‘Love & Virtue’: Diana Reid
Source: Ultimo Press
‘Are you a good person, or do you just look like one?’ is the tagline that gets us thinking, yet also barely scratches the surface of all that is contained within the pages of Diana Reid’s coming-of-age debut novel. Published by Ultimo Press, Love & Virtue (2021) is the recipient of the 2022 MUD Literary Prize and, by the novel’s end, it’s easy to see why.
Love & Virtue follows the perspective of Michaela as she embarks on her first year at Fairfax College as a university. Having graduated from the University of Sydney herself, Reid’s conceptualisation of campus life and politics speaks to the heart of this culture, critiquing its multifaceted layers of oppression while acknowledging the grey areas that also coexist in this space.
Naturally, these insights are delivered through Michaela’s experiences, whose voice is the drawcard of the story. Her thoughts are unflinchingly cutting, oftentimes privately judging everyone around her – even those she cares about – and regularly directing her derision inward. Although she may be misguided at times, her unwavering honesty and vulnerability make her endearing to readers.
Driving the friction throughout Love & Virtue is the friendship between Michaela and Eve, which is regularly combative in subtle ways. Michaela’s oscillating desires to try and impress, compete with and condemn Eve’s hypocritical behaviour precisely capture the toxic nature of their friendship. The complexity of their relationship also reflects the messy uncertainties that plague young adults caught between embracing their independence and seeking the approval of their peers.
Essential to Love & Virtue’s themes is the examination of what it means to be virtuous. At the centre of unfolding plot points including consent, privilege, abuses of power and feminism is the interrogation of morality. Reid cleverly creates a controlled environment in Michaela’s philosophy class where the subject of ethics is hotly contested, which is then mirrored in the ‘real world’ as she navigates university rape culture and the issue of misappropriating individual’s experiences for the greater good. Like any sound philosophical debate, the moral high ground remains unclear by the novel’s end.
Michaela’s romantic interludes are where the novel falls short. Her relationship with Paul reads like infatuation at best, and detachment at worst; the declaration that she loves him doesn’t quite ring true. There also exists the abrupt kiss between Michaela and Eve, which fails to further the plot, nor does it get brought up again beyond the confines of its own scene. In saying this, Michaela’s sharp narration of these scenes is enough to see these plot points through.
If Love & Virtue is anything to go by, then Australian literature has gained a new voice with a talent for discerning the zeitgeist in Reid.
