Woo Woo by Ella Baxter

There’s a peculiar delight in reading a book where the main character makes your skin crawl. Such is the curious charm of Ella Baxter’s Woo Woo. At the center of this sharp, satirical novel is Sabine Rossi—a protagonist so self-centered and insufferable that you may initially wish to see her knocked down a peg. Yet, by the final pages, you might find yourself rooting for her against all odds. This is a testament to Baxter’s skill, as she weaves a narrative that makes even the most unlikable characters compelling.

Sabine is a conceptual artist, her work as bizarre and provocative as her personality. The novel begins in the lead-up to her gallery show, bluntly titled “Fuck You, Help Me,” which features wearable puppets used in performance art pieces she livestreams for an eclectic online audience, complete with handles like Pignut666 and KibbleJoy. Her inner circle, including a fawning gallery owner and her exasperated but enabling husband, Constantine, treats her with reverence. Yet to outsiders—and even to readers—her antics are absurd and her art laughably pretentious. It’s no surprise that “woo woo” aptly captures Sabine’s chaotic essence.

Sabine’s eccentricity escalates as the novel progresses. Mentored by the ghost of avant-garde body artist Carolee Schneemann, she believes she’s being stalked by the Rembrandt Man—a shadowy figure she associates with a haunting Dutch portrait. Whether this figure is real or a manifestation of her unraveling psyche is left deliberately ambiguous, with Baxter crafting moments that teeter between the unsettling and the surreal. A climactic scene in which Sabine demolishes her own home while battling this apparition, broadcasting it live to her audience, is as harrowing as it is ridiculous.

At its core, Woo Woo skewers the world of conceptual art, exposing its most pretentious tendencies with razor-sharp wit. Baxter conjures a universe where critics declare, “The tapestries of her internal and external diaspora are more evocative than your whale cakes,” with unflinching seriousness. Yet even as the novel critiques this world, it also humanizes Sabine, whose relentless self-absorption is undercut by moments of vulnerability. The chapter epigraphs—drawn from sources as varied as Ovid, Chekhov, Cindy Sherman, and Lana Del Rey—remind us of art’s enduring power, even when it borders on the absurd.

Ultimately, Woo Woo is both a satire and an ode to the messy, often ridiculous pursuit of self-expression. Love her or hate her, Sabine Rossi embodies the flawed but persistent spirit of an artist. And so, despite everything, we’re left with a grudging respect for her—and perhaps, a little hope for her redemption.

‍