“Consent” begins with interesting dynamics between two sets of sisters. Identical twins Saskia and Jenny have very different personalities. Where Saskia is studious and humble, Jenny is glamorous and thrill-seeking. Then there are Sara and Mattie who have a very different relationship with each other because Mattie's mental disability means she needs daily assistance. Though Sara enjoys fine wine and expensive clothes she must take on the more modest role of being a carer when their mother dies. Annabel Lyon alternates between the stories of these sisters over a period of almost thirty years. At first we're left wondering what the connection is between these two stories, but eventually a commonality is revealed which leads to a suspenseful conclusion. It's interesting how these women's contrasting stories give a different perspective on sisterhood and how challenging it is to form an individual identity apart from being a sibling. However, I felt it turned into too much of a thriller about revenge which prevented me from emotionally connecting with the plight of these characters.
At first I felt really drawn into Sara's story when she was still young. Her passion for fashion drives her to relentlessly seek the respect of the snobbish staff of a high end shop and spend almost all of her inheritance on designer clothes. Strangely, as the story progressed, I felt that there was less distinction between the characters even as they grew older and circumstances forced them into very different situations. I would have preferred it if the novel focused on the story of only one pair of sisters. There are other novels such as “The Vanishing Half”, “A Saint from Texas” and “The Looking-Glass Sisters” which I feel have more compellingly described the alternating feelings of connection and disconnection in different kinds of sisterly relationships.
I did find it moving how Sara's distress about her sister's fate drives her into a circular self-destructive pattern. The author writes, “She's chained in the masturbatorium of her own guilt”. This is an evocative way to describe this state since grief sometimes drives people into forms of masochistic behaviour. But the overall issue of where consent tips over into victimhood is used more as a plot device and I didn't feel the story conveyed the psychological complexity of this issue as meaningfully as it could have. Also, both Saskia and Sara seemed to lack motivation until they were driven by a common purpose so I found it hard to care about them. The story raises some intriguing ideas and I liked the author's tightly-controlled writing style filled with sharp declarative sentences, but I ultimately found the story a bit disappointing.
