Her Fearful Symmetry

I don't think I realized when I picked it up that Her Fearful Symmetry was written by Audrey Niffenegger author of The Time Traveler's Wife. I have not read The Time Traveler's Wife but knew that there was an element of surrealism to it.


Her Fearful Symmetry was touted as "mesmerizing", "chilling" and "addictive."

The story is set primarily in London when an aunt they have never met (their mother's twin sister, Elspeth) leaves her flat to Julia and Valentina, sisters, twins and somewhat lost 20 year olds. The inheritance comes with two conditions - they must live in the flat for a year and their parents are not to enter the flat.

The girl's embark on a year long adventure just after their 21st birthday. Julia is the more dominate twin, Valentina she calls "the Mouse" and as Valentina yearns to enroll in design school, it is Julia who convinces her she cannot do anything alone. But in Elspeth's apartment they begin to go separate ways - Julia spends time in the upstairs apartment of Martin an agoraphobic who suffers from severe OCD while Valentina begins to spend time with Robert, downstairs neighbor and Elspeth's former lover.

When they are in the apartment, they are not alone. Elspeth's ghost has taken up residence and eventually learns to communicate with her nieces and Robert. One secret she will not answer, even in death, is why she and the girl's mother never spoke and why the girl's never met her.

The story has a level of implausibility that I was able to overlook through the strong characters and the building plot, but then when the secrets are revealed and the climax of the story reached, I was annoyed that I had let myself be sucked into this fantastical story.

I assume that this is Niffenegger's style and it has made her successful, but there were such good characters that I wish she could have come up with a less absurd ending.