She moves to Berlin, where they met and where she writes the novel we are reading. If the dull, continuous roar of social media isn’t interruption enough for her, she imagines a Greek chorus of ex-boyfriends reading over her shoulder, criticizing and annotating her every line. Social media has lurked in the background of contemporary literary fiction, only occasionally becoming a plot point (Megha Majumdar’s “A Burning” is set in motion by a Facebook post). Oyler writes well about flowing from platform to platform during a daylong conversation, about how staring at the internet can somehow be compulsion and reward. Like the narrator, Oyler has worked in feminist media.

Source: New York Times January 26, 2021 21:11 UTC