To begin by describing the plot in Caren Beilin's striking novel Sea, Poison would be a disservice both to readers and author, as it would suggest that the novel is concerned or even interested in convention when it wholly, thrillingly, is not. The incomparable Beilin (Revenge of the Scapegoat) instead creates a reading experience that rewards those who delight in surprising diction, syntax, and the unconventional, including characters, storytelling, and artificial constraints in the Oulipian tradition. She writes, "Now, sure, now it's all coming together. Nothing ever more you hear here shall be deemed coincidental. What am I doing? I'm writing this novel. Here it is."
The narrator is writer Cumin Baleen (who may have been called Matt in childhood), a Philadelphia-based woman in her 30s who has an unnamed autoimmune disease, for which she tries various medications. She receives laser eye surgery, which she believes damages something in her brain, causing writer's block. Cumin's boyfriend leaves her for their landlord, so she moves into the closet of a polyamorous woman, Maron, and lusts after one of Maron's partners, Alix. Beilan uses fractured and repetitive storytelling to swirl around some of Cumin's obsessions, including Shusaku Endo's novel The Sea and Poison, being perceived as having a Jewish appearance, rape inflicted by OB-GYNs, and Jewishness.
Those who enjoy erudite references, mixed with (among many themes) incest, medical trauma, and unusual storytelling, will be thrilled by Sea, Poison. --Nina Semczuk, writer, editor, and illustrator