Normal People Book Review

“Marianne had the sense that her real life was happening somewhere very far away, happening without her, and she didn't know if she would ever find out where it was or become part of it.”

This, although it may be an unpopular opinion, may very well be my favourite book of the year. It's only April, and I read this in January, so time will tell. But it was a very enjoyable book indeed. I sped through it in a few days. I devoured it.

It is, in truth, a horrid depiction of turbulent male and female relationships, but a very real depiction at that. The story of Marianne and Connell starts off when they're in their teens, still in high school in the small town where they live, and where their friendship/relationship starts. The rest of the novel continues from there, through their university years, in which a person naturally changes and evolves so much. It considers notions of class, loyalty, intelligence, prejudice, and crossing the boundaries that each of those tropes present.

There were so many moments while I was reading where I would clutch the book to my chest and exhale, "THIS BOOK". Not many books make you do that, but isn't it wonderfully satisfying when they do? That being said, I will admit to having been rather disappointed by the very open ended ending to the novel, it fizzled out a bit in a rather anticlimactic way.

I felt Rooney's development of these characters to be very real, and her depiction of how broken they are becomes more heart wrenching as the novel progresses, but Marianne and Connell always somehow return to each other. It also presents the question (a la When Harry Met Sally style) of whether men and women can actually be friends without sex getting in the way (my personal opinion is yes but I know not everyone feels the same).

The novel is quite psychological, as we can interpret Marianne's allowing of men to treat her abysmally as her equation to love, since her own father beat her and her mother. When her father died, she lacked a strong male figure in her life, and this results in her approach to relationships. This breaks my heart, because every time you think you're going to check in with her and find she's doing better, she's taken another step in the wrong direction. Connell remains, throughout the novel, the only boy who is ever sweet to her, even if they really can't communicate properly sometimes. Unfortunately he has set himself up as someone with very low expectations of himself, and we experience the same heartache when we check in with him and find he's also not doing any better. He feels a very deep sadness.

The way the novel gives you snippets of their lives every few months reminded me a lot of One Day, which I had really enjoyed reading (also the movie is such a good adaptation!), and so perhaps that's also why I really enjoyed the structure of the novel.

I don't want to spoil anything for anyone, but I will conclude by saying that I do really recommend trying this book. It's incredibly readable and it may in some ways, be an attempt to re-define what we consider to be the 'romance novel'. I do not find it romantic at all, but it is defining what the modern day 'romantic' relationship may be like.