Coffee Spew

Fake Accounts
Lauren Oyler
Catapult 2021

Reviewed by Bob Wake

The engine for Lauren Oyler’s razor-sharp debut novel is revealed in the opening pages when the unnamed narrator makes an unexpected discovery: “My boyfriend was a conspiracy theorist.” Like the McCarthy era dissected in Philip Roth’s I Married a Communist, Oyler’s narrative is a deep dive into another equally destabilizing period in American history: the beginning of Donald Trump’s presidency in 2017. Addiction to social media is a central theme, for sure. Expat Berlin is explored for us. Oyler’s already notorious career as a take-no-prisoners literary and cultural critic ensures that every essayistic detour and aside in Fake Accounts is freighted with brilliance and wit. A favorite line: “I was one of only two people on staff who knew how semicolons worked.” (Lorrie Moore seems a clear influence here, especially Moore’s darkly funny post-9/11 novel, A Gate at the Stairs. Both novels feature a politically suspicious boyfriend and part-time jobs for their respective protagonists as nannies for a harried mother.)