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2 1/2 stars. Before starting the book, I read a few reviews, which heightened my expectations immensely�� “the best novel published this year��, “the next classic��, “Sally Rooney considered by some to be a worthy successor to Samuel Beckett, Oscar Wilde, Yeats etc etc��. Excited at the thought of reading such a highly acclaimed novel, I was left flat and deflated (and I must add, relieved to have reached the end of the book). On the positive�� I liked the idea of what Sally was trying to get across to her readers, but I found the characters to be rather one dimensional, and instead of the story being written in such a way, that you could glean an emotional/multi-dimensional side to the characters, I had to rely on reading the authors (at time clunky) description of their thoughts and emotions. There were some flashes of beautiful almost poetic writing in the novel, but a lot of it left me confused, as it almost felt like 2 different authors at times, or perhaps a poor job by the editors? Normally in novels, I find myself noting down or highlighting some stimulating passages or extracts, that trigger the mind to go to another level, however, in this case I found myself noting some odd words and compiled sentences, that only convoluted the writing, and at times made no sense to me. Here are a few examples, also noted by some other reviewers on ŷ������ (so I know it isn’t just I that thought these were odd):
�� …he suppresses an irritable sigh, but suppresses it with an audible intake of breath, so that is still sounds like a sigh; (physically intaking breath, does not sound like a sigh at all to me!)
�� ...he looks down into his lap, and exhales quickly, almost like a cough; (what???)
�� …Peggy, watching, took a performatively large mouthful of Cointreau; (I can’t understand or see the need for the word performatively in this sentence)
�� .. plus many more examples where words have been crammed unnecessarily into sentences.
I also found the dialogue between the two main characters, Marianne and Connell (who were supposedly life-long friends, soul-mates and lovers), to be stilted and unemotional and as such, unrealistic. I found myself wondering if this was intended for a younger reading audience (teenagers), and could see it being made into a television series, watched by that genre.
It is definitely in my pile of books that I can’t think of anyone I would recommend to, and my rating would be somewhere between 2-3 stars.