Pretty Things

Content Warning: This section of the guide contains discussions of suicide and sexual harassment and abuse.

Nina declares, “[s]o I’m a grifter,” (42), and grifting dominates the story. It’s more than Nina’s, Lily’s, or Lachlan’s occupation: it is a theme that links Nina’s grifts to Vanessa’s career as an influencer, her family, and the wealthy in general. Janelle Brown uses the theme of grifting to suggest that people with money and power didn’t get them by acting honorably. Nina admits that she believed “in the great American myth, the Puritan ethic of nose-to-the-grindstone-and-thou-shalt-prevail,” but she realized that, “for most people not born into privilege, the playing field is a steep incline, and you are at the bottom with boulders tied to your ankles” (42). Being “at the bottom with boulders tied to your ankles” also recalls the imagery of sinking in Lake Tahoe; the structure of the novel revolves around the idea of the lengths people have to go to in order to obtain wealth in America.

Nina’s targets reinforce the pervasive theme of grifting: Brown presents celebrated wealthy individuals as grifters, too. Nina robs the predatory son of a Russian oligarch who hangs out with the dictator Vladimir Putin, and she scams a movie producer with a history of sexual misconduct.