Losing faith seems to be the most salient topic in our post-COVID world. The suffering of the pandemic and the isolation brought on by lockdown changed the lives of every human being on the planet. And the loss of faith came in so many different shapes and sizes --- religious faith, faith in people, and faith in the systems we thought could protect us and care for us.

Many writers have been trying to take stock of that historic time amidst the insanity going on right now. However, none of them has chosen a more fantastic, innovative and impressive way to attack the subject than Catherine Lacey, who is perhaps the most inventive novelist/memoirist working today. THE MÖBIUS BOOK is part fiction/part factual retelling of love and loss, which, like a Möbius strip itself, has no beginning and no end. And the line between memory and fiction is wiggly and soft, liable to break at any time.

"THE MÖBIUS BOOK is a hybrid book that offers a challenge in terms of its structure, but its compelling storytelling is a work of art."

In 2021, Lacey’s relationship with a significant other went bust. The Reason, as she refers to him, has determined that she no longer loves him, so they must part. Although a mortgage was shared, and there was an expectation of a much longer time together, Lacey accepts that it's over. She moves out of her house, crashing with friends until it can be sold.

As she begins to catalogue the wreckage of her life, Lacey takes solace in writing about the pain and depression that followed the breakup as both a fictional narrative and a memoir. The latter is filled with, among other ideas, the pain of the loss of faith --- a religious faith that ruled her life for so long but then suddenly became unconvincing and almost nonsensical to her growing self. And so in writing these coexisting narratives, she creates her own Möbius strip, as the creative ideas blend into the facts (eating disorders, bisexuality) and back and forth without end.

“Sometimes I wondered if the point of all that cold and somber pain might one day be revealed to me, that God would appear again and convert those years of hunger and beyond-hunger into wisdom itself. I was waiting then and I am perhaps still waiting now for something divine to happen, to be punished or rewarded for denying the flesh for so long.”

Lacey writes about the most painful and personal things so clearly. Readers are given a thorough depiction of her religious upbringing --- its foibles and comforts, and its destructive consequences. As she stops eating and wrestles with the control the church has on her and the autonomy of her bodily function, the issue of faith is explored in all its tentacle-like reach. It is brave and so matter-of-fact that one never doubts the idea of her life blending into her art, and vice versa. The never-ending struggle is apparent and neon-lit.

The fictional tale takes those elements and foists them into the story of Marie and Edie, whose relationship is going through changes and so much more. It is also partially a mystery, as Marie’s next-door neighbors have a viscous patch of blood wavering in front of their apartment door. The fact that no one else seems to see this makes Marie question the veracity of everything else in her life. Is what she is seeing real? How does she know? What is truth, and what is fiction? Lacey never tries to wrest the two apart.

THE MÖBIUS BOOK is a hybrid book that offers a challenge in terms of its structure, but its compelling storytelling is a work of art. That Lacey can weave such beautiful and moving sequences out of grief and lust, and the redemptive power of friendship and platonic love, is a testament to her working at a level that transcends most of what readers consider books deemed for classic status these days. Faith is a slippery slope, and Lacey’s musings are deeply troubling and set under the constraints and joys of being alive.