NORMAL WOMEN

After moving back to her hometown, a new mother becomes captivated by an unconventional community where she believes she can reclaim her body and purpose.

When Dani tells her husband, Clark, that she’s pregnant, he insists that they move to Metcalf. Metcalf isn't merely Dani’s hometown; thanks to her father’s waste-processing “kingdom,” Dani is local royalty. Feeling the weight of her legacy, Dani fears returning with a husband and baby but no career. As she and Clark settle into parenthood, Dani grows increasingly frustrated with her financial dependence on Clark and his lack of gratitude for her domestic labor. Just as Dani’s existential crisis hits its peak, she stumbles on The Temple, a yoga studio where vibrant women provide sexual stimulation to and promise emotional healing for the men who visit. Immediately drawn to The Temple’s “village” of confident and beautiful women, Dani quickly befriends the owner, Renata. But when Renata disappears, Dani begins to wonder if the healing center really contains the higher purpose she’s been seeking. Hogarth’s novel opens strong with creeping suspense, laugh-out-loud humor, and smart critiques of the ways gendered expectations wear on people’s self-worth, enjoyment of life, and relationships. But the book is not for everyone. The stakes of Dani’s choices rely on the assumption that toxic masculinity can only be cured by cisgender, heterosexual sex; if employed in a way that allows the men to access their deepest vulnerabilities, such sex can “fix the whole world.” Also, despite Renata’s passing comment that she respects other kinds of sex workers, readers are repeatedly reminded that The Temple is not full of “cracked-out streetwalkers.” Temple women are exceptional—and therefore acceptable—because they don’t have sex for pleasure alone, and neither do the men they heal, but for the greater good. They’re not like other women, and especially not the caricatured stay-at-home moms who share their love of yoga but who don’t even know how their credit cards work.

A conversation starter about gender roles and sex work, but a lackluster mystery and limited critique.