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Chapter 1
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Such a Fun Age, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
External Behavior vs. Internal Truth
White Guilt, Ignorance, and Redemption
The Quest for Meaning
Race, Class, and Privilege
Summary
Analysis
Alix Chamberlain looks back on the years leading up to the night of Emira’s Market Depot incident. Between 2001 and 2004, when Alix is a student at NYU, she sends countless letters to companies and receives nearly $1000 of free products, from nutrition bars to candles to makeup. Eventually, she quits her job at the school paper and starts working as a beauty intern at a small company. She continues asking companies for things, “and it bec[o]me[s] a rare occurrence when she d[oesn’t] receive them.” She writes letters of praise and offers advice for improvement, and she accompanies her reviews with high-quality photos of the product in question. Then she posts everything to her blog. Over time, her blog amasses a small but notable internet following.
Alix’s positive experiences receiving free products in exchange for reviews has taught her that hard work pays off and asking for something is a reliable way to receive something. And, based on what readers know about Alix so far (she’s a white, wealthy woman with enough disposable income to hire a regular babysitter) Alix’s positive experiences writing letters are indicative of her life as a whole—she gets what she wants and doesn’t experience many setbacks. It will be interesting to see how Alix’s successes impact her worldview. Does she acknowledge the role that privilege plays in her success? Or does she think that anybody, with enough grit and determination, could experience the success that she has?
Themes
When Alix is 25, she meets Peter Chamberlain in a bar. Their personalities mesh perfectly, and they’re both “fancy but not showy.” And Peter also treats Alix’s internet activities “like an actual job,” even though she downplays her business the first time she tries to describe it to him. When Alix and Peter marry three years later, she receives many of the party favors and refreshments for free in exchange for the promise of a positive review.
That the Chamberlains pride themselves on being “fancy but not showy” shows how highly they value outer appearances—but not necessarily inner truth. What’s important to Alix is that she appears modest, frugal, and subtle on the outside—she’s ashamed of her economic good fortune, it seems, but doesn’t want to part with it in a real way. She wants to benefit from her wealth but not be hated for it.
Themes
Later, when Alix is working in the student recruitment department at Hunter College, a high school English teacher friend recruits her to give a cover-letter-writing workshop to one of her classes. A few months later, one of the students, Lucie, a rich girl with a massive Instagram following, posts the cover letters that earned her acceptances to prestigious colleges to her Instagram account. She writes a caption thanking Alix—“I owe all of my acceptances to Alix,” it reads, along with the hashtag “LetHer.” Almost overnight, Alix becomes a brand. Alix changes her Instagram bio to #LetHerSpeak.
Had Alix not had a friend who taught English at a (presumably) wealthy high school, Alix would not have encountered Lucie, who would not have promoted Alix to her many Instagram followers. Alix isn’t wrong to have seized these opportunities, of course, but the fact remains that her success—regardless of her talent or work ethic—ultimately happened due to chance and access to opportunity, not hard work alone.
Themes
At 29, Alix quits her job at Hunter College and starts holding cover letter and interview workshops at halfway houses and sorority houses. She’s invited to serve on panels and speak about issues like “Hospitality in the Workplace” and “Designing Leaders for Creative Change.” She appears as a guest on feminist podcasts.
The financial stability Alix achieves through her blog’s success allows her to quit her day job and focus on developing her brand. Again, it's only by coincidence, luck, and the privilege of forming important connections that Alix’s business becomes so successful.
Themes
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One day, during a brunch function, Alix feels a sudden wave of nausea, and it turns out that she’s pregnant. Alix and Peter consider going through with their plan to return to Philadelphia, Alix’s hometown, to raise their child. In Philadelphia, they could have a house and a backyard. But Alix decides to postpone the move in order to focus on her career.
Expecting their first child forces Alix to think consciously about how the changes that come with parenthood (relocating to Philadelphia from Manhattan) will affect her career. Meanwhile, Peter doesn’t (at least consciously) consider how parenthood will affect his professional life. This points toward issues of gender inequality as they affect new parents.
Themes
When Briar is born, Alix’s life is suddenly full of Pack-’n-Plays, chafed nipples, and other childrearing responsibilities. She starts referring to herself in the third person (“Mama’s on the phone”). The Chamberlains have clearly outgrown their Upper West Side apartment, and Peter isn’t becoming the New York City news anchor he once dreamed he’d be. But Alix is too tied to the city to leave just yet. In addition to her blossoming career, she now has a group of girlfriends—Rachel, Jodi, and Tamra—for the first time since college. Alix’s friends have young kids and careers, too, and they support one other.
Motherhood totally transforms Alix’s life—even her identity (she’s no longer Alix, but “Mama”). To that end, motherhood seems to wear on Alix. Suddenly, she’s forced to balance her professional life with the physical changes pregnancy has wrought on her body and the mental exertion of having to care for an infant. The insinuation that the Chamberlains should move to Philadelphia because Peter’s career isn’t taking off in New York (while Alix’s is thriving) demonstrates how gender inequality seeps into their otherwise progressive partnership.
Themes
Then Briar starts to talk, and her voice drives Alix crazy. Briar talks about everything—that she likes hot dogs, that she is or isn’t tired, that she sees a turtle. When Briar naps, Alix feels like the fire alarm inside her head has finally stopped shrieking. Then she realizes she’s pregnant again. When she tells Peter the news, he’s less than excited—they both thought it couldn’t happen while she was breastfeeding.
It's rather ironic that Alix has begun to loathe Briar’s voice when Alix’s business, LetHer Speak, is all about empowering women to find their voice—shouldn’t Alix be most supportive of her daughter, and most excited that she has given Briar a privileged environment where she feels confident and secure enough to make her thoughts and opinions known?
Themes
A couple days later, Peter tells Alix that he’s going to call a broker in Philadelphia. Alix feels that she can’t say no this time; after all, she does work from home, and Philly isn’t so far from New York. Plus, when Alix first met Peter, she told him she could only stand to live in the city for a few more years. And he’s always liked that she’s the kind of person who doesn’t need to be at every event.
Peter doesn’t exactly force the family to move—and Alix even acknowledges how unsustainable it would be for her growing family to continue living in Manhattan—yet it’s ultimately Peter who initiates the move. Through his actions, he decides that Alix’s commitment to domestic life takes precedent over her commitment to her career.
Themes
Still, the move comes at the worst time. Alix is in the middle of writing a letter to Hillary Clinton’s campaign team; Clinton has just announced her candidacy and her “feminist platform completely matched [Alix’s] brand.” Alix hopes a link to Clinton will help her remain relevant, even after she moves to a less-relevant city.
Clinton is undeniably a pioneering force in women’s involvement in U.S. politics. But among more left-leaning people, her politics and particular brand of feminism can be seen as elitist and exclusionary—she very much belongs to the second-wave era of modern feminism, which has been criticized for leaving underprivileged women (minorities and women of the lower classes) out of the picture. So it's telling that Alix, herself a privileged white woman, identifies with Clinton’s “feminist platform.”
Themes
For Alix’s last engagement in New York City before the move, she speaks on a panel at an event called Small Business Femme, which focuses on reproductive care and empowering books for girls. Alix decides not to use her breast pump at the event. Instead, she brings Briar to the talk and breastfeeds her on stage. The crowd cheers. Photographers snap photos of Alix, pregnant, breastfeeding, and seated between two business-suit-clad men. The stunt earns Alix thousands of followers and many interview requests. Alix starts paying her small team of interns double to keep up with all the attention. Hillary Clinton’s campaign finally returns Alix’s letter, and Alix gets a book deal. Alix doesn’t make a public announcement about leaving New York, figuring that she’ll take the train in when she’s needed there. She plans to move back once her daughters are older.
Alix’s stunt at the Small Business Femme event shows how much she values appearances and the opinions of others. Thus far, the novel has suggested that Alix resents Briar and sees her as an impediment on her career. Yet she’s more than willing to use Briar as a prop when doing so could promote her business and portray Alix a champion of women in the workplace. Again, Alex is clearly being pulled in multiple directions in ways that Peter isn’t (she, for instance, is the only one of them who has to balance breastfeeding with her career). Yet her willingness to exploit Briar for professional gain comes off as insincere and selfish.
Themes
Not long after the move, Alix gives birth to Catherine May, and things start to look up. Alix welcomes the lower cost of living and the bigger house—the Chamberlains could afford to move into a three-story brownstone only a short walk from Rittenhouse Square. Still, she longs to share the happy moments of her new life with her old friends she left behind in New York City.
Alix seems happier about Catherine’s birth than she was about Briar’s, which was characterized by stress, big changes, and having to compromise her career. So it will be interesting to see whether Alix’s initial favoritism toward Catherine will continue as the children grow—and how this will affect Briar. Finally, this section reaffirms just how much Alix is giving up—professionally and personally—to relocate to Philadelphia.
Themes
Alix had never hired a regular babysitter before moving to Philadelphia—in New York, Peter’s mother could always watch Briar. Peter’s new colleagues at the news station send him home with recommendations “of Carlys and Caitlyns.” These girls all tell Alix what huge fans they are of LetHer Speak. But Alix knows these young hopefuls “would never work.” So Alix redirects her “knack for acquiring merchandise” toward acquiring a sitter. She makes a profile on SitterTown.com, and she finds Emira.
It's a small detail, but it’s worth noting how the privilege of free childcare (through Peter’s mother) has allowed the Chamberlains to save up and achieve greater financial security than people who don’t have the luxury of free childcare. Alix’s decision to seek out Emira over the “Carlys and Caitlyns” (in this context, names that evoke the type of privileged and progressive young woman who Peter’s white-collar colleagues would hire to watch their children) seems to be motivated by her fixation on outer appearances. She wants the world to see her as the type of person who passes on young women of means to give a woman like Emira (who readers already know is Black and not particularly wealthy) a chance. Yet, that Alix frames her seeking out of Alix as akin to “acquiring merchandise” (and thus dehumanizes Emira) should make readers consider whether Alix’s inner reality matches the outward appearance of social consciousness.
Themes
Emira’s profile had no picture. All it revealed was that Emira went to Temple University, knows beginner sign language, and can type 125 words per minute. When Emira arrives at Alix’s house for an interview, she continues to confound Alix. While the other girls asked Alix about her plans for her book and future pregnancies, Emira hasn’t even heard of LetHer Speak. And when Alix tells Emira she’s writing a book, Emira doesn’t even ask what the book is about or who Alix’s publisher is. That day, Alix asks Emira when she could start.
By all accounts, Emira certainly isn’t making the ideal first impression. She’s downplaying her credentials, and she’s not showing an active interest in Alix or her work, as Alix seems to expect a prospective employee to do to ingratiate themselves with the person they want to hire them. Yet Alix hires her anyway, possibly to make a point and build a personal brand around female empowerment, much as she does with her business.
Themes
And now, Emira watches Briar three times each week. When Emira is there, Alix sits in the sun with Catherine and reads all the trashy magazines she never would have read in Manhattan. In bed one night, Peter remarks how Alix seems so much happier here. Alix wonders if this is true, or if she just cares less now.
One could interpret Alix’s lack of motivation as a response to feeling down and unfulfilled since leaving New York and having fewer social and business engagements. Peter’s observation that Alix seems happier in Philadelphia doesn’t seem to align with Alix’s inner truth, which gestures toward Alix’s tendency to project the appearance of happiness and fulfilment to the world, even though it might not match how she feels on the inside. It also shows how Peter’s white, male privilege blinds him to the degree to which Alix’s new domesticity-centered identity has affected her mental state.
Themes
But all that changes when, late one Saturday night in September, someone throws an egg through the Chamberlains’ window. Alix hears someone shout “Racist piece of shit!” followed by the sound of laughter and running feet. “I told you this would happen,” Peter says to Alix as he calls the police.
Somebody in the Chamberlain household—presumably Alix or Peter—has done or said something to make people think they’re racist. Peter is a newscaster who would have more visibility among locals, so he’s the likelier candidate.
Themes
The egg is a response to a mistake Peter made at work. Earlier, Peter’s co-anchor Laney Thacker ran a segment about the creative ways local students were asking their dates to the Beacon Smith High School homecoming. Peter introduced footage of students presenting their elaborate homecoming invitations. The last clip featured a Black student and his friends as they marched toward a group of girls with a boombox. The friends started to dance, eventually revealing a white flag with Homecoming written on it. The Black teen held out a rose to his invite. The news cut back to the studio. Peter said, “Let’s hope that last one asked her father first.” His comment sparked immediate backlash, and online commenters accused Peter of sexism and racism. Peter immediately apologized to his producers, and they let him off the hook, since he’s young and new at the job. But Alix still worried that pressure from local students would make Peter’s bosses reconsider.
Peter’s comment insinuates that the Black student would need to receive special permission to go to homecoming with the girl since she’s white and therefore out of his league. It’s also sexist in that it implies that the girl’s father ought to control her love life. Peter’s comment is inappropriate, yet it seems more indicative of his unexamined gender and racial biases than of overt, intentional racism. That Peter’s higher-ups immediately forgave his honest mistake suggests that society affords white, privileged men a higher margin of error than people of color and women. Alix’s anxieties about Peter’s mistake reinforce her obsession with external appearance.
Themes
And so, when Emira arrives at their house on that fateful night to take care of Briar, guilt over Peter’s words overwhelms Alix. That’s why later that night, Alix decides to get out of her slump once and for all: she vows to live in Philadelphia, write her book, and get to know Emira Tucker.
Given what the novel has revealed about Alix’s fixation on appearances, the reader should be wary of her motivations for befriending Emira. It seems likely that she’s more interested in repairing her and Peter’s reputation than in actually forming a bond with Emira.
Themes
