Mona Awad’s latest novel, Rouge, is a sort of Mommie Dearest for the beauty-obsessed age. The novel begins with Belle, a shopgirl in Toronto who’s called home to Southern California when her glamorous but complex mother dies after falling into the Pacific Ocean in a strange accident. Belle learns a lot about her mother in the time of her death, as she’s greeted with a condo full of serums and creams, and mirrors that are all cracked or broken. Belle finds out that her mother has racked up a considerable amount of debt prior to her death, and has been patronizing a mysterious spa and getting ludicrously expensive treatments.
Belle herself is completely obsessed with skincare, she has a laughably complicated daily skincare routine with serums, masks, and treatments, all tailored to prevent signs of aging and skin degradation. Belle’s main source of comfort is curling up with her laptop to watch skincare videos—and Awad draws a clear line between Belle’s fraught relationship with her real mother, and this comforting maternal presence of this Youtube personality. Belle’s interest in beauty is inherited from her mother, a real natural beauty who was obsessed with preserving her youth and attracting male companions—who made Belle feel inadequate and ugly in comparison. The novel flashes back to Belle’s troubling childhood, the strange men her mother brought around the house, and her childhood fascination with her mother’s appearance.
Like much of Awad’s previous fiction, the novel takes on a magical realist element, as Belle is invited into the spa that her mother had patronized prior to her death. The spa treatments have a miraculous effect, but strange things begin happening to Belle as she becomes more untethered from reality and drawn further into this shadow world of cosmetic procedures that have mysterious effects on her. The novel is frightening and bewitching, as the reader watches Belle fall further into this other dimension of otherworldly treatments and frightening figures. The reader begins to understand that perhaps the spa had something to do with Belle’s mother’s untimely death, but Awad muddies the waters in terms of exactly how.
Rouge is a fascinating exploration of inherited beauty standards, and the commodification of appearance. Awad skewers the moving target of anti-aging products that promise transformation for a steep price. The novel is not just about beauty, but proves to be a deeper exploration of selfhood and grappling with the face in the mirror. While this novel felt less successful to me than her previous effort, All’s Well, and the murkiness can leave the reader feeling somewhat adrift, this novel is a fascinating consideration of some weighty questions. Awad creates atmosphere and mystery with lyrical and bewitching prose, and this novel is a worthwhile read for anyone who’s ever been sucked in by the promise of eternal youth.