Author Angela Flournoy’s debut novel, The Turner House, was a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction in 2015. A decade later, her much-anticipated second novel was just named to this year’s National Book Award longlist, and it’s not hard to see why.
The Wilderness follows the lives of five millennial Black women over the course of their decades-long friendship, as they move from young adulthood into middle age.
When the novel opens in 2008, Desiree and her grandfather, Nolan, are on a plane to Paris. Their ultimate destination is Zurich, where the terminally ill Nolan plans to die by assisted suicide. We learn fairly quickly that Desiree and her older sister, Danielle, are not close, and that in fact Danielle knows nothing about their grandfather’s plans.
From there we jump to 2018, where January sees social media posts of her friends on vacation and reflects on a family life that hasn’t measured up to her expectations. Despite being married to a seemingly good husband, “there seemed to be a growing list of things that had become her duty alone,”January thinks, “ranging in importance from folding the laundry to making sure he called his own mother on her birthday.”
From there, back to New York in 2012, where Desiree lives with her friend Nakia, a lesbian entrepreneur finding success in the restaurant industry. This episodic time travel eventually introduces us to Monique, a spirited librarian-turned-influencer, and to Desiree’s sister Danielle, who works as a doctor and flits around the edges of the established friend group.
The choppy structure of this novel feels a little disjointed, and I found myself thrown by the leapfrogging timelines and perspectives. In fact, The Wilderness feels more like linked stories than a typical novel. But Flournoy’s writing more than makes up for it. Each chapter brings a new surprise, and the characters are forged in vivid scenes that speak to their individual personalities as well as their relationships with one another. We see the women deal with careers, family, love and grief, along with timely challenges like racism, political upheaval and the COVID pandemic — what Flournoy describes as “the wilderness of adult life.”
One chapter takes us inside the Los Angeles home of Nakia and her partner, Jay, as they host a monthly salon for political discussion. The women try to keep the invite list around seven for ideal conversation and the guests “fifty years and younger, on the basis that younger minds (are) better at ‘imagining radical change.’”
Another follows Desiree as she drops everything to check on January, who is struggling physically and mentally after the birth of her second child. Flournoy’s depiction of new motherhood is real and raw. So is her rendering of female friendship and the challenges of measuring our own approaches to life against those around us.
What shines most in each episode of these women’s lives is the love they have for one another, which supersedes their occasional arguments and misunderstandings. The novel’s unsettling climax takes us to a near and all-too-believable future where humanity comes up against authoritarian rule, and we watch the characters navigate the violence of modern life.
Flournoy spins her web of friendship into the late 2020s with realistic flair and impressive grace. Along the journey, we learn that an essential aspect of growing up is figuring out how to remain connected to others. Friends fall sick. They get divorces. They deal with any number of unforeseeable calamities. “It is our job … to figure out how to be there for the people we love,” Flournoy writes, “come what may.”
The Wilderness is a kaleidoscopic journey that explores the celebrations and pitfalls of life and the value of found family.
