Emily and Einstein is
a novel that dances between genres: women's fiction, magical realism, romance,
dog lovers' fiction (surely its own genre by now). The novel doesn't fit into any neat package, and
Linda Francis Lee employs these incongruities, including a paranormal flourish,
to deepen her story's emotional punch.
The titular Emily is a book editor, happily married to her
husband Sandy—until he dies, and she finds out that he was a serial cheater
whose family immediately starts eviction proceedings against her. She's
furious, heartbroken, and humiliated. In time, she realizes that Sandy was a
charming, self-destructive man with big ambitions and no follow-through. He
wanted to run the New York marathon; he never managed. He wanted to be a rower,
a basketball player, an honorable husband. He failed, and failed again. Being
rich and beautiful has a way of shielding a man from his own failures. As Emily
finally understands, her husband "was a man used to getting his way
without having to bargain or even ask."
But Emily and Einstein
is not a simple novel about marital betrayal. Emily was stubbornly blind to the
reality of her marriage: as she says, she "was never good at sensing
trouble." Sandy lied to her from the very beginning, yet she forgave him. She
deliberately didn't see her marriage,
her husband, her life: she loved a man who didn't exist. She created a phantom
husband, a paranormal partner.
And here's where the fascinating magic aspect of the novel
comes in: Lee gives Emily's scruffy little rescue dog the soul of a man: to be
exactly, Sandy's soul. Wasn't it
Pythagoras who believed that a good friend was reincarnated as a dog? It sounds
complicated and weird, but Lee presents animal re-embodiment as a one-time
occurrence (no need to eye your dog for resemblances to your dislikable, dead
ex).
Sandy-as-Einstein is a scruffy, sarcastic, and funny dog who
finds it hard to come to terms with the fact he was a rabid little mutt as a
human. And Emily has her own learning to do: she needs to understand that she
is an expert at avoiding truths that stare her right in the face. Any of us who
have avoided a powerful, painful truth know the utter conviction of denial. But
this plot really hinges on one question: can Emily recognize Sandy-as-Einstein—a
truly impossible truth? Lee turns what could be a simple redemptive tale, in
which Emily gets over her faithless former husband and meets a lovely guy named
Max, into a real challenge: can Emily accept a truth that her commonsense tells
her cannot be true?
I loved the use Emily
and Einstein makes of its fantastic premise: the way that a touch of magic
and humor makes deep sorrow and painful secrets more visible. With a nod to
Pythagoras, Lee will have you believing in miracles and second chances—and you
might even find yourself eyeing the family pet in a new light.
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