The Book of Essie

Like Autoboyography, my impression of The Book of Essie is shaped by my cultural background. Also, anyone who knows me well knows that I am morbidly fascinated by the Duggar family, so I had to pick this up.

This is a story about power and control. It's a story about yanking yourself free, one that includes the risk and loss that come with speaking out. It's about the harm people cause by doing nothing, by refusing to intervene when vulnerable people are being targeted.

Weir also looks at the performative aspects of organized religion. People go through motions and worry about appearances. People learn quickly what is expected and accepted, and proceed accordingly. Fear and manipulation fuel actions. This is only exaggerated by the presence of a film crew.

I read a nonfiction book about The Bachelor franchise earlier this year (another morbid fascination, we don't have to get into it), and it made me think about how those filming and those filmed hold power over one another.

Lines are blurred between what's real and fake, what matters and doesn't, who has the final say in how something is portrayed. In The Book of Essie, you see this same tug-of-war. There's the back-and-forth between characters and cameras, but there's also the back-and-forth between the different characters being filmed, as each attempt to spin footage in their favor. Everyone has an agenda.

We're also asked to consider how women wield power in patriarchal environments. How does Libby's mother empower men like Ames? How does Essie's mother empower men like Caleb? Why do women passionately support figures and institutions that hurt them and their children? What do women lose in trying to assert themselves in spaces designed to keep them subservient? Or really, what do they gain?

More technically, I have two main qualms. First, I think adding Libby's perspective clouded some of the points Weir was trying to make. I'd have wrapped my head around the “extracting yourself brings both joy and pain” concept easily enough without a character named Liberty Bell.

Secondly, sometimes in trying to make points about abuse, the narrative would halt almost as though the author was speaking directly to her readers. I didn't object to the overtly political tone, but the delivery felt awkward, like Weir circled back to lay some barefaced personal convictions over top her story and its characters. It felt like I was being spoonfed.

It has its flaws, but it had me at evangelical reality television.