Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore’s fourth novel tests the limits of queer joy against unvarnished realism, detailing the parallels between the AIDS crisis and COVID-19 pandemic via eccentric narrator Terry Dactyl, a trans female brought up in 1980s Seattle by two progressive lesbian mothers and a convoy of dazzling drag queens.
You can’t help but fall for Terry, who trundles through loss and hardship while carrying herself with a naivety that is as irresistible as it is baffling. After moving to New York to study, she finds herself swept up in the drugs, dancing and disease of the queer Club Kids scene. Meanwhile, she falls into a job at a gallery, then falls into the ‘job’ of an ‘artist’ (though, perhaps luckily, never quite sees herself as one). Sycamore’s commentary on the elite artworld is not subtle, yet Terry remains immune to its pretence and pomp: instead, her years pass in a haze of technicolour fractals, scattered ashes and glittery makeup, as nights bleed imperceptibly into mornings and friendships are forged in delicious drag-queen dialogue. There’s a grit to Sycamore’s prose, but it’s spirited, tender and markedly not cringe, into which so much fiction about sex, substance and cities can tiptoe. Meanwhile, Terry’s inner dialogue is unfiltered and drawn-out, providing a genuinely joyous insight into the contradictory mind of a creative.
The second part of the novel finds Terry returning to Seattle during the outbreak of the Coronavirus pandemic. There she revels in nostalgia, dancing alone in neighbourhood parks in an attempt to cope with the isolation brought on by government-imposed restrictions. In these strange days, solace is found in the Black Lives Matter protests and routine 8pm applause for healthcare workers. Unlike Terry’s mothers, who become more conservative with age, for Terry, growing up does not mean straying from your beliefs for convenience. It means finding clarity in them, even if that means landing yourself in trouble. Sycamore herself is an activist and adopter of radical queer politics, so it’s unsurprising that a fire-in-the-belly feeling translates to the page. This is a book about community and intimacy, the importance of both for survival, the avoidable injustices that recur throughout history and the necessity of remaining hopeful, even as the weight of the world pushes down on your shoulders.
Terry Dactyl by Mattilda Bernstein. Sycamore Cipher Press, £11.99 (softcover)
