Miranda July’s All Fours is a novel that refuses to settle. It's a story about midlife, about the body, about loneliness, about sex, about the strange spaces we slip into when no one is watching. At the center is a woman in her mid-forties who leaves her home in Los Angeles for a road trip that quickly veers off course, becoming less about the destination and more about the disorienting, exhilarating sense of being untethered. July writes with the same blend of sharp observation and surreal humor that made The First Bad Man so distinct, but All Fours feels looser, freer, more willing to linger in uncertainty.
The novel is deeply interior, unfolding in the mind of a woman who is equal parts self-possessed and completely unmoored. As she drifts from one encounter to another, a sexual awakening of sorts begins to take shape, though July is never interested in the expected beats of transformation. Instead, the novel moves in loops and half-thoughts, dipping into past memories and half-imagined futures, capturing the way time itself begins to feel unstable in midlife. July is exceptional at writing desire, not just for sex, but for change, for understanding, for a sense of aliveness that has started to feel out of reach.
What makes All Fours so compelling is its refusal to moralize or explain itself. It’s not a novel about crisis, nor is it a novel about redemption. It’s about the in-between, the messy, absurd, exhilarating space of wanting something without knowing what it is. July’s prose is deceptively simple, full of moments that land like a joke and then leave a bruise. She understands the strangeness of being a person, the contradictions that exist within a single thought.
Critics have praised All Fours for its originality, calling it July’s most daring work yet. It was shortlisted for the 2024 National Book Award for Fiction, and for good reason as there’s nothing else quite like it. The novel is both profoundly moving and deeply funny, often at the same time, capturing the awkward, beautiful absurdity of being alive. July has once again proven herself as one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary fiction, and All Fours is a novel that will linger in the mind long after its last page.
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