None of This Is True: A Novel

Josie Fair is celebrating her 45th birthday when the novel begins and is beginning to feel as if she has missed out on life. She began seeing Walter when she was 15, and she married him when she was 18 and he was 43. When she first meets Alix, she feels so much older than Alix, whose children are still young. She dresses nearly completely in denim, and a neighbor even tells Alix laughingly, “We called her Double Denim” (35). However, although people may mock Josie, she proves herself to be, as Walter puts it, “not who she makes out to be. Not at all” (162). Throughout the novel, Josie proves Walter’s assessment right, revealing herself to be capable of manipulation, physical violence, abduction, and even murder.

Many versions of Josie’s character are offered up throughout the novel, causing perceptions of her to shift as the story unfolds. At first, she seems sympathetic and presents herself as such. She positions herself as a victim of Walter, her mother, and even her daughters. However, as the story continues and other perspectives are presented, Josie is revealed to be deeply manipulative and abusive. Even so, she always remains convinced that she is not accountable for what has befallen her and Alix’s families. Josie’s evolution throughout the novel therefore illustrates the challenges of Discerning Good Versus Evil in an Ambiguous World.

In the final chapter, as Josie contemplates what she has done, she still doesn’t seem to know what the real truth of her own story is. She reveals another version in which Roxy is responsible for Brooke’s death and the family all collaborates to hide the truth of what really happened. Yet despite this revelation, the author preserves an element of uncertainty in the veracity of Josie’s recollections. Because Jewell has already created Josie to be a notoriously unreliable narrator, she simply cannot be trusted to tell the truth—even to herself. Yet Jewell also makes it clear that Josie emphatically believes her own stories.

Walter Fair, Josie’s husband, first met Josie when he was dating Pat, Josie’s mother. He was 43 when he married Josie on her 18th birthday. On the night of her 45th birthday, Josie relates, “Walter is retired now, his hair has gone and so has a lot of his hearing and his eyesight, and his midlife peak is somewhere so far back in time […] that it’s almost impossible to remember what he was like at her age” (11). However, when Josie shows Alix an old photo of Walter, Alix is surprised to note that “[h]is hair is thick and shiny, his skin is clear and smooth, he looks young for his age, more early thirties than early forties. His forearms are big and strong. His eyes are madly blue” (123). Alix feels conflicted about her own attraction to a young version of Walter, and she continues to struggle with this conflict when she meets him as well.

Jewell creates a complex picture of Walter, supporting the theme of Discerning Good Versus Evil in an Ambiguous World. He began a relationship with Josie when she was a teenager, and yet he is a caring father to their daughters. Every night, he appears on Erin’s gaming stream, and has also set up monetization for her, working toward getting Erin out of their house and living more independently with Roxy. He also warns Alix about Josie, and yet that same evening, viciously calls his wife “stupid”: an insult that he knows will cause her to lose her temper.

Nathan Summer, Alix’s husband, earns a good living in office real estate. According to Alix, one of the good things about him is that “[h]e’s so generous. […] His money, he always tells her, is her money” (42). He also supports Alix’s career as a podcaster, building her a studio in their garden for her birthday. However, Nathan has an alcohol addiction and periodically goes on “benders,” as Alix calls them, in which he disappears for a night of heavy drinking before appearing the next day, penitent and apologetic. This pattern is a major source of stress on their marriage, and it isn’t until after his death that Alix realizes that his drinking is “how he balanced out the delicate ecosystem of his damaged psyche” (342), the result of his mother and brother’s deaths.

Josie describes Nathan disparagingly as “the sort of man who is attractive only because of some base, elemental factors to do with chemicals and attitude” (82). She uses Nathan’s alcohol addiction as a means of connecting with Alix through commiseration about men; eventually, Nathan’s behavior toward Alix is what convinces Josie that if she abducted Nathan, Alix would see how much better her life is without him. However, in the end, it is Nathan’s absence that finally shows Alix how fortunate her life really was.

Erin and Roxy are Josie and Walter’s daughters. Roxy is the eldest by two years, and left home when she was 16. As a person with oppositional defiant disorder, Roxy had a difficult childhood. She accidentally broke Erin’s arm when they were children, an event that caused social services to become involved in their family. Later, she fought with her girlfriend, Brooke Ripley, after which Josie pulled her out of school for two years. She only appears directly in the novel toward the end, when she returns to take care of Erin after Walter’s death is discovered.

Erin lives with Josie and Walter, but Josie never interacts with her. Erin is a passionate gamer and spends her days in her bedroom and online. Josie has a reluctance to enter Erin’s room and struggles with thoughts of her estranged relationship with her daughter. Erin only eats soft foods—mainly baby food, which Josie leaves outside her door. The manager at Erin’s school confirms that although Erin wasn’t officially diagnosed, she believes Erin to be on the autism spectrum. Although Josie contends that Walter was abusing Erin, Roxy reveals that he was going to her room at night to be a part of her gaming stream. They had monetized her gaming, and she was poised to move out of the house—in Erin’s opinion, although this plan was kept secret, her mother “could smell it” (334), and that is what prompted Josie to initiate her plan. In the end, Walter’s death serves to bring the sisters back together, as Alix reports that Erin is moving in with Roxy.