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| Hardcover edition |
Alice, a novelist, meets Felix, who works in a warehouse, and asks him if he'd like to travel to Rome with her. In Dublin, her best friend Eileen is getting over a break-up and slips back into flirting with Simon, a man she has known since childhood.
Alice, Felix, Eileen and Simon are still young - but life is catching up with them. They desire each other, they delude each other, they worry about sex and friendship and the times they live in. Will they find a way to believe in a beautiful world?
I realized that people will either dislike or really like this book when I looked at the ratings on Goodreads. Lately, I avoid checking a book’s rating and reviews until I’m already halfway through it. I just want to read a book objectively.
Let me start by saying that I dislike all four protagonists in this book. Their personalities belong to different quadrants—obnoxious, rude, pessimistic, and martyr-like. It is tiresome to follow characters with such traits, and each one of them embodies a different part of those four qualities. But wait up!
The story opens with a very descriptive introduction of Alice, a famous writer who decides to retreat to a large and beautiful house overlooking the sea in a small town near Balina, Ireland. One day, she visits the town to meet her Tinder date, Felix, in a hotel bar. Their conversation is awkward and cold. They quickly realize they have very different personalities. But Felix doesn’t want to be too rude by leaving her mid-date, so he endures the uncomfortable situation.
The next chapter follows a woman with an office job who decides to take a lunch break and meet her long-time best friend—tall, handsome, and funny Simon. Eileen and Simon clearly have electric chemistry, exchanging flirtatious remarks here and there, only to realize Simon is already seeing someone else.
Then comes a chapter where the two girls, Alice and Eileen, exchange emails—very, very long ones—about their views on various topics. From politics, the Bronze Age, beauty, capitalism, the collapse of civilization, having a baby, and most importantly their concept of happiness (so many topics that I frequently skipped), along with snippets of what’s going on in their lives.
They were best friends during their college days, living as roommates. Alice, who is socially awkward and different, feels lucky to have such a beautiful, smart, and well-liked friend like Eileen. Eileen is more outgoing than Alice, but deep down she struggles with inferiority and pessimism. It eventually affects her career choices because she doesn’t believe in herself—partly due to her mother and older sister who constantly criticize her.
Though their first date doesn’t go well, Alice and Felix accidentally meet again at a local shop. Feeling pity for Alice’s loneliness yet secretly fed up with her obnoxiousness, Felix befriends her and introduces her to his circle of friends.
Felix is a warehouse worker who despises his job. He is rude, cold, and extremely defensive. Many times, he is intentionally rude to Alice just to feel better about himself. And Alice seems prepared—almost convinced she deserves to be treated that way. It is truly a toxic relationship.
And then there is Simon, the handsome one (the author mentions it many times), a protective figure who is emotionally unavailable. He is so kind that he almost borders on self-sacrificing. Both Simon and Eileen are in love with each other, but they always find ways to avoid acknowledging their feelings.
The book progresses in that pattern: Alice’s life, Eileen’s daily routines, and their long email exchanges right up until the end.
My complaint is: why does the author choose not to use dialogue quotation marks in this book? Seriously, it’s exhausting because the conversations go on for so long—one page might contain only three long paragraphs. I have to hyperfocus just to keep track of who is speaking, and then the next chapter throws another long email about heavy topics. I ended up skimming quite a lot.
Other than that, it is Sally Rooney’s expertise (and many British authors) to create deep, clever conversations across a 300+ page novel. The characters are also imperfect, unlike those in typical romance books, and yet still not very lovable. The process of healing and searching for happiness for each character is quite plausible.
But I am a bit doubtful about the ending, specifically when Felix suddenly becomes the mediator who fixes everyone’s relationships. I don’t see his character as that type. Maybe it’s because I really despise Felix and expected him to be more of a gold-digger. Ha ha.
Anyway, it is a good read that reminds me a lot of my best friends. We all have that one or two friends whom we barely see after college or school life, but we continue to have deep and meaningful conversations whenever we do reconnect. I think Alice’s idea of a secluded life comes from the isolation during the COVID era.
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