is a rich and honest insight into the mind of women. It explores the wanting in our lives-the things we want but can’t have, the things we want that don’t want us, wanting what our friends and parents have, not wanting the things we’re told we should want. There were so many turns of phrase and character descriptions that I reread several times, wanting to keep it to myself that much longer. Never have I read a book that explored the issues of friendship, motherhood, and marriage like this one. ⁣ ( )