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Niagara on the Lake, Ontario, Canada
My virtue is that I say what I think, my vice that what I think doesn't amount to much.

Monday, July 22, 2019

Normal People

I read Normal People because I'd heard positive things about it from critics and friends and it was longlisted for the 2018 Booker. The book tells the story of the on again/off again relationship of Marianne and Connell, two young people who meet in school in a small Irish town. Connell's single mother is the housekeeper for Marianne's well-to-do family. When they first get together Connell is a footballer who is popular with his schoolmates while Marianne is a social outcast. At Connell's behest they keep their relationship secret. When they both go off to Trinity College in Dublin their roles are reversed and Marianne is the one who is socially accepted while Connell feels like an outsider because of his poorer financial circumstances. Neither of the pair are able to articulate their feelings to one another and, over the course of their relationship, they break up several times because of miscommunication.I wanted to like this book but in the end was disappointed. The peripheral characters were, with the exception of Jamie, one-dimensional and the angst and self-absorption of first love holds little interest for me at my stage in life. I can see that it would appeal to a younger readership though.

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