Miranda July’s All Fours has emerged in a literary landscape brimming with buzzworthy books as a cultural juggernaut, captivating and polarising readers since its spring 2024 release. According to bbc.com, this provocative novel, centred on a 45-year-old artist’s midlife odyssey, has ignited fervent discussions about desire, aging, and womanhood, earning accolades and criticism in equal measure.
The story follows an unnamed narrator, a semi-famous artist and mother, who embarks on a cross-country road trip from Los Angeles, only to halt in Monrovia after a chance encounter with a younger man, Davey. What begins as a quest for reinvention spirals into a three-week motel stay, where she spends a $20,000 windfall transforming her room into a Parisian-inspired haven. This detour sparks a sexual and emotional reawakening, intensified by her perimenopause diagnosis, prompting a fearless reassessment of her life’s trajectory.
•Penguin Random House/Getty ImagesTackling themes like creativity, motherhood, and marriage with raw honesty and quirky humour, the novel has been hailed as “the first great perimenopause novel” by The New York Times and a “spectacularly horny story” by New York Magazine.
*All Fours* has transcended the page, fuelling real-life conversations and meet-ups among women worldwide, from Paris to Seattle. Readers like 24-year-old Mia Morongell praise its “shamelessness” in addressing female desire and agency, while others, like Katie Krug, find the narrator’s choices—pursuing an affair and open marriage—narcissistic or inauthentic. Critics on Goodreads have called it “cringey” or “unrelatable,” with some decrying its privileged perspective. Yet, its impact is undeniable: nominated for the National Book Awards and Women’s Prize for Fiction, optioned for a TV series, and earning July a spot on TIME’s 2025 most influential list.
Associate professor Treena Orchard lauds July for creating a “culturally important rite of passage,” challenging heteronormative norms and giving voice to a transformative phase of life. With its paperback release, All Fours continues to provoke, inspire, and divide, cementing its place as a radical touchstone in contemporary fiction.
•Featured image: Miranda July/Getty Images
