Nine Perfect Strangers

“She understood she was no longer in her heyday, but she was still a solid, mid-level performer.”

Frances comes to terms with the practical reality of her writing career. Her career reflects her physical state, moving beyond the most successful or energetic period into a gentler, slower time. The spa treatment is an attempt to wrestle with this slow decline, an attempt to put off the inevitable. Until Frances accepts that the reality of her career and her body, however, she’ll not be genuinely happy.

“It shouldn’t make a difference that Jessica was disfigured by her own hand.”

By portraying Jessica’s surgery from two different viewpoints, the novel shows the different interpretations of her cosmetic procedures. Jessica believes that she has improved herself, while Ben sees the many procedures as self-inflicted wounds. These different interpretations are eventually true of the 10-day spa treatment: What Masha views as essential therapy, the guests view as something close to torture. Jessica’s cosmetic surgeries mirror the spa experience.

“For him, rules were about politeness and respect and ensuring the survival of a civilized society.”

Heather and Napoleon have different worldviews. She defines herself in opposition to him, deliberately breaking the rules that he so closely follows, sometimes without really understanding why. Heather breaks from her husband’s behavior because of repressed resentment regarding the death by suicide of their son. Her unspoken guilt and resentment manifest as a rejection of Napoleon’s habits, rather than a rejection of Napoleon himself, as she lacks the understanding to deal with her repressed pain.