Questions About Vladimir

by Julia May Jonas (Goodreads Author)

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Answered Questions (4)

why does this girl like old men? is this child prediting?!?!?!?!?

Katie Hahahahaha. No. Your confusion and outrage are both totally beside the point and surprisingly adjacent to the point.
a) "This girl" is not a girl, she…moreHahahahaha. No. Your confusion and outrage are both totally beside the point and surprisingly adjacent to the point.
a) "This girl" is not a girl, she's a 58 year old unreliable narrator obsessed with a 40 year old colleague, positioning her choices in the rosiest light she can imagine and b) that rosy light subtly exposes the underlying (and mostly subconscious) tension between her desire to be an innocent victim of circumstance (and gender, and power dynamics) and her desire to be the "main character" and powerful agent in her own life. That underlying tension fuels fantasy, sculpts reality, and dramatically impacts the lives of others. All of this is elegantly contained in the first few paragraphs of prologue your question refers to.
Your question is extra amusing because the title of the book (among other details) is a very obvious reference to Lolita (by Vladimir Nabokov), in which Humbert Humbert, the main character, is one of the most famous "sympathetic" villains in history. He's an actual (well, literary) child predator.(less)

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What happens with Edwina? I didn't understand why Cecily Tong wrote " this is not true" and gave her an F. Could Edwina have been the woman who showed up at the protaganist's door at the end of the book?

anna

This answer contains spoilers… (view spoiler)

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Did I miss something? Who was the woman who came to visit the protagonist at the end of the book?

Sara Leeann Ortiz

This answer contains spoilers… (view spoiler)

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Am I correct that the narrator was never given a name? What an interesting choice!

Valerie The narrator doesn't have a name, and neither does the younger woman who visits her at the end. We know they both slept with John. Is she implying tha…moreThe narrator doesn't have a name, and neither does the younger woman who visits her at the end. We know they both slept with John. Is she implying that their identities were subsumed by John? There are so many things to unpack here.(less)

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