Writing (and its hazards)

The Deepest Lake
by Andromeda Romano-Lax

Toronto: Soho Crime, 2024
$26.95 / 9781641295604

Reviewed by Jessica Poon

*

With The Deepest Lake, Andromeda Romano-Lax has crafted an unpredictable, juicy, and scandalizing thriller set in Central America; it is exactly the kind of novel that will cause you to miss your bus stop.

Writerly espionage is one of the most delicious aspects of this thriller; there’s even an epigraph from Anne Lamott: “You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better.”

Rose is a grieving mother who applies to a writers’ workshop in Guatemala, taught by Eva Marshall, a charismatic author with a previously drug-addled, stereotypically interesting life, the stuff of memoir wet dreams. Before an apparent drowning in the titular lake, Jules, Rose’s daughter, was an aspiring writer who genuflected before Eva Marshall. She became Marshall’s personal assistant, a thankless job that often involved getting coffee and a quagmire of ethical issues. That past tense is vital—Rose is certain there’s more to her Jules’s death than what’s been uncovered. 

If it means excavating the mysterious details of her daughter’s disappearance, Rose is willing to endure iffy educational workshops, surrounded by women even more privileged than her. Eva isn’t a circle jerk type of instructor—quite the opposite, really. She is ruthless, unkind, and, to her credit, sometimes absolutely correct. There’s a brilliant scene where Eva rattles a list of phrases to a raptly attentive workshop, without first explaining why:

Depths of sorrow. Daddy issues. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. … Inferiority complex. Normalized. Reframed.… Collateral damage. Mutually assured destruction. Compartmentalization. Emotional roller coaster … Benign neglect…. Dead language,” Eva says. “Every phrase I’ve read out loud—from your manuscripts—is an example of dead, abstract language. The kind of thing I don’t ever want to read in this workshop again.

Eva’s caustic screed is mildly reminiscent of Benjamin Dreyer’s Dreyer’s English: An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style. It’s not uncommon for women to cry after receiving feedback from Eva. She encourages young women not to dress in attractive clothing. She prods with nosy inquiries; she gives prescriptive suggestions; it’s all wildly inconsiderate but par for the course (a phrase Eva herself would slam). And Eva predicts, with accuracy, which workshop members will leave prematurely. 

Eva observes that so often the story women long to tell—need to tell—is buried and repressed. For all her definitively problematic ways, it’s easy to see why Eva attracts a cult-ish fervour, attracting Jules, a twentysomething whose insecurities prohibit her from applying to MFA programs—something she neglects to tell her parents, who are already divided on the merits of such a questionable degree. But a mentor in the form of Eva is intoxicating—worth more than an MFA incurring sixty thousand dollars in debt, surely.

(In great contrast to Eva’s harshness, Gabriola Island resident Romano-Lax writes in the Acknowledgements section: “Unlike the character Eva Marshall in this book, I do believe that most people have a story worth telling and I don’t think it needs to be told formulaically or workshopped brutally. Quiet the self-censor, embrace imperfection and get it done!”)

The prevalence of social media—an author’s most vital currency, perhaps more so than their actual writing—is excoriated, but from the realm of reluctant, studied participation. Even the most successful author can hardly escape the pressures of self-promotion on social media, which is depicted with damning lucidity. Jules, not quite a Luddite but also not particularly adept at social media despite her youth, is tasked with filming curated snapshots of authenticity. Eva asks Jules matter of factly to choose someone more telegenic than an old woman. Eva’s callousness is pragmatic, demonstrating the persistence of ageism and lookism. 

That same nonchalance applies too, when Eva dismisses someone’s concern because they have stage 4 cancer—i.e., they won’t live long enough to continue hectoring her. Admittedly, this all makes Eva sound terrible—and therefore a fantastically mesmerizing character—but she’s also a self-made woman who’s successfully converted her life’s myriad miseries and adventures into compulsively readable books since the age of nineteen. Talent and charisma, though sometimes accompanied by serious personality defects that make you want to pull out the latest edition of the DSM, is seductive. And anything seductive, of course, means blatantly unethical things, often receive the benefit of the doubt. 

Eva is also a philanthropist, which might also merit investigation. Rose learns that Jules gave away one of her most beloved books—written by Eva Marshall—to a German backpacker she had no romantic affiliation with whatsoever. Why would Jules give away one of her most prized possessions while working as Eva’s personal assistant? How well did Rose truly know her own daughter?

To many, trauma and memoir are, if not synonyms, then, certainly incestuous cousins, to the point where writers with relatively fortunate histories actually feel bereft of harrowing life experiences. In an episode of Community, Troy (played by Donald Glover, once known as Childish Gambino) pretends to have had a funny uncle, which receives the sympathetic adulation he longs for. But, when he reveals it was all a farce, he ends up crying about the lack of tragedy in his life, which, for comedic effect, is taken seriously. Tragedy, after all, is a memoirist gold mine. Nobody, apparently, wants to read about endless jollities. Romano-Lax (Annie and The Wolves) is more than aware of the stereotypes perpetuated—not wholly incorrectly—about creative nonfiction and memoir. To quote one character: “I knew there’d be a bunch of Liz Gilbert and Cheryl Strayed types here, but this is crazy. What is it about upper middle-class blond women and memoirs?”

There’s no denying The Deepest Lake is deeply satisfying escapism; however, it also skillfully depicts parental grief, artistic struggles, and that persistent feeling that, if you just find the right words, then, your life will have meant something.  

*

Originally from East Vancouver, Jessica Poon is a writer, former line cook, and pianist of dubious merit who recently returned to BC after completing a MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Guelph. [Editor’s note: Jessica Poon has reviewed books by Sarah Leipciger, Katrina Kwan, Shelley Wood, Richard Kelly Kemick, Elisabeth Eaves, Rajinderpal S. Pal, Keziah Weir, Amber Cowie, Robyn Harding, Roz Nay, Anne Fleming, Miriam Lacroix, Taslim Burkowicz, Sam Wiebe, Amy Mattes, Louis Druehl, Sheung-King, Loghan Paylor, Lisa Moore (ed.), Sandra Kelly, Robyn Harding, Ian and Will Ferguson, Christine Lai, Logan Macnair, Jen Sookfong Lee, J.M. Miro (Steven Price), Bri Beaudoin, Tetsuro Shigematsu, Katie Welch, Megan Gail Coles, and Ayesha Chaudhry for BCR]

*

The British Columbia Review

Interim Editors, 2023-25: Trevor Marc Hughes (non-fiction), Brett Josef Grubisic (fiction and poetry)
Publisher: Richard Mackie

Formerly The Ormsby Review, The British Columbia Review is an online book review and journal service for BC writers and readers. The Advisory Board now consists of Jean Barman, Wade Davis, Robin Fisher, Barry Gough, Hugh Johnston, Kathy Mezei, Patricia Roy, Maria Tippett, and Graeme Wynn. Provincial Government Patron (since September 2018): Creative BC. Honorary Patron: Yosef Wosk. Scholarly Patron: SFU Graduate Liberal Studies. The British Columbia Review was founded in 2016 by Richard Mackie and Alan Twigg.

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