In the Meantime

by: Robin Lippincott

Published by: The Toby Press

Reviewed by Julie Failla Earhart

Robin Lippincott’s third novel, In the Meantime, has a lot more to do with style, structure, and character development than it does with plot. The plot is rather simple, really. In 1931, two friends, ages five and six, stumble upon the prettiest boy they have ever met. He is playing in the mud and is wearing a mud crown. The three become inseparable for the remaining lifetimes, with the novel ending on September 7, 2001. I can see where Lippincott chose to give the last chapter its pre-9/11 date. There is something innocent about all the days before that one that defines lifetimes.

What makes this novel different than the average coming-of-age or the BFF (best friends for ever) novel is the style. The long and never-boring sentences are reminiscent of the great Faulkner himself—only with punctuation. The back cover blurb is approximately 200 words, yet there isn’t a word that can be deleted because each word provides important information for the reader to learn about the three main characters, Kathryn, Luke, and Starling. Some sentences run for almost two pages, but they are easy to follow.

In regards to structure, in the first section, we see the children meeting. In the second section is near the end of Kathryn’s life, after Luke has passed and Starling has disappeared. What happens between those two sections is In the Meantime, where the three plot to go New York and live together, where Kathryn takes a husband and a lover, where Luke becomes a successful editor and tries to deny his homosexuality, where Sterling dreams of becoming a famous actor, only to have both his dreams and his lust for Luke dashed.

Character development is crucial in a novel like this, especially one that is a mere 178 pages long. You get to intimately know Kathryn, Luke, and Starling, yet there is not one spoken word of dialogue. Amazingly, none of the characters actually speak, yet each has his/her distinctive voice and speech pattern.

One chapter doesn’t seem to fit. It takes place on August 6, 1945 when the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. We see the effects of that day and event on three friends who seem to mirror Kathryn, Luke, and Starling in a different culture. But it is jarring, and I see no need for it to be there, unless it is to make a statement that friendships like theirs are not unique and happen everywhere.

Armchair Interviews says: If you want to read a book where every word was measured for its value to the sentence and the story, this is it.