Romantic love and family dynamics may be the staples of literature, but fictional friendships have provided readers with some of the most enduring and memorable couples, and none more so than the toxic variety. Complex love/hate relationships have inspired novelists from Thackeray to Ferrante, and are the driving force behind many recent thrillers, including Ottessa Moshfegh’s Eileen and Tara Isabella Burton’s social creature.
In my debut novel, 25-year-old house guest Kate strikes up an unlikely friendship with Della, a life coach a decade older. Ella’s lopsided alliance is tested when Della invites Kate to join her family for a summer in France, separating the younger woman from everyone she knows as events spiral out of control. of her.
You are reading: Books about toxic female friendship
Looks into the microscope, friendships are uniquely fascinating, free of family duties or, generally speaking, sexual desire. We choose our friends, and yet they can have a huge influence on our lives, holding up a mirror, giving support, but also exerting an influence that can be hard to decipher. these novels of toxic friendship explore much more than cruelty or manipulation: their characters are caught in a web of codependency and intimacy, affection and deception.
1. cat’s eye by margaret atwoodwhen painter elaine returns to toronto for a retrospective of her work, she is assailed by memories of her past and the friendships that ruined her childhood, particularly with cordelia, who taunts her and intimidating “as if driven by a need to see how far she can go.” But who really had the power in that relationship, and what gives early friendships their unique hold on our lives? atwood explores these destructive dynamics With usual insight and brilliance, As Elaine reflects, years after losing contact with Cordelia, despite the fact that they have tormented each other, “We are like the twins in the old fables, each given a half. key”.
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2. Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Quartet Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels tell the story of yet another pair of friends whose lives are inextricably intertwined for decades. From their poverty-stricken childhood in post-war Naples, to their divergent paths through education, work, marriage and children, Elena and Lila are joined in a feverish dance of competition and compassion, jealousy and love. . more complex than toxic, their relationship nonetheless brings them both misery and comfort. The couple may have spent their entire lives locked in a rivalry, but it is Elena who has the last word, when she sits down to write her story: “We’ll see who wins this time.”
3. Toni Morrison’s Sula In Morrison’s 1973 novel, it is a man who causes the rift between childhood friends Nel and Sula. Growing up in Medallion, a fictional black community in post-World War I Ohio, the two girls are inseparable. although her nature is very different from the transgressive sula, for nel, “talking to sula had always been a conversation with herself”. life is hard for women in medallion, however, although the friendship survives a series of traumas, it is nel’s sexual betrayal by her that causes the irreparable rupture. only looking back later in life does nel reassess what the most important relationship of his life has been.
4. lord of the flies by william golding of course, kids have toxic friendships too, and in golding’s 1954 debut, the young survivors of a plane crash first form alliances, then turn on each other, in a classic exploration of the group . dynamics and social hierarchies. Through the now classic story of Ralph, Jack, Piggy and Simon, Golding reveals how quickly the social contract can break under pressure, how friends can become rivals and ultimately bitter enemies, with disastrous results.
5. The Secret History of Donna Tartt, Tartt’s first bestselling novel, tells the story of another group of murderous friends, this time pushed over the edge by the secretive and ritualistic behavior of her college clique. When she joins a select group of classics students at a Vermont college, Richard is captivated. but as we know from the beginning of the novel, one of them will eventually die. Tartt’s skill is in increasing the pace and tension as she discovers how these privileged college students lead each other to destruction.
6. The Girls by Emma Cline The group here is led astray by a charismatic leader, in the form of Manson figure Russell Hadrick. It’s 1969, and restless 14-year-old Evie is drawn into her gang of followers by the captivating Suzanne, both her enabler and, ultimately, her savior. While many authors and filmmakers have attempted to capture Manson’s seductive charm, the power of Cline’s novel lies in evoking the heady world of the girls around him.
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7. Passing through Nella LarsenFirst published in 1929, Larsen’s novel centers on the friendship between Irene and Clare, who grew up together in Harlem. When they meet again as adults, Irene is dismayed to discover that her beautiful friend Clare de Ella is now “passing” for white and is prepared to tolerate her husband’s racism. Irene, meanwhile, has married locally and is part of the Negro Welfare League. As Clare begins to spend more time with her family, Irene becomes suspicious of her friend’s motives. Why has clare been thrown back into the culture she left behind and will the destructive jealousy between the couple lead one of them to betrayal?
8. undoubtedly one of her archetypal manipulators, william thackeray’s vanity fair becky sharp uses her considerably less charismatic friend, amelia sedley, to secure a place in a society she would otherwise be out of. excluded. Determined to marry well and escape her penniless beginnings, Becky makes her way through the upper classes, without a thought for her friend’s feelings—or anyone else’s. an early example of the toxic friend as stand-in and ultimately usurper.
9. Patricia Highsmith’s even more ruthless and amoral talented Mr. Ripley is Tom Ripley, though in Highsmith’s 1955 novel the friend she clings to is the far more glamorous and handsome Dickie Greenleaf. As Tom immerses himself further into Dickie’s world, he becomes jealous and obsessed. Another usurper, Tom begins by copying the richer, upper-class Dickie’s hair, clothes, and expressions, and ends up taking his life.
10. notes on a zoë heller scandal at first sight, sheba’s friendship with her fellow teacher and her barbaric confidante is her salvation. When Sheba begins an affair with a 15-year-old student, the much older and lonely Barbara offers more than a shoulder to cry on: he eventually moves in with Sheba, shielding her from the world. But what are Barbara’s motives in helping her fallen friend, and who is ultimately in control of the story? a modern classic of toxic friendship and betrayal.
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Charlotte Northedge’s The Guest House is published in paperback by HarperCollins on March 17. To help the Guardian and the Observer, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. shipping charges may apply.
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