46 pages • 1 hour read
Abbi WaxmanThe Bookish Life of Nina Hill
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2019A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Family Bonds and Inheritance
Nina’s discovery that she is included in the will of a man she never knew to be her father forms a crucial plot device that allows the author to explore the linked themes of family bonds and biological inheritance. Although Nina initially maintains that she doesn’t want anything that William Reynolds might have left her, she reconsiders this stance as she comes to value her newfound family as the other gifts that William has bequeathed to her. Within this context, William’s letter makes the insightful observation that Nina should “hold on to the family [she has] suddenly acquired” (299) because they are his “gift” to her, just as Nina is his gift to them. Until this moment, Nina has perceived William to be nothing more than a serial abandoner, for he left his first wife and cheated on his second and represented a distant figure in the lives of his older children and grandchildren. Likewise, he played no role whatsoever in Nina’s life, although she later learns that this was only due to her mother’s insistence. In his letter, he admits his guilt over his past mistakes, and when he acknowledges his tendency to hide from his flaws, Nina recognizes this tendency in herself as well. She also realizes that she and William share qualities of intelligence, anxiety, and a love of reading. William’s emphasis on family also gives Nina the nudge she needs to connect with Lydia and reconcile with Tom.
As Nina becomes acquainted with her biological family, the common ground she finds with them helps her to better understand herself. For example, her affection for her 10-year-old, bookish sister Millie reminds her of herself at that age, and she feels the same affection and protective instincts toward Millie that she also feels for the girls in her elementary book club. Likewise, the physical resemblance she shares with Peter and Archie highlights the personality quirks that they also share, especially Peter’s love of organization and Archie’s tendency toward anxiety. In her time spent with Peter and Archie, Nina enjoys the sense of belonging she gains from these interactions, which remain uncomplicated by any sense of self-consciousness. Being with most of her family members feels comfortable and safe and satisfies an inner longing for connection that Nina usually only experiences when she is alone. Thus, her newfound family fills a fundamental need that ordinary friendships and dating cannot satisfy.
The qualities that Nina eventually realizes she shares with Lydia—a tendency toward sarcasm, keen intelligence, and a love for trivia—confirm this sense of belonging and give Nina a new framework for further self-discovery. As she tells Archie, “A week or so ago I thought I was the child of a brave, creative, brilliant world traveler and never understood why I was shy, nervous, and basically unwilling to travel outside my zip code” (171). Learning about the other side of her genetic inheritance helps Nina to explain many of her inherent tendencies and personality quirks.
Finally, inheriting William’s car becomes the means by which Nina realizes all that she stands to gain by opening herself up to new life experiences. When she embraces the process of learning to drive a manual transmission, the scene signifies her willingness to learn new skills that will in turn take her to new chapters in her life. Thus, her acceptance into the Reynolds clan becomes Nina’s catalyst for putting her life back together. As the narrative states:
Lydia was a woman of action, and she was related to Nina, so Nina must have woman-of-action genes somewhere. Besides, now Nina had a family. She had friends. She had money. She had a bitching car. She’d survived a terrifying drive in that bitching car, and there was nothing she couldn’t do, or at least try to do (316).
Although the novel’s focus on genetics as the chief determiner of personality represents a vastly oversimplified model of human behavior, the qualities that Nina considers herself to have inherited emphasize the less tangible connections that she shares with her newfound family. Thus, the author uses this model to deliver the message that developing meaningful relationships with other people is a more effective life strategy than remaining isolated from the full range of human experiences.
Embracing Change and Broadening Social Connections
Nina’s character growth involves learning to be more flexible, resilient, and tolerant of chaos and surprises. The wish to control her surroundings and reduce discomfort is partly a response to mitigate her frequent anxiety; having a defined schedule soothes her, for she finds comfort in the illusion of maintaining full control over her life in the midst of an otherwise chaotic world. The graphics of her planner emphasize this tendency toward rigidity, but in a direct contrast to this dynamic, Nina’s friends encourage her to relinquish her hold on scheduling and embrace the prospect of change to improve her own mental health and enjoyment. For example, Polly teases Nina for her nervousness over getting to know Tom, and Nina’s dislike of unpredictable events is further illustrated when her anxiety causes her to inadvertently reject him on two separate occasions. The firs occurs when she scurries away from the movie theater despite the open invitation to join him, and the second incident occurs when she resists giving up her scheduled Thursday evening down time to go out with him. To rationalize her inner resistance, she decides that she has no time for a boyfriend, but she is simply using her schedule as a way to avoid social overwhelm and protect herself from becoming awkward and embarrassed. Thus, her avoidance of new relationships serves as a defense mechanism that also prevents her from enjoying new experiences or broadening her social horizons.
Significantly, several female characters in the novel are designed to act as unofficial mentors for Nina, counseling her to accept change and embrace uncertainty. Most prominently, Louise reminds her that her anxiety can transcend its role as a defense mechanism and instead become a barrier to healthy functioning. Likewise, Lili references her deceased husband to remind Nina that life never goes as planned, and Eliza, who has also lost a husband, recommends that Nina balance her energy between her internal needs and her external connections. In various ways, these women all advise Nina to remain open to new experiences and relationships.
While Nina is initially wary of becoming romantically involved with Tom and even actively pushes him away, she shows much less resistance to becoming acquainted with the members of the Reynolds family. She doesn’t feel a sense of threat from them, and in fact, when Lydia shows aggression in the lawyer’s office, Nina is able to deal with her easily. This facility with conflict resolution stands in stark contrast to her reactions to situations that hold romantic connotations, implying that Nina is not equally challenged by every type of social encounter. Ultimately, Nina is easily able to accept relationships with her new family members, and with their help, she is able to break new ground with Tom. This shift suggests that her family has positively influenced her ability to renegotiate her comfort zone and include more people in her life. The concluding events also suggest that Nina has finally found a sense of balance between solitude and socializing. While she will always value being alone and indulging her imagination, she is also fully invested in her relationships with other people. Thus, Nina uses her inheritance from William to secure her own future, and in the novel’s conclusion, her spontaneous suggestion of a trip to Mexico shows that she is ready to expand her horizons.
Fiction as a Refuge and a Guide
The Bookish Life of Nina Hill conveys the message that finding refuge in books—and, in some cases, preferring books to people—is a perfectly healthy and acceptable approach to mitigating the chaos of the world. Far from characterizing Nina’s intense love of fiction as a maladaptive behavior, the novel’s structure openly celebrates the protagonist’s tendency to find comfort and a sense of refuge in books. This theme is further emphasized by the fact that she surrounds herself with books in both her private and her professional life. Her tendency to link life events with literary and cinematic scenes is designed to resonate with all avid readers who feel a similar attraction to the literary world.
In accordance with the novel’s metafictional approach, Waxman uses key scenes to poke fun at the tendency of some dedicated readers to behave snobbishly toward those who have other interests. This dynamic is established in the opening scene when Nina actively dislikes the customer who failed to enjoy Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, a 19th-century novel that is considered a classic of English literature and a precursor to the genres of women’s fiction and romance, which also characterize Waxman’s The Bookish Life of Nina Hill. Similarly, Nina takes pride in her own book collection and decides that Tom can’t be a viable romantic interest because he appears to be more interested in sports than literature. However, Waxman also designs characters whose purpose is to challenge such snobbishness, such as Polly, who doesn’t read much but still feels invested in the bookstore and makes gentle fun of Nina’s dislike for people who don’t qualify as avid readers.
While Nina’s choice to retreat amongst her books creates unintended conflict when she pushes Tom away, Waxman also crafts scenes to suggest that reading can provide pivotal emotional experiences and help people to better understand their own lives. For example, when a character in William Saroyan’s The Human Comedy confesses his loneliness, Nina is compelled to confront her own loneliness, and she spontaneously texts Tom, taking the decisive action needed to advance their relationship. Saroyan’s book also offers Nina a point of connection to William, for when she sees a copy of it in his library, she relates to his love of reading; having the same book as her father solidifies her inner sense of the bond they share, and this suggestion that they might share more than just DNA fuels her acceptance of being part of the Reynolds family.
