Cosmetic Surgery and Quiet Violence On Board in Lindsey Harding’s “Pilgrims 2.0” https://ift.tt/e6iWhBz
Pilgrims 2.0, Lindsey Harding’s debut novel, opens with a narrator’s eyes locked on the ethereal cruise ship named PILGRIM. Crew members scrub away the grime and grit from the ocean liner’s prior trip, preparing it to embark on its 52nd voyage:
Between Crown Princess in Berth 93 and Catalina Express in Berth 95, a time machine sat in Berth 94, moored and anchored […] By Monday afternoon, PILGRIM would be sailing again. The path she traced through the Pacific Ocean was roughly the same every two weeks, but each passenger took a different journey. For this cruise could take a body — a woman’s body — almost anywhere she wanted it to go.
PILGRIM is a cruise ship dreamed up by Rebecca Heston, late-wife of plastic surgeon extraordinaire Walter Heston. It is meant as a vacation haven designed by and for women with the ultimate goal of self reinvention. PILGRIM specializes in a different kind of ‘excursion’, taking cosmetic surgery to the seas in the form of a personalized menu of procedures for each passenger: “While they get their work done, they’re pampered, catered to, doted on, and they return home twenty years younger.”
Whispers of PILGRIM and its promises began to spread, and voyage after voyage, desperate women flock to its decks with itineraries in hand.
Told through POV snapshots, Harding’s fluency in flash fiction is apparent and dazzling. Chapters shift through the perspectives of a wide cast of characters at neckbreak speed without missing a beat. The story pivots around four main female protagonists: Lyla, Nicole, Bianca, and Annalie. These women board the ship as strangers, but thanks to PILGRIM’s operating system, BECCA, and her observant algorithm, they find themselves seated next to each other at the opening night dinner. BECCA knows that all four women have “checked the box for ‘life changing’ when asked to describe their hopes for the cruise.”
Where these women’s lives collide are in charming scenes of witty banter and bold assumptions. But for all the fun, there is an overwhelming sense of dread that chases the reader through the pages due to Harding’s uncanny ability to balance on a sharp edge between delicate and dangerous. Each character must grapple with “what she was. What she wasn’t. What she could no longer be.”
Lyla’s struggle with infertility has driven her to a pseudo-pregnancy procedure — all of the symptoms and side effects without an actual pregnancy. Nicole is buried in debt and she’s lying to her husband about it. After failed attempts to sell products from a company that reeks of an MLM, she believes that her make-over will be the spark to success before her husband discovers the truth. Bianca gave up motherhood to pursue a professional career in tennis, but now she’s on the brink of aging out before she can go pro. She refuses to let that sacrifice be for nothing. For Annalie, her own reflection drowns her in grief, a constant reminder of her twin sister’s death that she can’t handle being haunted by any longer.
Throughout the narrative readers might expect to find a commentary fighting for self-acceptance and rejecting the idea that cosmetic reinvention will provide emotional rebirth. The procedures these protagonists are willing to endure might seem crude, violent even, particularly in a world where the phrase “body positivity” has flooded social media and exploded in popularity. Yet, they look around before the cruise comes to a close, wondering about the women they see around them. Questions such as, “who were they […] what had they suffered? And what strength had they uncovered, buried beneath their now flawless skin and remarkable figures, that granted them the courage to recover what they’d lost?”
The novel doesn’t reject or accept any stance on whether plastic surgery did or didn’t bring these women peace. Instead, there is a fathomless and darker conversation about reinvention to be had.
These women aren’t the only ones on board keeping secrets.
When Rebecca Heston started designing her cosmetic cruise liner, there was one thing she was insistent upon: an all-male crew. Her reasoning is simple: “It’s about time the roles were reversed, don’t you think? Caregiving could use a facelift.”
Deck hands, room stewards, technicians, biohazards waste detail, and surgeons — all men — are now in charge of the care and well-being of all passengers on board. Alongside the four female protagonists, the novel cycles through the perspectives of Dr. Heston, nicknamed “The Captain”; Rocco, a recent grad student with an obsession with data; recently divorced Cedric; and Larry, whose boredom leads to pranks with potentially deadly consequences. After all, “he didn’t want to hurt these women, not really, but sometimes he couldn’t help himself.”
Including these points of view derails any commentary on the vanity or validity of cosmetic surgery and instead embarks on a more poignant conversation about quiet acts of violence enacted against the female body. Lyla, Nicole, Bianca, and Annalie are utilizing plastic surgery as a method of transformation, a desperate hail mary to change the course of their lives. They board the ship unaware that there are men present who also crave reinvention, men who are willing to use and abuse these women for their own selfish gain.
What the protagonists face isn’t assault in an overtly sexual manner; rather, the novel raises questions around other types of violence that exist in the space between ignorance and awareness. What’s more abhorrent, the novel asks, the violence you’re aware of, or the violence you’ve endured, but you remain ignorant to?
Pilgrims 2.0 is a stunning portrayal of desperation that holds buoyancy in its empathy and finds brutality in asking where the line of violence is drawn or if, perhaps, the line has been drawn too late. Lindsey Harding’s debut novel is a knockout, solidifying her place in the pantheon of timely and affecting contemporary literature.
FICTION Pilgrims 2.0
By Lindsey Harding
Acre Books
Published November 15, 2023
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