Sordid sisterhood

>> Last Summer at Barebones is a tale of obesity
and sibling rivalry

by JULIET WATERS

“I go back to Barebones Lake,” Dee, the narrator of Last Summer at Barebones tells us, “the Wednesday before the Saturday on which I plan to shoot my sister.”
After finishing Diane Mason’s first novel, I spent some time wondering why more sisters don’t end up killing each other. Given the cruelty that big sisters, especially, are capable of, sistercide seems like a remarkably rare crime. According to foul-mouthed comic Vagina Dentata, aka Theresa, “big sisters are the Rottweilers of siblings... big sisters have absolute power, and boy, it corrupts absolutely.”

Ironically, Theresa is the big sister who relentlessly abused Dee throughout her puberty. Because of Dee’s extraordinary obesity (at 12 she weighed 253 pounds) she was an easy target. And because of Theresa’s beauty and popularity, the abuse seemed especially sadistic. After a mysterious incident at Barebones Lake in 1970, Dee and Theresa have become estranged.

In the meantime, Dee’s weight has melted off. She is skinny but reclusive. A freelancer for tabloids, the only people she has contact with are the freakish subjects of her stories: the incredible vampire fish boy and twin sisters who might kill each other if they didn’t share the same brain.

Now Theresa has suddenly resurfaced out of nowhere. Fat, angry and occasionally funny, Theresa’s gained all of Dee’s weight, but lost none of her own nasty attitude. The real blow, however, is that Theresa’s comedy routine refers to a childhood of obesity, the facts of which she’s stolen from Dee’s life. As Dee explains, “She took everything, by accident or design. She left me with only the story of my life. And she’s not getting that. It’s not her life. It’s my life. It’s Mine. Mine.”

This is about as melodramatic as Barebones gets, until the end. What follows is a 400-page black but poignant narrative about an imaginative, sensitive and inexplicably huge child. An uncomfortable portrayal of the daily abuse and discrimination faced by the size-challenged, Barebones seems always on the verge of a possible Degrassi Jr. High plot line. But the novel usually surprises. Dee’s only friend, Richard, a prepubescent diabetic, ends up blossoming into a blind but gorgeous 14 year old. His abandonment of her seems inevitable, but when it happens, it’s not for the reasons we might have predicted.
Richard’s mother, known to everyone as Auntie Alice, is an obnoxious, self-absorbed aspiring artist who, despite her neglect of Richard’s health, manages to exude tremendous warmth. Miraculously, Alice manages to bust Dee’s mother, Jane (an agoraphobic June-Cleaver type), out of her perfectly Windexed shell. Jane represents Dee’s shadow. A brilliant mind is slowly falling apart behind the perfect ’70s housewife disguise, but everyone in the family is too absorbed in their own pain to notice except Dee, which she does with about as much understanding as one can expect from a 12 year old.

Dee’s father, known as “The Dad,” a nickname he acquired in high school, is a likable, if dense, high school janitor who harbors his own demons. Brother David is a doctoral drop-out, aspiring folk singer and junkie. The only person from this group who seems to rise above the wounds of dysfunctional living, is Theresa. Though of course, she is the one inflicting most of the wounds. But is she as powerful as she seems?

Mason has produced an excellent first novel, though it can be slow moving and, frankly, could lose a few pounds. Readers compelled by the suspenseful beginning may lack patience for the subtly crafted misery of the middle. Readers who appreciate Mason’s fine writing may feel irritated with the opening and closing theatrics. Also, Theresa inevitably seems to steal the show, which makes Dee a less interesting character. Mixed intentions sap some of Barebones’ energy, but impressive talent restores much of it. :

Last Summer at Barebones by Diane Baker Mason, McArthur & Company, pb, 448pp, $24.95