None of This Is True: A Novel

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2023

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Prologue-Part 1, Chapter 7

Part 1, Chapters 8-14

Part 1, Chapters 15-21

Part 2, Chapters 22-28

Part 3, Chapter 29-Epilogue

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Book Club Questions

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Symbols & Motifs

Bumblebee Pendant

Alix’s bumblebee pendant is one of the first things that Josie notices about her in the Lansdowne. As the narrative states, “And there in the middle of it all is Alix Summer with her big smile and her big teeth, her hair that catches the light, her simple gold chain with something hanging from it that skims her gleaming collarbones whenever she moves” (13-14). To Josie, the pendant is a part of Alix’s confident, charismatic persona, and from that moment on, she covets the pendant, a golden bumblebee, which symbolizes Alix’s seemingly golden life.

The origins of the pendant and the significance of the bumblebee to Alix are never clarified, but it is enough to know that the pendant is deeply meaningful to Alix. She wears it every day, and in times of stress or anxiety, “Alix’s fingertips clutch her golden bee pendant and slide it back and forth along the chain” (47). When the police find items from Alix’s house in Josie’s underwear drawer, the pendant is not there. When Alix asks the police to look for it, this is the first time the narrative reveals that it has been lost—with every other item Josie takes, the reader witnesses the theft. The first time the author reveals the missing pendant is when Alix asks the police to look out for it, “her fingers going instinctively to her clavicle where the pendant used to hang” (286).

The question of what happens to the bumblebee pendant becomes a small mystery. In the final chapter of the novel, which returns to Josie’s point-of-view, Jewell finally reveals that Josie has taken it, and just like Alix used to do, Josie’s “fingertips find the golden bumblebee that hangs around her neck and she slides it back and forth across the chain, feels the skitter of her heart as her thoughts churn and roil” (364). Although in the end, events do not turn out as Josie planned, she does attempt to abscond with a small measure of Alix’s charmed life in the form of the pendant, even adopting Alix’s mannerism of playing with it when worried or nervous.

Denim

The first time that Alix meets Josie properly, the day after their brief meeting at the pub, Josie is “wearing a floral-print T-shirt with a blue denim skirt and has a handbag also made of blue denim. Alix notices that the dog’s collar and lead are blue denim too and senses a theme” (29). Josie’s denim is a symbol, for her, of when she felt most powerful; her own sense of personal power is rooted in “her lucky jacket, the jacket she was wearing when […] [she became] the sort of girl who had the love of a real man” (103). Until now, that time was the high point in Josie’s life, and she has always felt secure in the identity represented by a denim wardrobe. As she opens up to Alix, however, Josie reaches for the deeper meaning of the denim: “I think it’s got something to do with the early days of my relationship with Walter, you know. […] I wore it a lot during the first couple of years we were together and it became, for me, almost a part of our love affair” (121). For Josie, denim is laden with meaning—she likes to feel powerful and in control, and she felt that way the most strongly when she first met Walter.

However, Josie’s attitude toward her denim shifts as the story continues. As her admiration of Alix grows, Josie becomes dissatisfied with her denim wardrobe. Her sense of identity is shifting, and the denim doesn’t represent her anymore. As the narrative states, “that girl is starting to feel like a shape-shifter, a fraud, a one-dimensional paper doll. She’s blurring in her mind’s eye into a human puddle. She rips the jacket off and looks at herself again” (103). In this moment, Josie feels her identity shifting and puts the denim jacket away. She chooses instead to wear sunglasses and hoop earrings that are both consistent elements of Alix’s wardrobe, and Josie’s adoption of them shows her desire to attain a new identity, one modeled on Alix. She sees this change as part of a larger change. As she states, “[It] was all about breaking patterns. Going to the fancy pub that night. Getting rid of the denim. […] It was as if I had to break small patterns before I would be ready to break big ones” (225).

The Image of Husbands as “Kings”

Throughout the novel, Josie tries to draw parallels between Walter and Nathan as a way of further connecting her experience to Alix’s, an indirect way of appealing to The Sisterhood of Women. As Alix observes, “[Josie] actively wants Nathan to be as bad as Walter” (201). As Josie insinuates herself into Alix’s life, she tries to amplify the discontent that Alix is feeling as a way to draw them closer together.

However, Josie needs to first convince herself that this comparison is valid, and one of the ways that she does so is by developing the motif of referring to both men as kings. This motif begins with her explanation to Alix of the power dynamic in her own home, about which she claims, “Walter was the king, of course, and everything in the home was done to protect him” (221). She develops this idea further to gain Alix’s sympathy and to root the concept in Alix’s mind so that she may in turn apply it to her own household. Josie explains further, “That man thinks he’s the king, you see. He lets me have my way here and there, like with the dog. Like coming here for dinner. But he does it in the way that a king would do it. A thrown treat” (222). Later, Jewell reveals that this is not an accurate depiction of Josie and Walter’s power dynamic, but rather a construction that Josie uses to forge the illusion of a connection between herself and Alix by drawing parallels between their lives.

From what Josie can tell, however, there is some truth to her assessment; Nathan does what he wants without repercussion or reprimand. As Josie gets closer to Alix, she is personally offended by his behavior and confronts him about it. Afterward, “She watches him through the small window in her bedroom, slinging his suit jacket over his shoulder, sliding his stupid sunglasses onto his stupid nose, walking down the street as if he were the king of the universe” (231). This moment marks Josie’s growing conviction that Nathan is just like Walter and that Alix would be better off without him, just as she believes herself to be better off without Walter. In the end, this idea provides her with a justification for abducting Nathan, which she convinces herself is her duty according to The Sisterhood of Women.