Vera, or Faith
It’s that old rascal, author Gary Shteyngart, sprinkling literary black magic in his latest novel, Vera or Faith. Some critics claim, “it’s the most important book published this year.” Perhaps, but only for readers who love books that excoriate America. For me, the novel is simply Shteyngart gaming with words, playing with puns or metaphors and employing literary tricks –just because he can. Set “in the near future,” in full bloom of AI technology, sweetly narrated by ten year old Vera Shmelkin, a Jewish/ Russian/Korean girl, the novel is a thinly veiled indictment of dystopian America.
Super bright, and nicknamed “Facts Girl” at school, Vera (Faith in Russian) has two mothers: Her biological, American/Korean Mom Mom ---whom Vera has never seen, and her adoptive, WASP, Anne-Mom, who is raising Vera and Anne and her biological son, Dylan. Small wonder Vera is bewildered and anxious. Curious about everything, Vera keeps a diary of “Things I Still Need to Know. “ There are several entries.
Vera needs to know how to save her parents volatile marriage. She needs to know why there are so many protesters joining “The March of the Hated.” And she needs to know the significance of Fifth Third posters cluttering up her neighborhood. She also needs to know how to make friends other than Kaspi, her AI chessboard ---“adviser in chief.”
When Vera’s fifth grade social studies teacher assigns a debate about the Fifth Third movement, Vera investigates its ideology. As Vera begins her research with Yummi, a Japanese debating teammate, she learns that 5/3 is meant to enhance the vote, but only “for those who landed on the shores of our continent before or during the Revolutionary war but were exceptional enough not to arrive in chains.” Clearly the “exceptional” folks were white. Her teacher asks Vera’s debate team to take the “pro” 5/3 position. Vera feels terribly unexceptional. Were the 5/3 vote written into constitutional law, Vera and Yummi’s vote would count less than Anne-Mom and Dylan’s ---both white Americans. Vera is also worried about her Daddy.
Daddy Igor, “a fountain of sparkling wit,” and the love of Vera’s life, is an “intellectual” who “drinks special juice.” Daddy also edits a magazine “for smarties.” Having ”survived Jewish/Russian immigrant parenting,” Daddy’s invincible. Lately Daddy has been more absent from home than usual. When Vera consults Kaspi, her reliable AI, he reveals Igor is a traitor, a spy leaking vital political secrets with Russia. Anxious, Vera feels responsible. She must save her county, but first Vera needs to know why her Korean Mom Mom abandoned her and Daddy. And so begins Vera’s mission to drive to Ohio with Stella an AI programmed car ---Vera’s sole guide.
Satirical, witty, a little cynical, peppered with typical sarcasm and Shteyngart shtick.