Susan Choi’s fifth novel, Trust Exercise, is an intricate puzzle that challenges readers to look below the surface in order to question which parts of the metafictional narrative are real, and which are not. The story– told in three acts– is set in a southern American suburb in the early 1980s. The plot revolves around the students and teachers of an elite high school referred to as the Citywide Academy for the Performing Arts, and the novel itself deals with themes of imbalanced power dynamics within personal relationships, and within the world of theatre. 

 

The story kicks off in the drama class of freshman theatre students, Sarah and David, taught by the beguiling Mr. Kingsley, where their romance begins, deteriorates, and, eventually, ends. The end of their brief love affair, coupled with Sarah’s other tumultuous relationships and high school struggles, triggers a tangled chain of events that stretch far into the future. As the tale unfolds and builds towards the shocking coda, you are forced to question everything you know about the story.

 

The book in itself is a trust exercise; a free fall where typical narrative conventions will not catch you before you hit the ground. Over and over, the reader’s expectations, and notions of reality, are diverted. Each of the novel’s three sections pulls the story further apart, while simultaneously adding more layers to it. In every act, a new character is invited to step out of the wings and into the spotlight, as the “protagonist” of that section. The tales of these three leading ladies– Sarah, Karen, and Claire– intertwine, and leave readers wondering whose version of the story is the truth.

 

It’s difficult to decide whether Trust Exercise’s continual deconstruction of the traditional novel structure is genius, or if the story’s comprehensibility suffers for it. The style of writing seems to be both a strength and a weakness, especially when it comes to the overall reading experience. Choi is evidently a talented author; Trust Exercise is packed with brilliant metaphors and captivating prose. Such moments of clever and intriguing writing, however, coexist with convoluted run-on sentences, confusing flashes back and forward in time, and changes in points-of-view from the third-person to the first. The characters are realized, but in many spots, the storytelling feels detached from them.

The structure of the book is very ambitious– it will work for some more than others. Despite how frustrating the complex and unconventional storytelling can be, the book does contain beautiful instances of literary prowess, and narrative twists that make trudging through the novel worth it. Overall, this novel leaves readers with a lot to think about, and stands out in the vast sea of coming-of-age tales. Trust Exercise masterfully questions the consequences of fanciful storytelling, and warns us not to trust everything we read.