Perfettament Imperfetta
by Kirsten Spiteri
Kirsten Spiteri’s Perfettament Imperfetta (“Perfectly Imperfect”) is a novel about sexual obsession. The object of this lustful (and not unwanted) attention is Charlotte Haber, a 17-year old who is very much into fast cars and dubious friendships, and has – by all accounts – a particularly sexy backside. The novel is characterised by diary-like entries alternating between two narrators, both of whom have a crush on Charlotte. One is thirteen year old Wade, her neighbour and friend of Charlotte’s brother Matt. The other is Manuel, a widower in his sixties who gives private lessons in philosophy to Charlotte and two other students. Much of the punch of this novel derives from the parallelism that Spiteri draws between these two males. While Wade is just on the cusp of adulthood, Manuel is trying to come to terms with old age and approaching mortality. There is delicious irony in the fact that although Manuel couches his desire in more philosophical and angst-ridden terms, his craving for Charlotte is not too different from Wade’s.
The book is relatively short – more novella than novel-length. On the one hand this makes for a quick and zingy read. At the same time, it means that the story has some problematic aspects which remain unaddressed in the short span of the book. For a start, since the narrative is driven by Wade and Manuel, we never really get the chance to understand Charlotte’s character and motivations. For much of the novel, Charlotte remains a two-dimensional juvenile male fantasy (except for her derrière, which receives regular 3-D treatment). Charlotte is merely wet dream material for Wade and the rather more desperate Manuel. It is only in the final pages that Wade, who has grown more mature in the course of the book, reports a deeper, darker, more intimate conversation he shares with Charlotte. This briefly allows us to glimpse a rounder, more human figure beyond the male narrators’ voyeuristic gaze. Incidentally, considering that the style of the book – with its references to contemporary teenage pop culture – seems geared towards young adults, I was rather surprised at the several explicit sex scenes, even though they may be in line with the subject matter. That makes me sound like a prude, but after all it wasn’t that long ago that Pierre Mejlak’s young adult mystery Riħ Isfel was published with a warning on its cover, just because of one slightly risqué beach scene. How times change…
Another reservation I had about the novel is that, unlike Wade, Manuel remains rather underdeveloped as a character. Manuel provided an opportunity for a deeper exploration of desire in old age and of the moral and legal niceties of sexual consent. These timely and challenging subjects are hinted at but not treated in great detail in the novel. Indeed, for me, Perfettament Imperfetta works best as “Wade’s story”, a coming-of-age narrative about a young teenager in contemporary Malta who must learn to navigate the realities of adulthood, including first encounters with sex, drink and drugs.
In this respect, Spiteri
joins a group of exciting young Maltese authors who are capturing the zeitgeist
with their treatment of previously taboo subjects, rendered in a fresh style.
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