American Appetites (Magill Book Reviews)

At a glance:

Ian McCullough is as political scientist who specializes in demographics. He reduces human existence to the sum of its external indicators. Indeed, by his own standards, his life should be perfect. But something is missing. He feels that what he is doing is somehow not real, that his real work is historical research,and that some day he will find the time to devote to it. The trouble is that he is too successful, and greed has replaced the higher motivators.

Ian’s wife Glynnis believes that greed is the principal driving force for most people. She equates hunger with greed, and successfully profits from this human weakness with her cookbooks and her gourmet expertise. Glynnis also provides structure for Ian, a man who prefers the confines of a squash court to the more open tennis court. It was Glynnis who pushed Ian into the field in which he is such a great success. It is Glynnis who runs the house; indeed, it is “her” house, and the house is “her.”

Ian has never been certain about anything, perhaps because he recognizes that appearances are misleading. Glynnis, on the other hand, was always certain of everything, which is probably what brings about her destruction. She allowed the outward signs of Ian’s “infidelity” to convince her of something which was not true. In the end, however, Ian’s uncertainty will also destroy him.

AMERICAN APPETITES is rich in metaphor, a novel written with the thrift of a short story. It is also rich in insight into human nature. Joyce Carol Oates shows that people are, after all, not the sum of the statistics which make up their everyday lives, but something more. The fact that something is inexplicable and unpredictable is what makes human life at once so interesting and so difficult.

Sources for Further Study

Booklist. LXXXV, October 15, 1988, p.345.

Boston Globe. December 18, 1988, p.17.

Chicago Tribune. December 18, 1988, XIV, p.1.

Library Journal. CXIII, December, 1988, p.134.

Los Angeles Times Book Review. January 15, 1989, p.3.

The New York Times Book Review. XCIV, January 1, 1989, p.5.

The New Yorker. LXV, April 3, 1989, p.116.

Publishers Weekly. CCXXXIV, November 4, 1988, p.70.

Time. CXXXIII, January 9, 1989, p.64.

The Washington Post Book World. XIX, January 8, 1989, p.1.