The Beach Club

The Beach Club is filled with isolated people who have experienced loss or abandonment in ways that have shaped their relationships with others. The novel explores the various complex ways in which such voids can manifest, particularly when they occur in childhood; the loss of a parent, Hilderbrand suggests, can set one’s course in life.

For example, the death of Mack’s parents is at the root of his struggle with commitment. His relationship with Maribel alternates between comfortable companionship and his feeling that she is a “sheen of sweat, begging, pleading” (310)—imagery that evokes his discomfort with what he perceives as neediness. His relationship with Andrea relies on distance, both physically and emotionally. Although Andrea and Mack are sexually intimate, Andrea “never [tells] Mack she love[s] him” (123). Consequently, when she returns each summer, Mack feels that he is stuck “right […] where [she] left [him]” (118), yet this stasis serves his own emotional needs by allowing him to continuously defer any decision or action.

By contrast, Maribel’s “empty spot inside” causes her to cling to perceived stability (18), even at the expense of her own happiness. Maribel was born of a short-term affair, and she and her mother never felt secure.