Service, by Sarah Gilmartin - Steve
The #MeToo movement has inevitably permeated the arts world, with Service - Sarah Gilmartin’s follow-up to her well-received debut, Dinner Party - being the latest release to use the zeitgeist as its backdrop.
Rather than simply paying lip service, however - even though the hashtag is pointedly mentioned on a number of occasions - Service proves to be a more reflective, psychologically-driven beast. Achieving this feat by utilising three narrators (the victim, the accused, and the accused’s wife), the outcome is more or less what you’d expect, but the journey makes this predictability an acceptable price to pay.
The backdrop of choice is a high-end restaurant, breeding ground of the kind of toxic masculinity that used to flourish unimpeded before a magnifying glass was hovered over it (think of the backdrops of Disney+ tv series The Bear and Philip Barantini’s 2021 film Boiling Point). This choice is an inspired one, showing the horrific consequences of unchecked misogyny.
Even though the outcome is unsurprising, the deft use of unconscious bias and unreliable narration means you’re left to doubt even this seemingly predictable conclusion. When the subject matter is this dark it’s a stretch to call it enjoyable, but it nonetheless effortlessly encourages you to keep reading.
If anything, we’d like to have spent longer in this word, as the novel’s 250 pages fly briskly by. Don’t be surprised to see this in awards contention sooner or later.
Steve
