Disclaimer😅-This is my first review here and English isn’t my native language so please be kind and don’t judge me that much.
Set in Ireland, it revolves around the lives of two best friends Alice and Eileen who ruminate about life and go through their relationships with their respective partners Felix and Simon. This is Sally Rooney’s third novel, published in 2021. I had earlier read Normal People by her and loved it pretty much. I enjoyed this one too,but not as much as Normal People. I liked this book, alot. Especially the emails where Eileen and Alice dread over their existential and identity crises and write quite philosophically to each other.
The juxtaposition of the intellectual, cerebral conversations between Eileen and Alice with the more mundane, ordinary routines and interactions between their love interests is quite striking. I think Rooney captures the loneliness and anxiety of late- 20 somethings very accurately. Towards the end I did feel the novel sort of losing its grip. I didn’t feel much for Alice and Felix’s relationship, except that it was sort of toxic-especially Felix’s character but interesting thing is, I actually liked how self aware he was even though he could be so callous at times.
Rooney really excels at fleshing out her characters’ flaws. I empathised with all of them but the least with Alice, she came across as way too self-absorbed by the end. I cared more about Simon and Eileen’s relationship because they just felt more organic I guess and genuinely yearning for one another.
All in all, Rooney excels at writing books that are super engaging and her writing style is quite appealing to me. Easy to get into and keep reading. I enjoyed reading this book but felt it lacked the depth Normal People had in terms of plot and characterisation. At the end there was just no conflict and it felt like everyone was fussing over nothing basically. Rating-3.75/5 stars for me.
by Notyourmermaid25