[{"id":316070,"date":"2026-09-15T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-15T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/electricliterature.com\/?p=316070"},"modified":"2026-09-14T12:00:53","modified_gmt":"2026-09-14T16:00:53","slug":"when-expectations-test-the-boundaries-of-a-friendship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/electricliterature.com\/when-expectations-test-the-boundaries-of-a-friendship\/","title":{"rendered":"TAKE WHAT YOU CAN Tests the Limits of Chosen Family"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Somewhere in France, two girls launch a boat into the sea. So begins Naima Coster\u2019s latest novel, Take What You Can<\/a><\/em>. We follow the girls\u2014Milly and Val\u2014as they navigate the waves and, as the novel unfolds further, become successful women, continuously pulled against the uneven terrain of their marriages, babies, careers, and the unfettered love that exists between them. <\/p>\n\n\n

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In adulthood, after years of long-distance friendship, Milly and Val\u2019s relationship takes a new form when Val and her husband uproot themselves at Milly\u2019s suggestion, and the women decide to raise their children together in New York. There, they give birth to daughters, their families intertwining, but the years that passed while they led separate lives bubble up and push them to a precipice. The memory of a woman who became a motherly and guiding figure in their lives beginning on that long ago trip to France threatens to unspool them. Who are they to each other? What lives in the margins of their love?\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Take What You Can<\/em> is a complex portrait of female friendship that pries at the intimacy threading through chosen family, and asks what the boundaries are\u2014if any\u2014between two women who are tethered to each other. Class divides and the strain of the past force Milly and Val to confront what they really want\u2014for themselves, and from each other\u2014and sift through their desires, lingering grief, and the unruly vault of motherhood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coster writes with shimmering precision, unfurling the tumultuous and spirited depths of female friendship amidst stunning backdrops. Out at sea, the girls reach a spot where they can stand on stones: \u201cThe water was clear, and silver fish glinted like blades below the surface.\u201d The prose opens, bends, immersing us in the scene as they climb \u201cin their flimsy sandals onto a jagged outcrop strewn with the remnants of other visits: goggles, a tube of sunscreen, an empty wine bottle.\u201d Each image leaves an undeniable imprint. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I first met Naima while we were both MFA candidates at Columbia, and I can remember sensing an authenticity and kindness in her that was often hard to find in a competitive writing cohort. In the years since, Naima\u2019s impressive literary career has spanned three novels: Halsey Street<\/a>, What\u2019s Mine and Yours<\/a>,<\/em> and now, Take What You Can<\/em>. It was a joy to speak with her over Zoom in early April about the evolution of her writing and the many facets of her stunning new novel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Yasmin Roshanian:<\/strong> The way we tell stories reshapes with time, and this is your third novel\u2014what a feat! How did writing<\/strong> Take What You Can<\/em><\/strong> differ from writing<\/strong> Halsey Street?<\/em><\/strong> I\u2019m curious what you struggled with here, and what has lingered from each novel.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I thought I was emotionally ready to write about a lot of the things that came up for me in becoming a mother. Once I started, I realized that I hadn\u2019t gotten past anything.<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Naima Coster:<\/strong> I\u2019ll start with what I intended. I wanted to write something that paid really close attention to just two characters, which is similar to Halsey Street<\/em>, but different from my last novel, What\u2019s Mine and Yours<\/em>. I wanted to sink into their psychology and their emotions\u2014even more than I had previously. I also wanted to write about love, and the love that exists between these two best friends, Milly and Val. It\u2019s a love that sustains, that isn\u2019t lost, and that was new for me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was difficult to write this book because it was the first time I wrote a novel where the emotional material was really close to me. I thought about writing about new motherhood, class envy, and estrangement when my daughter was two-years-old. I thought I knew what it was to be an unmothered mother, and to have questions and strong feelings about class\u2014what I had, what I didn\u2019t have. I thought I was emotionally ready to write about a lot of the things that came up for me in becoming a mother. Once I started, of course, I realized that I hadn\u2019t gotten past anything. Everything was so fresh and raw for me, which wasn\u2019t true for Halsey Street<\/em> and What\u2019s Mine and Yours<\/em>. They\u2019re not autobiographical novels, but they are very personal. This novel is not autobiographical, either, but it was the first time I found myself writing about open wounds and really unresolved feelings. It made the writing difficult. It took a lot longer than I thought. It wasn\u2019t straightforward to wrestle with the themes and emotions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

YR: The intricacies of female friendship is a central theme. For many women, friendships rather than romantic loves are their longest and most enduring connections. Milly and Val are such forces, their love feels almost unconditional, but it\u2019s also volatile, nearly splintering them both. What is it about this form of intimacy that\u2019s so consuming?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

NC:<\/strong> I knew I wanted to write about how hard it is to love someone when you\u2019re truly close. Their friendship is more than occasionally catching up, or even unconditional support for each other. They tell each other everything\u2014or at least that\u2019s the expectation. They turn to each other when times are hard and count on each other to show up. It\u2019s like many of the ideas that people impose on marriage\u2014somebody who’s there for you no matter what, who has made a kind of vow. Milly and Val have a version of their own vows. There\u2019s an implicit understanding around the ways they\u2019ll show up. But the problem with an implicit understanding is that as life changes, there\u2019s a lot to negotiate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Milly and Val live in a world where so much matters more than female friendship and is supposed to take precedence: their careers, their children once they have them, their marriages. And for a time, they’re living apart. Once they live near each other, all of the unspoken expectations cause a lot of friction between them. They have to find a new way of being with one another that requires more open negotiation of their needs, desires, and expectations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I wanted to write about this relationship because my friendships have been so deep and important to me, and because I don\u2019t have strong family ties to my nuclear family. That creates a special kind of pressure on the relationship, too. It exists in a life where there are big gaps, and big pains, and I wanted to explore how friends manage that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

YR: The financial disparities between the women also leads to tension and resentment. While Milly is generous with her wealth, their circumstances beg the question of who deserves what, and why. I was thinking a lot about how a friendship can function when there are such clear imbalances.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

NC:<\/strong> I hope one of the things that the book pushes readers toward is being more honest about themselves and their class position. It’s a problem between Milly and Val. There is a big class disparity between them, but they both have really significant privileges and advantages that they\u2019ve accrued over the course of their lives. Their story is a story of social mobility, and they\u2019re both aware of how much other people have. It produces a kind of dishonesty in both of them. Val might be renting an apartment in Park Slope, but she has access to that apartment and that neighborhood with all of its advantages and privileges\u2014which is the neighborhood I live in\u2014because of her social network. The book is really about how the desire for more and the belief that one deserves more can obscure a clearer view of inequality and one’s advantages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

YR: The artistry surrounding food\u2014and the pleasure it brings\u2014feels palpable throughout. We see \u201cpork belly tamales, spring vegetable paella, arepas with black lentils and shaved radish, braised chicken with chimichurri, and ceviche, of course ceviche.\u201d How do you see this kind of gratification operating here? What does it mean to indulge?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Becoming a mother can produce even greater desire for self-actualization and self-determination and power.<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

NC:<\/strong> I wanted to write about Milly and Val having travel experiences. They first become friends when they go to Europe, and it becomes a way to be a tourist\u2014not just to another country and culture, but into another kind of class experience. And they experience it through food. They can have a bottle of white wine and<\/em> a bottle of red wine, they can savor these foods that make them feel they\u2019ve reached a certain position in life, because of the ways that the food is coded. It\u2019s better than other kinds of food, or experiences, and that carries over to their life in New York. It becomes a way that Milly and her wealth\u2014and Val, who I don\u2019t think is rich, but has lots of privileges\u2014can have access to a kind of finer life, an indulgent life. Although the food is expensive, it is more accessible than a trust fund, or real estate. It\u2019s a way that Val can experience what it\u2019s like to be rich for a night, or at a party. The indulgence there is at once about pleasure and taste\u2014the food is truly delicious\u2014but it\u2019s also about the pleasure of slipping into another life through consumption.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

YR: There are no constraints when it comes to sex, either. I was hoping you could speak to what it means to take ownership of your sexuality here, especially for two women who are postpartum.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

NC:<\/strong> I knew I wanted to write about their sex lives postpartum, because the experience of giving birth for both of them transforms their bodies in different ways, and their relationship to themselves. It felt like sex was an important way to explore how they are reconstituting their identity after this big shift. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the big questions around sex has to do with a sort of entitlement, and what these women feel entitled to. How much pleasure do they feel entitled to? What kinds of power dynamics do they feel entitled to have in their respective relationships? What do they feel they deserve is the question that keeps coming up around everything, including sex. Milly and Val have different answers at the beginning of the book, and they have different answers at the end. But I think they move closer together. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I also wanted to explore how becoming a mother and giving birth doesn\u2019t produce the end of desire\u2014in some ways, it can produce even greater desire for self-actualization and self-determination and power. These women grow to feel that they need more and deserve more after their lives change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

YR: Milly and her husband, Harris, quietly have an open marriage. Even with looser rules around sex, Milly craves more. Her appetites are unrestrained in a way we don\u2019t often see with women\u2014there\u2019s usually so much shame equated with want. It felt liberating to see her so unabashedly pursue her desires.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

NC:<\/strong> The public conversation around non-monogamy has really changed since I started the book. And still, Milly in this moment would occupy a precarious position as a high-profile, highly visible woman of color. Having an open marriage and having this sexual freedom opens up all kinds of trouble for her in terms of the way she\u2019s regarded\u2014and how she might be viewed already\u2014because Black women are hyper-sexualized, and seen as lascivious, as salacious. Milly\u2019s already seen as somebody who has a life she doesn\u2019t deserve. She\u2019s very wary of having that aspect of her marriage be public.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dialogue is an interesting way to reveal what characters haven\u2019t looked at. It reflects the ways they’ve been formed by the world, and the ways they form the world around them.<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

She also knows what she wants, and isn\u2019t afraid to seek it\u2014which I admire about her\u2014but she isn\u2019t always sensitive to the needs of others. She isn\u2019t always emotionally open and available to her partners, or to Val. So although her non-monogamy remains a site of freedom, it also becomes a site for her to explore responsibility, and what she owes to people. It\u2019s not just about what she should get.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

YR: The pain of mothering when you are without a mother is something both Milly and Val reckon with. Milly is still grappling with her mother\u2019s death, while the abuse Val endured has formed its own loss. All forms of mothers haunt the page.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

NC<\/strong>: Their motherlessness is both a point of connection and alienation for them. They both know what it is to long for care and presence that you can\u2019t get\u2014and to feel that absence at a time when you\u2019re so vulnerable, and becoming a mother yourself. But they have really different wells to draw from, different kinds of pain, and they have trouble understanding each other\u2019s pain. That becomes a block to their intimacy as well. They don\u2019t openly engage in a question of whose pain is worse, but they both feel that the other doesn\u2019t really understand the kinds of hurt they\u2019re carrying. I think for both of them the pain of motherlessness is ongoing.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

YR: As Milly carries the ongoing weight surrounding her mother\u2019s death and her miscarriage, she writes, \u201cI didn\u2019t want to be the only one here, everyone else in our lineage blotted out, erased. But I went on living.\u201d It\u2019s a beautiful testament to loss, to lineage, and ultimately, to how grief is a form of love left without a latch. What did it mean for you to give her this vulnerability?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n