Book Review: Are the women who work on Onlyfans victims or smart capitalists?

Does the release of “Margo's Got Money Troubles” mean it's finally Rufi Thorpe's time? Since her gripping debut novel, “The Girls of Corona Del Mar,” Thorpe has enjoyed a cult following among writers and critics for her fiction set in the California landscape. Yet despite years of hype, award nominations, and word-of-mouth praise, the overall reception of her work has remained subdued.

Now Thorpe's literary hum has translated into a resounding roar. Long before its publication, The Hollywood Reporter announced that A24 had acquired the rights to the author's fourth novel, “Margo's Got Money Troubles,” with David E. Kelley writing the television adaptation, as well as Nicole Kidman and Elle's production companies and Dakota Fanning as executive producers.

What caught your attention? I would argue that beyond Thorpe's strong characters and tight plots, what sets her apart from her peers is the persistent philosophical tension that lies at the center of her books. “Margo's Got Money Troubles” taps into the conundrum of the virgin-whore paradigm, using the rise of Onlyfans to explore whether the women who generate a following on the site are pitiful victims or savvy capitalists working the system.

Margo Millet was a 19-year-old student and part-time waitress when she had an affair with Mark, her English professor at Fullerton College. Her six-week adventure wasn't particularly notable. She reflects: “It was a wind chime in human form, foolishly hanging from the glorious tree of higher education.” Without the money to attend NYU, along with her best friend Becca, Margo found herself untethered, an all-too-familiar state.

She grew up with Shyanne, her single mother, who worked in retail and hoped with unfounded hopes that Margo's father, Jinx, would leave his wife and children for her. Jinx was a professional wrestler who traveled the world, making it easy to hide his affairs from him and slip in and out of Margo's life. After drug addiction led to a stint in rehab, he retired from the profession and his marriage dissolved. As Jinx's life moves into a new chapter, Margo finds herself unexpectedly pregnant with Mark's baby.

Reconciling the aftermath of a flashy wrestling career is a fitting crisis for Thorpe's novel, which is rife with people who are always something more than they seem to be. Teachers are lying cheaters, fighters are artists, and single mothers are not so easy to pigeonhole. Interestingly, it is in Mark's classroom where Margo begins to discern the power of perspective and storytelling. In distinguishing between fictional and real characters, Mark emphasizes that fictional characters “are only interesting because they are not real. Falsehood is where the interest lies.” It's a grain of truth that Margo clings to.

Thorpe clings to ideas of perspective and circumstance, as well as delusions of fantasy and reality throughout the book. Deploying a structural twist that also helps broaden the way we understand her main character's experience, Thorpe gives Margo the freedom to move from first to third person: “It's true that writing in the third person helps me. “It's much easier to feel sympathy for the Margo that existed back then than to try to explain how and why I did all the things I did.”

The grace of sympathy is also largely absent in sweeping generalizations about women's sexuality. Frustratingly, it is Mark who tells his class, “The way you look at something changes what you see.” If only it were that simple. This lack of perspective and sympathy explains why it is easier for Thorpe's characters to shapeshift than to try to explain themselves to people who don't recognize complexity.

Mark doesn't practice what he preaches. The adoration sours and, faced with her pregnancy, all communication ceases. Margo acknowledges that “the things Mark liked about me I never felt really had anything to do with me. They were more of his fantasy about me.” Despite the logical arguments (Becca makes it clear: Raising a child “is not a philosophical question. It's a financial decision”), Margo decides to go ahead and have the baby.

However, once Bodhi is born, she loses her job as a waitress. It's understandable that two of her three roommates are moving into an apartment without babies. Margo is stuck: her mother doesn't help her; she's too busy courting a prudish suitor. And with no child care available (let alone affordable), Margo can't hold down a job. Reconciling “how sacred the baby was to her and how mundane and irritating it was to everyone else,” Margo found herself “so raw and dripping, so mortal, and yet stronger than ever.”

Conveniently, in fiction, solutions have a way of presenting themselves once one finds trust. Rootless Jinx settles in as roommate and home chef, taking care of Margo like he never did when she was a child. The employment issue is resolved by what a person might imagine to be one of the easiest opportunities available to a stay-at-home mom: developing a customer following on Onlyfans. Anxious about what it means to engage in consensual and voyeuristic but completely virtual sex work, Margo's roommate Suzie notes: “It seems strange to say that a celibate person is a slut. At that point you are just pretending that the words have meaning.” With that, and the financial independence that the site provides, Margo throws herself into work.

The raunchy and playful way Margo builds and flaunts her online persona, Hungry Ghost, is a total joke. At every step, she maintains control of her image and commitment. Lest you think that Thorpe has chosen to shower Margo's work with the cliché of empowerment, think again. The play is performed without false glamour, but also without the stain of shame. Margo's gift for language and her penchant for the absurd flourish as she distinguishes herself from other women on the site.

The job becomes a puzzle of optimization and professional networking, with the help of Jinx, who puts aside her paternal and protective hesitations when she sees that OnlyFans is not too far from WWE. Together, they forge new friendships and create an unlikely family for baby Bodhi. In what seems like a fairy tale twist, Margo finds a strange kinship with a client who pays her for endearing personal stories rather than provocative photographs or videos. Complications arise and shenanigans stop when outside forces pose realistic and heartbreaking stakes. Thorpe allows his characters to remain flawed but bent on redemption in this thoroughly entertaining, utterly endearing and thought-provoking novel that asks, “What kind of truth would require so many lies to tell?”

Thorpe's novels defy easy categorization. The radiant energy of her characters and the tangled plots of her books do not align with the moody atmosphere and tone-poem quality of most contemporary literary fiction. However, these novels are still more intense and rigorous than most high-end women's fiction. It's refreshing to find an author who wants to tell you a good story, but also asks a lot of tough questions. Although it is considered a beach read, perhaps due to her California roots, Thorpe deserves to break away from the limited vision that marketing gives to female writers.

Lauren LeBlanc is a member of the board of directors of the National Book Critics Circle.