Role of Deception in Marriage

So Much Blue is structured around five secrets which Kevin withholds from Linda for the majority of the novel: the act of withholding these secrets becomes more important than their content, ultimately revealing how deception can paradoxically cause a marriage to decay while allowing for its continued existence.

First, the framework of the novel emphasizes how Kevin’s secrets create an emotional rift between him and Linda. Three of Kevin’s secrets are utilized as structural pinpoints for the three stories interwoven throughout the novel – the ‘Paris’ sections are dominated by Kevin’s affair, the ‘1979’ sections reveal his murder of a policeman and his burial of a young girl, and in the ‘House’ sections he withholds the knowledge of April’s pregnancy from Linda. Each of the alternating chapters examines these secrets with varying degrees of directness: the Paris sections, for example...