cbr18bingo Clown — features characters who are costumed performers (LARPing, cosplay for OnlyFans, professional wrestling).
Cannonball!
Margo’s Got Money Troubles is a very clever and entertaining novel about performance, voice, point of view. The narrator is Margo, who, while shifting her voice between first and third person, relates the story of her own shifting persona as a daughter, a single mother, a content creator, and a business person. Margo uses her wits and her heart to try to create the life she wants for herself and her child, but family, friends and and a problematic ex seem to veer between being necessary supports and formidable obstacles.
Margo herself was born out of wedlock to Shyanne, former Hooters waitress and Bloomingdale’s employee, and Jinx, a former pro-wrestler and promoter who never married Shyanne. Jinx has a wife and children elsewhere, and his presence, while highly valued by both Shyanne and Margo, has been a rare treat for them. Shyanne has a gambling obsession and is dating a conservative holy-roller. When she learns that Margo is pregnant by her English professor at the local college, Shyanne urges her to get an abortion, as does the married college professor, and Margo’s high school friend Becca. Margo, however, decides she will keep the baby, partly out of annoyance at being told by others what to do and partly because she thinks keeping the baby is the “right” and “good” thing to do. But when baby Bodhi is born, Margo quickly learns that no one is going to support her decision — not her boss, who fires her; not the college professor dad, who has her sign a NDA in exchange for a payoff; not her roommates, who have had enough of a crying baby while they try to study. Two of the three roommates are moving out, and while roommate Suzie is staying, Margo has to figure out how to get a new job and some kind of childcare asap. This is when, out of the blue, Jinx shows up at her door. Jinx’s troubling true story is revealed gradually through the rest of the novel, but his presence seems a godsend. Not only is he great with the baby, his wrestling background and connections give Margo an idea: she will create an OnlyFans account and make money from home. After all, it’s all performance; one can hide who one really is while presenting a face (and more) to strangers that will fulfill their fantasies and expectations. Margo’s foray into OnlyFans engages her creative side and puts her in contact with other content creators. Despite warnings from them and Jinx, it also puts Margo into contact with consumers, including a guy named JB who pays Margo extra to answer his emails to her.
Margo finds that she is making very good money very quickly, but a number of problems arise almost simultaneously. Gaining fans initially seemed easy, but keeping them is another matter all together, and this becomes a test of Margo’s creative skills. Jinx, while initially concerned about Margo’s OnlyFans career, ends up being a real support and a fount of business wisdom. Meanwhile, Shyanne is appalled. Her biggest worry is about keeping her conservative fiancé. It was bad enough that Margo had a child out of wedlock, but an OnlyFans account is more than she can handle. Meanwhile, Margo is starting to really care about JB but worries that she cannot be honest with him. On top of that, Margo’s ex starts stirring up trouble, and Margo learns some things about her dad that could upset her entire life.
I really enjoyed this novel. The characters are all well drawn, realistic, and by turns annoying and sympathetic. Thorpe did her research when it came to learning about OnlyFans and professional wrestling, too. One can see that content creators have to be savvy marketers and that what they do involves far more creativity and production value than most people would credit. The various story arcs develop and resolve in a very satisfactory way. Margo’s Got Money Troubles has been turned into an Apple series with Elle Fanning, Nick Offerman and Michelle Pfeiffer, and while I haven’t watched it, I just might now.
