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Laura 's Reviews > Outline
Outline
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Exceptional reading.
I felt that each of the female characters - represented a different facet to the pain of the disintegration of Faye's, our narrator's marriage. As if each woman, was in fact recounting all the variations of loss experienced by Faye. Each woman relaying not simply the loss of their partner but the avalanche, or domino effect of the result of the breaking down of the most significant relationship in their lives; and most disturbing of all - their sense of identity and in tandem with this, a loss of what is real, both past and present. A process with which I can infinitely identify.
Some strange Greek translations
Panayiotis - usual, not Paniotis
Yiasas - not Yassas
And I had to laugh about her boat excursions with "her neighbour", how could she not know that he would expect "something" in return.
All the women capture in their painful accounting of lost love - those very confounding other losses - of belief, in purpose, of their children -
And in most cases the male rejection of the female. I particularly liked her idea that men want women to fulfill their fantasy - they must perform the part allocated, expected of them.
The best, most truthful, most insightful "novel" I have read in a very long time.
I felt that each of the female characters - represented a different facet to the pain of the disintegration of Faye's, our narrator's marriage. As if each woman, was in fact recounting all the variations of loss experienced by Faye. Each woman relaying not simply the loss of their partner but the avalanche, or domino effect of the result of the breaking down of the most significant relationship in their lives; and most disturbing of all - their sense of identity and in tandem with this, a loss of what is real, both past and present. A process with which I can infinitely identify.
Some strange Greek translations
Panayiotis - usual, not Paniotis
Yiasas - not Yassas
And I had to laugh about her boat excursions with "her neighbour", how could she not know that he would expect "something" in return.
All the women capture in their painful accounting of lost love - those very confounding other losses - of belief, in purpose, of their children -
And in most cases the male rejection of the female. I particularly liked her idea that men want women to fulfill their fantasy - they must perform the part allocated, expected of them.
The best, most truthful, most insightful "novel" I have read in a very long time.
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Reading Progress
August 31, 2019
– Shelved as:
to-read
August 31, 2019
– Shelved
September 10, 2019
–
Started Reading
September 10, 2019
–
59.84%
"The characters seem false - in that they represent types rather than individuals. That long show off performance of Angeliki, even "the neighbour" as he relates his life to our narrator seem highly stylised - these are not natural conversations - they are distillations of people's lives and conversations - no-one is able to spout such self-reflective philosophies unless they have just written a memoir."
page
149
September 10, 2019
–
71.89%
"So - all the people are involved in story telling - apart from the student who wants her money back - Cassandra.
I can only think of The Decameron - Boccaccio's set up where young Florentines leave the city to escape the plague and tell stories to while away the time - stories primarily about relationships of men and women - and the difficulty, possiblity of understanding the other. Also Chaucer's - Canterbury Tales."
page
179
I can only think of The Decameron - Boccaccio's set up where young Florentines leave the city to escape the plague and tell stories to while away the time - stories primarily about relationships of men and women - and the difficulty, possiblity of understanding the other. Also Chaucer's - Canterbury Tales."
September 11, 2019
–
Finished Reading
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Definitely want Transit, and Kudos. My explanation of the other women holds true for this sense of 'fake' - as if the author wanted to exorcise or examine all the pain/loss of her marriage. And in a way this makes the "characters" more than acceptable to me - because each one rings true.I suppose the other sense of "fake" is in the condensing or stylistic devise of each character telling his/her tale. I don't think there are many people who can deftly present such refined analyses of their lives. I suppose this is why she chose writer, or writing students - to convince us if this possibility. However the Truth of what she reveals far outweighs any stylistic devises.
The trilogy gets better in my view Laura - great review of a great book
Hi, thank you GY. Can't wait to read Transit and Kudos.
I don't know what my problem is: everyone else seems to see something in this book that I just couldn't discover. About seventy pages in I began to wonder if there was any point to it at all? Everything seemed so artificial that I just couldn't be bothered - and yes, for goodness' sake, what was she doing going out in that boat: indeed what was she doing even talking to her seat neighbour on a plane????? You might ask a few polite questions at the end of a flight, knowing that you will soon part, but not at the beginning when you know you are going to be trapped in very close proximity for the next several hours?!?!?!?!?
Hi Karen - none of the conversations are what we might class as natural. The point is the universal difficulty of negotiating a successful relationship - with a distinct bias for the female perspective. The characters aren't actually break people they are just props for ALL the writers thoughts - Ms Cusk is delivering a fairly minimal range of the usual novel type illusions, which is a reflection and match which supports the content.
I like the idea of the various relationship stories revealing the facts of Faye's own untold relationship story, Laura. Will you read more of the series?
Laura wrote: "Hi Karen - none of the conversations are what we might class as natural. The point is the universal difficulty of negotiating a successful relationship - with a distinct bias for the female perspec..."Your insights are twisting my arm to go back and have another go...
Tempting! It seems impossible not to relate with the females in this book, at least, by the way you present their stories, Laura. I had never heard of this series, I will have to further investigate.
Hi Fionnula - this writer is better I think with Memoir - she admits herself that there are a lot of "boring" bits necessary in fiction, and she managed bro avoid them here by essentially having various characters just talk to her, but what is more apparent really is it's various conversations with - herself. Yes - I'm looking forward to the other two. I can't order right now because moving house and don't have an address!!
Hi Karen - everyone likes different things - read something you really are excited about - is probably more fun.
Dolores hi - yes it's a book primarily about female experiences.
Loss of the sense of identity, loss of the sense of present, past and future as connected to the disintegration and ultimate loss of a partner relationship - I had this series on my radar and this first episode on the shelf but your review tickles me to start it soon, Laura.
Hi Ilse, thanks. I went through a particularly unpleasant divorce myself, and some of Cusks analyses of what happens to the psyche, the sense of self are I believe quite accurate, although I am happy to say - we bring it on ourselves. Mostly down to lack of knowledge, experience. That whole angst about being betrayed - it is possible to say - and the other person - what did they think/feel? I look forward to your review!!
WOW. Your review has really touched me, Laura! I will get this book.
Hi, Fergus - thank you.
Good review. Just finished the book and the writing was so good I don't know why I wouldn't keep reading the trilogy. I mean, literary fiction trilogy - is that a thing?
All the little weavings we do to create a tapestry of our life, and then a thread is pulled... It's interesting, the observation that the narrator throws her experience (or distributes her experience?) into the housing of others and converses with herself in this way. That's an odd choice for a writer or, then again, perhaps meta? Glad you found a book that sparked a bit! Lovely review.
Hi Antigone - someone liked this - so I went back and read it - and being annoyed that the Likes/Comments - were blanked out I deliberately re-opened it - vengeance against GR management. I guess I 'm lucky to see your comment. Yes - I do like Cusk - I think I'm missing the last one in this trilogy - I'll get to it soon.It's an easier way of generating authentic characters perhaps - use versions of yourself (from the past) - but also the unified experience of women. I'll have to re-read it.
I thought you were not enjoying the experience at halfway when you described the characters as "fake".
I rated Outline at 4 stars (so I liked it well enough), but I felt that the writing style had become rather repetitive in books two and three