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Nina: Adolescence
" . . . a superb first novel . . . That Nina
dares to embrace life shows how much this
author knows about the resilience of young
hearts." --O, The Oprah Magazine
Synopsis
At the center of an attic studio littered
with paints and portraits stands
fifteen-year-old Nina, nude. A canvas
separates her from her mother, who perches
on a stool, paintbrush in hand. In a
desperate attempt to coax her mother out of
her emotional seclusion since the accidental
death of Nina’s little brother, Nina has
offered herself up as a model. The painting
that will result, entitled Nina:
Adolescence, will mark her mother’s
triumphant return to the Boston art world
and form the centerpiece of a gallery show.
But the exposure makes Nina uneasy, and her
father begins to protest with increasing
vehemence. The family starts to come apart,
sending Nina into a tailspin as she
recklessly attempts to free herself from a
disintegrating household and the confines of
someone else’s frame. With the tension
reaching a breaking point, Nina finds that
the gift she gave to her mother is rapidly
becoming a sacrifice and could very well
serve to be the cause of her unmaking . . .
Inspiration
The first thing people ask after reading
Nina is whether the book is
autobiographical. My favorite phrasing of
this question, posed to a friend of mine
when her book club read Nina, was "Is your
friend normal?" I'm happy to inform you that
Nina is not, in the strict sense of the
word, an autobiographical novel. I do not
have a crazy artist mother or an alcoholic
father, my younger brother did not die under
my supervision, I did not fall under the
spell of a sleazy photographer in my teenage
years. Whether or not I am normal I will
leave to your judgment. But I can attest to
having had a generally happy childhood. Of
course there are details that come from my
own life—the book is set in an imagined
version of my own hometown, for example.
The second question I get is: where did all
of that come from then? Where did you learn
about all that pain? The short answer is
imagination and observation—the same place
every writer gets her material. I did draw
on my own adolescence, which provided me
with enough trauma and angst to fill the
pages of twenty books. Flannery O’Connor
once said that anyone who experienced
childhood had a lifetime’s worth of material
to write about. Like Nina, as a teenager, I
was obsessed with beauty—both physical and
artistic—and was both terrified of and
fascinated by desire. Writing Nina was a way
of meditating on and maybe even exorcising
those obsessions.
Process
Nina first appeared in a short story
entitled “La Llorona,” a magical realist
piece about a woman who fills her San
Francisco neighborhood with a yearning wail
every morning. I finished the story and had
it published in
Blithe House Quarterly
Online, but I still wondered about Nina, why she was
so full of grief. I began writing earlier in
her life, trying to figure out what could
have made her so sad. Eventually, she
evolved into the Nina that appears in the
novel. Nina: Adolescence took about 2˝ years to write. I had to throw out about 400 pages of my first draft, which was painful. But it was also an
essential learning experience. I’m much more
mercenary with my words now, and usually
don’t think twice (or maybe twice, but not
three or four times) about tossing out a
passage or a scene that just isn’t working.
I spent much of my first draft trying to
figure out what the story was. I was
terrified by the idea of writing a novel, so
I made myself a first-draft rule: no
editing. I had to keep writing, no matter
how terrible it was, no matter how much
garbage I was churning out. Hence, I wrote
garbage, lots of it. I went down many paths
I didn’t need to take. But it’s said that no
writing is wasted, and I think this is
probably true. All those false trails
eventually led me to a better understanding
of my characters.
Critical Acclaim for
Nina:
Adolescence
"Hassinger's lovely first novel is elegant,
sad, often funny, often unsettling. She
writes with such precision and
understanding, with mercy but unsparingly,
about adolescence, its wonders, horrors,
passions—sexuality, family ties, and
friendship—that, like all excellent
portraits, it is not only about the subject
of the portraits themselves, but also about
the viewers." --Elizabeth McCracken
"There's a sly sensuality to Hassinger's
prose, and her attention to Nina's body can
be as loving as it can be ominous. . . .
Hassinger deserves credit for writing a
truly penetrating book . . . the novel
surges forward like a quiet thriller, with
Nina at the center, nakedly vulnerable to
the forces of grief, neglect and abuse.
Hassinger manages to take the utter
confusion of growing up—of nearing
independence yet desperately needing the
guidance of others—and exaggerates that
feeling of terror tenfold, stretching each
tremulous moment as thin and penetrable as
Saran Wrap fitted over a bowl." --Salon.com
"In terms of summoning reader sympathy, few
could outdo the young protagonist of Amy
Hassinger’s first novel, who finds coming of
age even more complicated when a showing of
nude portraits of herself, painted by her
artist mother, garners all the wrong kind of
attention." –Vogue
"Hassinger makes Nina's loss of innocence
and plunge into self-destruction chillingly
believable. Her graceful, observant prose
beautifully captures Nina's inner world—her
guilt, yearning, anger, desire, and
joy—while ruthlessly skewering the
narcissism of ambitious adults. An
unsettling and acutely sensitive debut."
–Booklist
"Affecting . . . Achingly straightforward .
. . [A] touching drama with a refreshingly
undramatic simplicity. . . " --Kirkus
Reviews
"Disturbing . . . eerily seductive . . .
expressive . . . " --Publisher's Weekly
"The author captures the nuance and language
of adolescence with stunning ease. . . .
Deeply unsettling." --ForeWord Magazine
"Very few writers are able to give the
period of adolescence the wider resonance of
serious adult literature. In Nina:
Adolescence, Amy Hassinger does so
brilliantly. This is an exciting debut by a
splendid young writer." --Robert Olen Butler
"A simple story made complex and beautiful
by Hassinger's skillful handling of
character, plot, and imagery. She handles
tragedy without melodrama, emotion without
sentimentality, despair with pragmatism, and
a plausibly inspiring hope." --Lisa Carey
"In clear and lucid prose, Hassinger reveals
the complex emotions that surround the
border of childhood. Tender and brutal . . .
and very honest." --Chris Offutt
Awards and Honors:
Chosen as an Auditor’s Pick by Ingram
Library Service’s “The Heard Word,”
September 2003.
Winner of a 2003 Publisher's Weekly Listen
Up! Award.
ForeWord Magazine’s Audio Book of the Year,
2003.
Chosen as a recommended book for summer 2003
by the Buffalo News.
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