40 pages • 1 hour read
Tom PerrottaMrs. Fletcher
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2017A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
The MILF
The motif of the MILF is central to the novel. While Eve is initially disgusted by the notion, she eventually explores MILF-related pornography and is turned on by the fact that mother-types are considered sexually attractive and permitted diverse sexual experiences. After Brendan’s departure, and the absolution of Eve’s practical maternal duties, she is pronounced a MILF by an anonymous messenger, Amanda, and Julian; the fact that Eve is an attractive woman of a certain age who has been liberated from her immediate maternal duties makes her a figure of fantasy for both of them. Julian’s idea of Eve is “a porn fantasy come true,” beating “I did it with my best friend’s mom” by becoming a conquest of one’s archenemy’s mother (119).
However, Amanda’s attraction to Eve is rooted in admiration of her, as she says, “I hope I look half as good as you when I’m your age” (116), and perhaps is seeking to fill the maternal void from her own mother’s death. Eve initially finds that the MILF figure allows her sexual possibilities she had not even thought of; however, when she is toying with the possibility of having an affair with Julian, it seems tawdry and cheap. She realizes that she is settling for Julian’s MILF fantasy because she does not have the mature sexual relationship she craves. When George, her eventual betrothed, calls her his MILF during sex, she wonders whether he is the sender of the original text and finds the word a turn-off. She decides to attribute the MILF fantasy to “a passing shadow” (307) that took over her and George during a crisis point in their lives. By the end of the novel, she would like to desire and be desired on her own terms, without recourse to labels.
Oral Sex
Becca, who leaves the Fletchers’ house “looking rumpled but victorious” (7), deems the oral sex she gives Brendan as a point in her favor, and she perhaps sees it as a sexually positive feminist act given that she has mastered the art through YouTube tutorials. However, this “going-away present” (179) becomes more sinister, given that Brendan has dumped Becca to be single at college, then drunkenly sexts her the night before his departure and mistreats her during the act in the manner of a pornographic actor. Later, when Zack overhears Becca and Brendan’s Skype call and makes obscene gestures regarding oral sex, it becomes clear that whatever Becca’s original intention was in imparting the gift, the act has become skewed to objectify her as an attractive, sexually available girl, whose own needs and pleasures will be sacrificed in favor of the dominant male.
When Amber gives Brendan oral sex as a default for retaining his sexual interest, he is surprised that this confident feminist is giving him something he “didn’t even have to ask for” (178). Arguably, Brendan, who has his mind on Zack’s shunning him, feels low in confidence and almost like he does not deserve an act that focuses solely on his pleasure. However, his embarrassment at not playing the “game” of the dominant male that the act would merit causes him to replay the same derogatory scene with Becca. Moreover, his violence and sense of entitlement almost causes Amber to choke. However, whereas Becca accepted Brendan’s machismo as normal, Amber retaliates by punching him in the scrotum, causing him immense pain, and then ejecting him from her bedroom and life. Here, Brendan’s inability to combine the receipt of pleasure with respect for the giver causes him to lose his automatic entitlement to pleasure and to see himself rejected for his selfishness.
Education
Unconventional students, such as empty-nesting Eve, African American veteran Dumell, and recovering depressive Julian, are eager to expand their world views and learn something different. They enthusiastically apply themselves to the academic and social aspects of Margo’s Gender and Society class, both because they find it interesting and because it becomes an important point of connection in their lives. The class also liberates the students from their preconceived notions of appropriate gendered and sexual behavior, as they take its teachings beyond the classroom. Julian, for example, acknowledges that the class makes him rethink the gender norms he has taken for granted his entire life, and he talks about his feelings of PTSD honestly with Dumell who has suffered similar ones, in defiance of the gender stereotypes that dictate that men should be strong and silent. Julian proves wise for his years when he supports Dumell by permitting him to “feel what you fucking feel. You don’t have to apologize to anyone” (150).
The class also liberates the characters’ dormant sexual instincts. Eve uses it as a point of building a bridge between her and progressive, rebellious-looking Amanda, who is less conventional than her in terms of appearance and sexual experience. While Eve’s attraction to Amanda is largely inspired by pornography, the expansion of her education gives their attraction more substance, and they become collaborators in their endeavor to expand the seniors’ education. Dumell, meanwhile, takes the lessons to an unprecedented level when he begins dating Margo and navigating the challenges of being a racially mixed, cisgendered and transgendered couple together.
While students who are seeking a difference in their lives are open-minded to education, those who are in a position of privilege and want to retain their power are closed-minded to teachings that challenge their worldview. Misogynist Barry, who styles himself as a “what-you-see-is-what-you-get sort of guy,” would cut the learning opportunities in Margo’s class short with the line: “I was born with a penis. End of story” (53). Barry’s unwillingness to self-reflect on his gender identity is symptomatic of his comfort as a straight white male, and his fear of relating to anything that would challenge his authority. Brendan does similarly poorly in a college essay where the tutor asks him to examine “What Does White Privilege Mean To Me?” (97). Like Barry, he has had no need to examine his privilege, and so is uninterested in and unwilling to sufficiently explore the topic.
Brendan regards his college education as the perfunctory bridge between high school and what he hopes will be the six-figure salary that will further reinforce his privilege in the future. Brendan’s worldview has been set since being the popular kid in high school, and he has little interest in expanding it. However, once Brendan is humiliated and rendered accountable for his misdemeanors—first during college and then following his return home—the only education that makes sense to him is the manual labor he performs as George’s plumbing apprentice because he enjoys “the physicality of the work” (301). While Eve initially balks at the thought of her son in a working-class profession, she finds it “oddly plausible” (301) given her son’s athleticism and current lack of aptitude for academic study. Whereas the outset of the novel showed Brendan going for a college education and Eve left behind, by its conclusion, they both change their minds about their aptitude for learning.
