How to Kill Your Family

The label “feminist thriller” is a relatively new one, and it’s applied to realistic novels with female protagonists who refuse to comply with patriarchal values, producing psychological suspense and even horror. These protagonists critique the world in which they live and the ways in which it runs counter to their welfare. The feminist thriller “is a taut and suspenseful read which is […] dotted with social commentary about issues women are facing. It might criticize systems that so often work against [women], and the characters may resort to vigilante justice in the face of such systems” (Murphy, Nora. “A List of Feminist Thrillers.” CrimeReads, 31 May 2022). The female protagonists of feminist thrillers “also exhibit a narcissistic lack of empathy and aversion to remorse, as the authors use their exaggerated features as a way of pillorying all those who get away with more than they should, namely men” (Odintz, Molly. “The Age of the ‘Feminist American Psycho’ Thriller Has Arrived.” Literary Hub, 20 Jul 2023). Grace Bernard, the protagonist-narrator of How to Kill Your Family, embodies these qualities.

Grace is very conscious of the disadvantages women face, and she condemns society for them. She proudly avenges her naïve mother, whose artlessness made her “weak.” Grace feels a “strong need to right [the] wrong” done to Marie (88), who was discarded by Simon, insulted by his family, and then abandoned by her own because they “disapprov[ed] of her life choices” (46). Simon, conversely, never suffered for his choices; his parents “blamed everyone but [him]” (13), accusing Marie of using him and claiming he only “made a foolish mistake, as many young men do” (12). Grace is enraged by the society that excuses a man’s “mistake” while condemning a woman and child to poverty because of her “choices.” The novel suggests that Grace’s need for control stems from her lack of it as a child. She reports her childhood awareness that “something very wrong had been done to Marie and me” (46). Men, and the social structures that empower them, disempower women, creating Grace’s obsession with control.

In fact, Grace exploits men’s expectations of women for her gain, using them to her advantage. When she realizes how “big, stupid Amir” can be useful (20), she flirts with him because she has “to keep him sweet if [she’s] to get what [she] want[s]” (8). Later, she justifies murdering Andrew by pointing out how his attitudes are classically “male” and, therefore, suspect. She writes, “[Men] so often just want you to hold up a mirror for their own opinions […] and Andrew might have presented himself as a woke eco-warrior but he wasn’t immune” (70). She invents a story about having depression, feigning helplessness to get close to him. “Men like women being vulnerable,” she says. “They like to feel that we might need [their] help” (73). Grace even uses sex to emotionally manipulate her best friend, Jimmy, knowing sex would prompt him to “prize [their] relationship even more fiercely” (100). Grace is aware that women—including her mother—are often accused of using sex to manipulate men, and she exploits the stereotype to maintain control of the relationship. She notes Lee’s “casual misogyny” and how he objectifies women sexually. When it’s time to kill Janine, Grace enlists a 17-year-old boy who agrees to anything after he becomes infatuated with her. “I’d forgotten how easy it was to manipulate teenage boys,” she writes (214). Grace knows how to code switch to appeal to men (or boys), how to act like she’s suffering or vulnerable or confused to capitalize on a man’s desire to feel needed, to use sex (or its promise) to attract and manipulate him. One of the reasons she becomes complacent after Bryony’s death is that she enjoys knowing that “nobody was listening to [Simon’s claims that he was being targeted]—a terrible thing for a powerful white man to experience” precisely because powerful white men are so accustomed to being listened to (301).

Grace’s reliance on vigilante justice shows the extent of her disillusionment with society. She knows Simon’s sex and money protect him from being held accountable—legally and socially—for hurting the women in his life, so she designs another way to make him pay. Her conviction for a “grubby” crime she did not commit serves as a further indictment of a broken legal system that unfairly targets innocent women and fails to punish guilty men. In fact, she claims to be “the victim of a huge miscarriage of justice” (286) an opinion supported by her lawyer. She’s grateful she was exposed to feminist literature because it gave her the vocabulary to describe what she has witnessed since childhood. She writes, “I understood how the system was stacked against women long before I ever knew the words to describe how we are marginalised, discarded, belittled. I saw it chip away at my mother” (125). In fact, recognizing how powerless women can feel in the presence of powerful men is the very reason she lets Lara Artemis live. When Lara tells the truth about Lee and takes responsibility for enabling him, Grace decides that “enough had been taken from” this woman who, like Marie, was “ensnared by this family” (159).

Grace’s empathy, however, does not extend to many people, and her narcissism and distaste for remorse also mark her as a feminist thriller protagonist. She blames women for being too eager to snatch at the crumbs patriarchy offers. She laments, “How little men promise. How much we grasp at it” (113). While she certainly feels sympathy for her mother’s plight, she also admits to hating Marie for her “weakness,” which Grace vows to answer with her own strength. She writes, “My sex is so often disappointing” (44) repeatedly belittling Kelly in her journal, an attitude that comes back to haunt her once she’s released from prison. Rather than see Kelly as another victim of patriarchy, she thinks of her cellmate as an “empty vessel” and calls women like her “a dime a dozen” (195). Grace even condescends to her (imagined) reader, who she constantly suggests may not have the wits to follow her narrative. She is also eager to assure her audience that, despite killing six family members, she “happily carried on with the rest of her life, never to regret a thing” (5). Though she briefly admits to tears and regret following Andrew’s murder, she is so eager to persuade and to believe in the righteousness of her actions that she fails to notice the contradiction.

Throughout the narrative, Grace exploits men’s expectations of women to redress the social imbalance of power between the sexes. She employs vigilante justice to punish men for their corruption and misuse of power, including Lee and Andrew, who had no role in her mother’s fate. Grace looks down on other women for their perceived weakness regarding men, demeaning Janine, Kelly, and even Marie for failing to be stronger, despite her acknowledgment that society’s demands on women are unfair and infantilizing. Her lack of empathy for other women is antithetical to modern feminism, but her proud rebuke of patriarchal values coincides with some of the feminist values that underwrite the feminist thriller genre.