The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner

My favorite Kushner, the not evil one, has come out with another book I've been coveting from afar while watching it pop up in online reading lists. In an attempt to stop drowning in books, just because I feel the need to own them, I patiently waited 2 months to check it out from the library to finally read it. I am quite virtuous.

I consumed The Flame Throwers quickly and feverishly after reading a snippet and loving the cover art design. As a pretend Photoshop genius, I appreciate The Mars Room cover since it was created with one or two of many popular design programs, Photoshop, Illustrator or maybe InDesign, which seems deceptively simple but probably took long tedious hours to complete not counting redesign time. I'm also inexplicably drawn to neon especially when used for maximum contrast to a background.

The bare bones plot of The Mars Room is about women in prison with some men sprinkled throughout for some extra flavor. Like the best writers, Rachel Kushner makes all of her characters sound realistic and believable as people you could have met or seen in real life. You might not share the same journey but you will recognize some road signs along the way. Also because a lot of them are in desperate situations or were, depending on their story, you want to help them.

The prison complex is complicated for those encased in it, unable to leave, versus the people working there, usually temporarily. All rules and regulations are well defined and anything that would be enjoyable or possibly fun is banned or contraband. They would probably ban smiling or laughing if someone figured out a connection between humor and violence. The maddening lack of control while every aspect of your life is controlled is something everyone can understand whether they have been in any sort of institution or not.

The story shows us various paths of how deceptively easy it is to end up in the prison system when you are lacking funds and witnesses. No one has quite the fall from grace as the title character in Orange is the New Black but it seems like some women were set up from the start by bad circumstances or lack of tools or knowledge that make ending up in prison inevitable.

Exploiting everyone is the easiest way to comfort or the ultimate long-shot; freedom. With two life sentences Romy is desperate. She has no outside connections, or they are unwilling, and needs a break. Not very likely but she scrapes by with the only tools and people she has access to. Mainly a male teacher who buys books for her and does little illicit favors for other inmates. These little favors feel like nothing to him since they are so easy to do in the outside world. The prisoners overwhelming gratitude makes him feel gross, like he's doing something wrong, and instead of stopping he continues just making sure to spread his wealth and access around so no one thinks he is playing favorites. Internet access is another forgotten luxury he can use to look up information about inmates and the people they want dirt on.

Setting up cons needs to be slow and steady as one inmate mimes to Romy slowly reeling in an imaginary line. You go too hard too fast it won't work. Romy has nothing but time so she slowly begins her set up for a connection to the outside for any information about her son. The negotiations in the prison visitation room mirror those Romy has experienced in the Mars Room just without gratuitous amounts of physical contact. The Mars Room was her past employer, a strip club, that keeps popping up in her memories even though it wasn't that great a place to inhabit. Anything compared to prison is divine.

I won't give away any massive spoilers since this book is fairly new but I will ominously say the pursuit of freedom comes at a high cost whether you are in prison or not. Depending on who or what you have to live for you might decide a slice of freedom is worth more than a life sentence of denial and captivity.