Review: Love You Two by Maria Pallotta-Chiarolli

Challenging Teen Novel About Family, Relationships and Truth

Dec 19, 2008

This intricate family drama aimed at teens illustrates the many ways that relationships develop and the impact on family and friends for those who "love differently".

The challenges of the teenage years, including making sense of romantic and sexual relationships, have become increasingly difficult in a world where relationships are becoming more complex and the concept of “normal” is constantly being redefined.

In Love You Two (Random House, 2008) Maria Pallotta-Chiarolli, Australian author and Senior Lecturer in the School of Health and Social Development at Deakin University, explores the many ways that love can be expressed and the complex and often confusing pressures and expectations that relationships can bring to bear.

Giuseppina (Pina) is 16 years. She lives in Little Italy in Adelaide with her Australian-Italian parents and younger brother. Her traditional Italian grandparents live nearby.

Finding her mother’s email account left open, Pina’s curiosity is stirred by a subject line reading “Love you t(w)oo”. The phrase is one that Pina’s mother uses with her two children, but this email is not addressed to them. Unable to resist, Pina reads the email and discovers that her mother has been involved in a long-term affair with a family friend and that her father is apparently both aware and approving of the arrangement.

Pina’s friends think her parents are the perfect couple. Pina is devastated to discover that they are just as dysfunctional, in her eyes, as the divorced or constantly fighting parents of her friends. Her emotional chaos leads her into an unwanted sexual encounter with her overbearing boyfriend.

When the combination of her own confusion, guilt, anger and grief becomes too much, Pina catches a bus to Melbourne to find solace and refuge with her Uncle Don and his Vietnamese girlfriend Wei Lee. In Melbourne, she discovers that many people live very different lives in public than they do in the privacy of their own homes and intimate relationships.

Redefining Love, Friendship and Family

Pina’s emotional journey leads her to question what she considers acceptable in her own friendships and expectations of herself and others. Her initial anger at her mother gradually develops into a reluctant admiration of the unhappiness that she has endured to protect her children from the consequences of her own non-traditional relationship choices.

In addition to exploring a variety of ways of expressing a physical attraction between two adults (heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, polyamory), Love You Two also examines the influence and impact of other relationships, such as that between siblings, parents and children, extended family and friends. Pina’s best friends have their own relationship issues that affect how they relate to each other.

In addition to non-traditional male/female relationships, Love You Two also explores the challenges of multiracial relationships and the pressures put on modern couples and families by more traditional parents and grandparents.

The novel explores relationships, particularly sexual ones, that some readers may find challenging, however it does not encourage promiscuity. Pina’s first sexual experience is a result of a dysfunctional relationship with her boyfriend, his bullying personality and her own low self-esteem and emotional confusion. The idea that a relationship should be healthy, safe, passionate and honest as a foundation for further intimacy is one that is reinforced by several characters throughout the book.

A Thought-Provoking Novel for Teens

While readers may occasionally feel overwhelmed by the sheer number of non-traditional relationships presented by not only central, secondary and incidental characters, Love You Two is an interesting and engaging novel with a well developed central character. Pina’s confusion and raw emotion are well portrayed and she is a sympathetic character as she struggles to come to terms with her expectations of herself and her parents, particularly her mother.

Sexual themes make it unsuitable for younger teen readers, but older teens are sure to find conflicts and experiences that they can relate to, particularly in the variety of family dynamic, peer pressure and friendships represented

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Dec 30, 2008 2:53 AM

Guest :

The plot was too unrealistic, bombarding the reader with too many types of relationships. The main thread of the story seemed to condone the idea of having more than 1 concurrent relationship, that if it is out in the open then it's not an affair. It was definitely overwhelming with too much unnecessary information. I'm no prude and quite open with my daughters about life and love but cannot recommended the book for any teen!

Mar 8, 2009 3:22 AM

Guest :

I wish I had read this book when I was a teenager. It should be compulsory stuff in schools. It touches extremely important points of diversity and acceptance, and even though not all of us go through all those challenges, it is important to be aware of them and respect deeply those who struggle with mono-hetero-race-age-normativism.