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Birding
In a small seaside town, autumn is edging into winter, gulls ride winds over the waves, and two women, pass each other on the promenade, as yet unaware of each other's existence.
In the nineties Lydia was a teen pop star, posed half naked on billboards everywhere with a lollipop between her lips and no idea how to live, letting the world happen to her. Now, three decades later, Lydia is less and less sure that what happened to her was in the least bit okay. The news cycle runs hot with #MeToo stories, and a famous former lover has emerged with a self-serving apology, asking her to forgive him. Suddenly, the past is full of trapdoors she is desperately trying not to fall through.
Joyce, in middle age, has never left home. She still lives with her mother Betty. With their matching dresses, identical hairdos and makeup, they are the local oddballs. Theirs is a life of unerring routine: the shops, biscuits served on bone china plates, dressing up for a gin and tonic on Saturday. Nice things. One misstep from Joyce can ruin Betty's day; so Joyce treads carefully. She has never let herself think about a different kind of life. But recently, along with the hot flushes, something like anger is asserting itself, like a caged thing realising it should probably try and escape.
Amid the grey skies, amusement parks and beauty parlours of a gentrifying run-down seaside resort, these two women might never meet. But as they both try to untangle the damaging details of their past in the hope of a better future, their lives are set on an unlikely collision course.
With mordant wit and lyrical prose, Birding asks if we can ever see ourselves clearly or if we are always the unreliable narrators of our own experiences. It is a story about the difference between responsibility and obligation, unhealthy relationships and abusive ones, third acts and last chances, and two women trying to take flight on clipped wings.
In the nineties Lydia was a teen pop star, posed half naked on billboards everywhere with a lollipop between her lips and no idea how to live, letting the world happen to her. Now, three decades later, Lydia is less and less sure that what happened to her was in the least bit okay. The news cycle runs hot with #MeToo stories, and a famous former lover has emerged with a self-serving apology, asking her to forgive him. Suddenly, the past is full of trapdoors she is desperately trying not to fall through.
Joyce, in middle age, has never left home. She still lives with her mother Betty. With their matching dresses, identical hairdos and makeup, they are the local oddballs. Theirs is a life of unerring routine: the shops, biscuits served on bone china plates, dressing up for a gin and tonic on Saturday. Nice things. One misstep from Joyce can ruin Betty's day; so Joyce treads carefully. She has never let herself think about a different kind of life. But recently, along with the hot flushes, something like anger is asserting itself, like a caged thing realising it should probably try and escape.
Amid the grey skies, amusement parks and beauty parlours of a gentrifying run-down seaside resort, these two women might never meet. But as they both try to untangle the damaging details of their past in the hope of a better future, their lives are set on an unlikely collision course.
With mordant wit and lyrical prose, Birding asks if we can ever see ourselves clearly or if we are always the unreliable narrators of our own experiences. It is a story about the difference between responsibility and obligation, unhealthy relationships and abusive ones, third acts and last chances, and two women trying to take flight on clipped wings.
271 pages, Paperback
First published May 2, 2024
144 people are currently reading
3823 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 188 reviews
April 10, 2024
I think I'd like to read this book again straight away (and I would if I hadn't got tons of other things to read). I was feeling a bit let down by this book until the last quarter and then I realised I'd been reading it all wrong. It's not the first time I've had preconceptions and missed the whole point of a book. It probably won't be the last.
So the book follows two women - Joyce who is headed for an entire lifetime of subjugation under her mother's suffocating presence; and Lydia who is struggling to find her place in the world after a failed career in a band and a less than stellar job as a freelancer.
Joyce wants more out of life than existing in a pokey flat with her mother and Lydia, newly reunited with her best friend, Pan, and Pan's daughter, Lol, is trying to understand why the man who abused her gets to say sorry and walk away.
Two women whose unsatisfying lives intersect for one stunning moment. But what will come next?
As I said I read this book all wrong. I should have luxuriated in the slow build up of pressure instead of wondering when that one moment would arrive. Hence I'd like to read it again and soon. Rose Ruane writes characters very well and she captures the pathos and ennui of the situation and town very clearly.
There are difficult subjects to navigate but nothing feels sensational or overdone. Both women are clearly in need of some love and care and I felt sympathy for Joyce and Lydia but also for all the other characters whose lives weren't all they wanted them to be but were still hopeful.
Highly recommended. A gentle but effective novel.
Thankyou to Netgalley and Little, Brown for the advance review copy.
So the book follows two women - Joyce who is headed for an entire lifetime of subjugation under her mother's suffocating presence; and Lydia who is struggling to find her place in the world after a failed career in a band and a less than stellar job as a freelancer.
Joyce wants more out of life than existing in a pokey flat with her mother and Lydia, newly reunited with her best friend, Pan, and Pan's daughter, Lol, is trying to understand why the man who abused her gets to say sorry and walk away.
Two women whose unsatisfying lives intersect for one stunning moment. But what will come next?
As I said I read this book all wrong. I should have luxuriated in the slow build up of pressure instead of wondering when that one moment would arrive. Hence I'd like to read it again and soon. Rose Ruane writes characters very well and she captures the pathos and ennui of the situation and town very clearly.
There are difficult subjects to navigate but nothing feels sensational or overdone. Both women are clearly in need of some love and care and I felt sympathy for Joyce and Lydia but also for all the other characters whose lives weren't all they wanted them to be but were still hopeful.
Highly recommended. A gentle but effective novel.
Thankyou to Netgalley and Little, Brown for the advance review copy.
April 18, 2024
Sometimes while reading a book, I like to tab phrases or passages that I really love or that resonate. Most of the time this is a couple of tabs per book but my copy of Birding is almost more tab than book!
I read this with a sense of wonder constantly marvelling at the stunning writing. Rose Ruane is basically a word magician. The way she can conjure characters, emotions, scenes fully realised and vivid in your mind is nothing short of incredible.
Two women who have had very different lives find themselves for very different reasons similarly trapped in a crumbling seaside town. Lydia was a 90s pop star now looking back on her experiences through a new lens and Joyce, now in her 40s, has lived with her mother and under her thumb, her whole life.
The relationships in this book are complex and multilayered. The nuances of the situations and different types of abuse experienced by several of the characters are sensitively but honestly laid bare. It’s an often heartbreaking but also hopeful.
Fantastic set of characters all relatable in their own way. Special shout out to Lol who I absolutely loved. Just wanted to give them a giant hug!
Poetically insightful, profound and so wise. So many feelings and situations in this book that I recognised and I found myself almost constantly nodding along muttering ‘yup’
It’s also threaded through with some brilliant moments of humour and empathy.
Birding is a book about what we steal from other people, about the power of noticing the beauty in the everyday and ultimately it’s a story of recognising yourself giving yourself permission to be
Hot contender for my Book of the Year.
Oh and shout out to the brilliant cover design too!
Hugely grateful to Corsair for my proof copy in exchange for an honest review
I read this with a sense of wonder constantly marvelling at the stunning writing. Rose Ruane is basically a word magician. The way she can conjure characters, emotions, scenes fully realised and vivid in your mind is nothing short of incredible.
Two women who have had very different lives find themselves for very different reasons similarly trapped in a crumbling seaside town. Lydia was a 90s pop star now looking back on her experiences through a new lens and Joyce, now in her 40s, has lived with her mother and under her thumb, her whole life.
The relationships in this book are complex and multilayered. The nuances of the situations and different types of abuse experienced by several of the characters are sensitively but honestly laid bare. It’s an often heartbreaking but also hopeful.
Fantastic set of characters all relatable in their own way. Special shout out to Lol who I absolutely loved. Just wanted to give them a giant hug!
Poetically insightful, profound and so wise. So many feelings and situations in this book that I recognised and I found myself almost constantly nodding along muttering ‘yup’
It’s also threaded through with some brilliant moments of humour and empathy.
Birding is a book about what we steal from other people, about the power of noticing the beauty in the everyday and ultimately it’s a story of recognising yourself giving yourself permission to be
Hot contender for my Book of the Year.
Oh and shout out to the brilliant cover design too!
Hugely grateful to Corsair for my proof copy in exchange for an honest review
July 31, 2025
Touching, funny, thoughtful and very well crafted. I liked this a lot.
June 29, 2024
(2.5) this was really two disparate narratives which are presented as if they are symbiotic and as if there is going to be a “collision of worlds”, but i’m reminded of susannah dickey’s common decency in that they are probably not, and “collision” is an overstatement (dickey navigates this more deftly though i feel). the joyce half of the book was really quite strong, very interesting and far more subtle in how it explored the particularities of both loving and resenting someone who abuses you, as well as the very specific british brand of fascism that dresses itself up in manners and niceties but is really very vicious and worms its way into even the domestic sphere (or should that be: starts in the domestic sphere and worms its way outwards?). a little more could’ve been made of this but i’m not complaining!
it is a shame that the same cannot be said for lydia’s half. it was so filled with annoyingly self-aware millennial therapy speak, written as if the narrator was trying to bash us over the head with didacticism, and empty platitudes dressed up as profundity that i had to grit my teeth through a lot of it. lydia effectively comes to a conclusion of “not all men ❤️ suddenly i’ve realised everyone who isn’t me has a rich inner life and we can all harm and be harmed ❤️ who knows if my version of events (being deeply harmed through sexual abuse) is objectively correct but if i shout at the person who abused me it reverses the power dynamic and i’m actually the terrible person ❤️” and it would have been fine, i guess, if it didn’t drag on tediously over the last 30-50 pages of navel-gazing and wasn’t presented as a universal truism that allows all abused women to let go of their angst, cruising dangerously close to the kind of overly simplistic abuse apologia that disingenuously wraps itself up in the language of women having agency, but ultimately makes women doubt the legitimacy of their experiences of being harmed by people with power over them and shoves them back into a state of silence that allows trauma to flourish. but it did, and it was, and it sent (i feel) quite a dangerous message about the healing power of anger and justice. in this way the last third of the book was so bungled and confused that it was actually enough (along with some of the mixed metaphors that made very little sense and seemed only to exist to make the narration sound more florid) for me to drop it by at least half if not one star.
i can’t be too harsh though, as i really tore through this in about two days. i just wish both halves had been equally compelling
it is a shame that the same cannot be said for lydia’s half. it was so filled with annoyingly self-aware millennial therapy speak, written as if the narrator was trying to bash us over the head with didacticism, and empty platitudes dressed up as profundity that i had to grit my teeth through a lot of it. lydia effectively comes to a conclusion of “not all men ❤️ suddenly i’ve realised everyone who isn’t me has a rich inner life and we can all harm and be harmed ❤️ who knows if my version of events (being deeply harmed through sexual abuse) is objectively correct but if i shout at the person who abused me it reverses the power dynamic and i’m actually the terrible person ❤️” and it would have been fine, i guess, if it didn’t drag on tediously over the last 30-50 pages of navel-gazing and wasn’t presented as a universal truism that allows all abused women to let go of their angst, cruising dangerously close to the kind of overly simplistic abuse apologia that disingenuously wraps itself up in the language of women having agency, but ultimately makes women doubt the legitimacy of their experiences of being harmed by people with power over them and shoves them back into a state of silence that allows trauma to flourish. but it did, and it was, and it sent (i feel) quite a dangerous message about the healing power of anger and justice. in this way the last third of the book was so bungled and confused that it was actually enough (along with some of the mixed metaphors that made very little sense and seemed only to exist to make the narration sound more florid) for me to drop it by at least half if not one star.
i can’t be too harsh though, as i really tore through this in about two days. i just wish both halves had been equally compelling
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 10, 2025
’There is exactly the right amount of me in the world, and I’ll conceal or reveal as much of it as I choose to’.
May 11, 2025
Not every sentence needs a simile or metaphor.
March 22, 2025
Lydia, in her late forties is contacted by Henry to inform her he will put on a play that recounts a part of their history that ought to have negated their continued contact. Lydia is stunned, haunted and full of regret.
Joyce, of similar age, lives with her super controlling, critical mother Betty in a small house a few blocks back from the sea, after their comedown, the departure of Joyce's father without a word of explanation or contact since she was a child. Joyce has never joined adulthood, her mother keeping her in a kind of stasis, until one Saturday evening when they prepare to go to the club, Betty utters that maybe they might meet a man, both of them, mother and daughter.
Birding navigates a short period of time in 2019 in these two women's lives as they live with who they have become and reflect on significant aspects of the past that shaped them.
Both have a desire to step outside of their patterns and in some small way the shift begins to happen, as their current minor transgressions exhibit a healthier rebellion and acknowledgement of what inside them, needs to find expression.
Joyce, of similar age, lives with her super controlling, critical mother Betty in a small house a few blocks back from the sea, after their comedown, the departure of Joyce's father without a word of explanation or contact since she was a child. Joyce has never joined adulthood, her mother keeping her in a kind of stasis, until one Saturday evening when they prepare to go to the club, Betty utters that maybe they might meet a man, both of them, mother and daughter.
Birding navigates a short period of time in 2019 in these two women's lives as they live with who they have become and reflect on significant aspects of the past that shaped them.
Both have a desire to step outside of their patterns and in some small way the shift begins to happen, as their current minor transgressions exhibit a healthier rebellion and acknowledgement of what inside them, needs to find expression.
March 25, 2025
This one wasn’t really for me. It was a bleak book about abuse on many different fronts using many different fonts and none of it made me feel anything new, nor touched anything old in a necessary way. Not sure how it made the WP2025 longlist.
September 4, 2024
In the 90s, Lydia was once a pop star. Now she’s not quite sure what she is. But when she finds herself homeless she tracks down her old friend Pan, who lives in a decaying seaside town & temporarily moves in with her.
In that same seaside town lives Joyce. She’s a middle aged spinster, still stuck at home in a one bedroom flat, with her ageing mother Betty. Their relationship is somewhat unique; they wear identical clothes and hairstyles, they even kickstart their Saturday night down the club with matching G&T’s. Some might be forgiven for thinking they were sisters.
Joyce and Lydia don’t know one another. But they both have dreams of a better life. And as the waves relentlessly smash against the once esteemed, now neglected pier and the amusement arcades shriek as loudly as the seagulls, these two women cross paths without even knowing, both lost in their own worlds of whys and what ifs.
My oh my, what an astonishingly well written and evocative book this is. It’s the kind of book that almost needs to be read aloud, such is the magnificence of its words. Rose Ruane takes you right there, to this run down town, with its residents and residences all slowly rotting. I loved Joyce and Betty, I was both hypnotised and repelled by them and their little claustrophobic house. The detailing was so evocative and vivid that I felt like I was right there sitting in their living room eating a viscount biscuit with them. (Just the one of course, any more would be sheer piggery.)
Birding is an incredibly well written and observational book. It will have you wincing and smiling and laughing and nodding at its accurate depiction of life. Very immersive and very authentic. Grab your stick of rock and jump in!
In that same seaside town lives Joyce. She’s a middle aged spinster, still stuck at home in a one bedroom flat, with her ageing mother Betty. Their relationship is somewhat unique; they wear identical clothes and hairstyles, they even kickstart their Saturday night down the club with matching G&T’s. Some might be forgiven for thinking they were sisters.
Joyce and Lydia don’t know one another. But they both have dreams of a better life. And as the waves relentlessly smash against the once esteemed, now neglected pier and the amusement arcades shriek as loudly as the seagulls, these two women cross paths without even knowing, both lost in their own worlds of whys and what ifs.
My oh my, what an astonishingly well written and evocative book this is. It’s the kind of book that almost needs to be read aloud, such is the magnificence of its words. Rose Ruane takes you right there, to this run down town, with its residents and residences all slowly rotting. I loved Joyce and Betty, I was both hypnotised and repelled by them and their little claustrophobic house. The detailing was so evocative and vivid that I felt like I was right there sitting in their living room eating a viscount biscuit with them. (Just the one of course, any more would be sheer piggery.)
Birding is an incredibly well written and observational book. It will have you wincing and smiling and laughing and nodding at its accurate depiction of life. Very immersive and very authentic. Grab your stick of rock and jump in!
April 4, 2024
Birding is so superbly written with humour that is wickedly dark at times but with a raw and honest edge that probes around very bleak topics with the disbelief and almost bonhomie of characters losing their grip on what is going on for them.
Although both Lydia and Joyce live in the same, rundown, depressing seaside town they don't really meet, but both of them have lives that are troubling and this book follows events that bring revelations and life-altering realisations.
At times this is really quite harrowing to read as you bear witness to abuse, manipulation and conflict that is wincingly painful but you see things from various perspectives, and the insight always awards glimmers of home, of change and transformation.
I don't think I've read a book so compellingly accurate about complex and codependent mother -daughter relationships as this one, and the very difficult balance of being in a caring role and trying to also parent through trauma. It is a fantastic book.
Although both Lydia and Joyce live in the same, rundown, depressing seaside town they don't really meet, but both of them have lives that are troubling and this book follows events that bring revelations and life-altering realisations.
At times this is really quite harrowing to read as you bear witness to abuse, manipulation and conflict that is wincingly painful but you see things from various perspectives, and the insight always awards glimmers of home, of change and transformation.
I don't think I've read a book so compellingly accurate about complex and codependent mother -daughter relationships as this one, and the very difficult balance of being in a caring role and trying to also parent through trauma. It is a fantastic book.
May 18, 2024
This is a gorgeous, glamorous and weird book about gorgeous, glamorous and weird girls and their almost second coming of age that's happening to each of them in their middle ages.
I found that each relationship and character in this book was handled with so much love and care, no matter if that was a positive or negative relationship or a "good" or "bad" person. The characters in this book are so complex and real feeling. No character can be written off as all good or all bad, despite what you may go into it thinking and feeling in the earlier pages. It was so easy to love some of these people, and so easy to want to reach through the page to give them a hug at points.
This book really shows the underbelly of the seaside town and the goings on inside somewhere once considered very regal and glamorous. As someone who grew up in seaside towns it definitely rang true and felt extremely authentic.
The queer undertones and commentary on queerbaiting leading into self discovery was so interesting, and I love a middle aged queer realisation more than anything. Knowing you still have so much life to live and you can now live it in the most authentic way is so hopeful
It also touches on the Me Too movement in a really gentle - but direct - way and talks about responsibility, acceptance and letting go. I personally found it so validating and even helpful for my own journey.
I found that each relationship and character in this book was handled with so much love and care, no matter if that was a positive or negative relationship or a "good" or "bad" person. The characters in this book are so complex and real feeling. No character can be written off as all good or all bad, despite what you may go into it thinking and feeling in the earlier pages. It was so easy to love some of these people, and so easy to want to reach through the page to give them a hug at points.
This book really shows the underbelly of the seaside town and the goings on inside somewhere once considered very regal and glamorous. As someone who grew up in seaside towns it definitely rang true and felt extremely authentic.
The queer undertones and commentary on queerbaiting leading into self discovery was so interesting, and I love a middle aged queer realisation more than anything. Knowing you still have so much life to live and you can now live it in the most authentic way is so hopeful
It also touches on the Me Too movement in a really gentle - but direct - way and talks about responsibility, acceptance and letting go. I personally found it so validating and even helpful for my own journey.
July 28, 2024
The only good thing about this book is the cover, which I think is stunning and the synopsis that really gives you the vibes you want in the book, but the story itself is nothing like that.
I usually don’t give one star to a book where I read every page of it, but in this case I did, which just shows that I really want to get something from the book, but it didn’t deliver. It was very messy creative wise, there were some good ideas about characters, but everything else, such as the plot, the storyline and the writing style, were just off for me.
I usually don’t give one star to a book where I read every page of it, but in this case I did, which just shows that I really want to get something from the book, but it didn’t deliver. It was very messy creative wise, there were some good ideas about characters, but everything else, such as the plot, the storyline and the writing style, were just off for me.
March 5, 2025
I don't normally go for messed up woman having a crisis tropes, but this was so well-written it really pulled me in.
This book had a lot to say about exploitation, being seen, acceptance and authenticity. I felt these issues were addressed sensitively and with nuance.
This novel really shone through Ruane's prose. Her inventiveness for metaphor, imagery and word choice were constantly entertaining and surprising. The dying seaside town setting was so vivid and evocative.
This was a tad overwritten, but I don't think you can knock the author's enthusiasm for writing a bloody good book. Off to a great start with the Women's Prize for Fiction 2025 Longlist with this book I would probably have never otherwise discovered.
This book had a lot to say about exploitation, being seen, acceptance and authenticity. I felt these issues were addressed sensitively and with nuance.
This novel really shone through Ruane's prose. Her inventiveness for metaphor, imagery and word choice were constantly entertaining and surprising. The dying seaside town setting was so vivid and evocative.
This was a tad overwritten, but I don't think you can knock the author's enthusiasm for writing a bloody good book. Off to a great start with the Women's Prize for Fiction 2025 Longlist with this book I would probably have never otherwise discovered.
April 12, 2025
ne desem eksik kalır. çok beğendim. on üç sene evvel yazılmış olsa üzerine tez yazmak isterdim. fakat şimdi de zihnimde bir şeyler karaladım. kadın olmanın her hâlini romanına aktarmış Rose Ruane. özenli ve farklı bir dili var. neredeyse şiirsel - bir o kadar da güncel. pandemi döneminde yazılmış olmasına rağmen günümüz aurasını da kapsayan bir anlatımı var. kitsch bir eser demek yanlış olmaz, tam da yaratıcısı 'the artist' Ruane gibi. trans hâlinde yazmış olabilir diye düşündüm okurken, bilhassa Joyce ve Betty'nin bölümlerini. sanki ikisi de hem bu dünyadan hem de değil gibi. hem cringe, hem de gerçek. dört duvar arasında yaşananlar, küçük bir kasabada olanlar bize çok uzak fakat aynı anda burnumuzun dibinde oluyor gibi. Lydia'nın bölümleri ise dili boyayan lolipop yalamak gibiydi, acımtrak, meyan köklü, eskimiş. tahakkümperver insanlardan kurtulduktan sonra ruhun özgürlüğüne paha biçilmez. The Lolly Lydia is a free soul now. Thank dog! - çok özel bir roman, kalbimde çok hususi bir yer teşkil edecek bundan böyle. 4.5/5
April 26, 2024
It’s the way this book is so TTPD coded omg. It goes in depth into both Lydia’s and Joyce’s loneliness and lack of meaning to their lives. At its core, this is a coming-of-age story of two middle aged women who are simply lost in their lives, trying to find who they are without the influence of others, and I ate it up. I think it was the perfect length and anything longer would’ve just dragged. I did expect something a little crazier for the climax (murder), especially considering how slow the rest of the book was, building up all until the end. You could truly feel the atmosphere of this small town, it was just SO clear in my head how the wind felt, what the buildings looked like, etc. Nothing happened and yet I was fascinated and couldn’t stop myself from reading it. 4.25⭐️
Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.
Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.
May 15, 2025
4.5 🌟
A strong character portrait / study of two middle aged women whose lives didn't turn out as they had hoped, both because of external oppressive forces and because of their own passivity in the face of those forces. I personally love a metaphor and simile so the fact that there were a lot of them made me happy as a reader; and it felt fitting that these women needed to think metaphorically about the state of their lives and the possibilities for different outcomes in order to escape the claustrophobic reality of their literal existence. This was a delightful surprise! Such wit thread throughout.
A strong character portrait / study of two middle aged women whose lives didn't turn out as they had hoped, both because of external oppressive forces and because of their own passivity in the face of those forces. I personally love a metaphor and simile so the fact that there were a lot of them made me happy as a reader; and it felt fitting that these women needed to think metaphorically about the state of their lives and the possibilities for different outcomes in order to escape the claustrophobic reality of their literal existence. This was a delightful surprise! Such wit thread throughout.
Read
December 15, 2025Longlisted for the 2025 Women’s Prize in Fiction
'You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.'
—ANTOINE DE SAINT-EXUPÉRY, The Little Prince
four stars & THAT COVER DESIGN THO gets all the stars & heart eyes!!
2025 Women’s Prize—Fiction
1. All Fours, Miranda July
* The Artist, Lucy Steeds
2. The Safekeep, Yael van der Woulden [WINNER]
* Nesting, Roisin O’Donnell
* Birding, Rose Ruane
3. Tell Me Everything, Elizabeth Strout
* Crooked Seeds, Karen Jennings
4. Good Girl, Aria Aber
* The Dream Hotel, Laila Lalami
5. Fundamentally, Nussaibah Younis
6. The Persians, Sanam Mahloudji
* The Ministry of Time, Kaliane Bradley
[12/12 read!]
'You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.'
—ANTOINE DE SAINT-EXUPÉRY, The Little Prince
four stars & THAT COVER DESIGN THO gets all the stars & heart eyes!!
2025 Women’s Prize—Fiction
1. All Fours, Miranda July
* The Artist, Lucy Steeds
2. The Safekeep, Yael van der Woulden [WINNER]
* Nesting, Roisin O’Donnell
* Birding, Rose Ruane
3. Tell Me Everything, Elizabeth Strout
* Crooked Seeds, Karen Jennings
4. Good Girl, Aria Aber
* The Dream Hotel, Laila Lalami
5. Fundamentally, Nussaibah Younis
6. The Persians, Sanam Mahloudji
* The Ministry of Time, Kaliane Bradley
[12/12 read!]
June 1, 2024
Enjoyed Joyce's chapters lots more than the Lydia chapters but still enjoyed it. Some really lovely descriptive writing too
Want to read
March 22, 2025Long-Listed for 2025 Women’s Prize for Fiction. 🎉 Have Not heard of this before, but sounds interesting.
May 18, 2025
this book was an idea, not a story. a good idea, maybe. an important idea, definitely. but ultimately just an idea.
July 12, 2025
3,5 stars rounding up
The half-star and the rounding up are for something at the very end which isn’t a spoiler per se, but I’ll still mark it as such:
Mentioning the year in which this is set at the very end of the story is a stroke of genius that genuinely took my breath away. It was such a game changer for how we left one of our main characters.
This is a book I enjoyed parts of and did not have the most fun time with as a reading experience, but I imagine it’ll stay with me. Especially because of that ending.
The half-star and the rounding up are for something at the very end which isn’t a spoiler per se, but I’ll still mark it as such:
Mentioning the year in which this is set at the very end of the story is a stroke of genius that genuinely took my breath away. It was such a game changer for how we left one of our main characters.
This is a book I enjoyed parts of and did not have the most fun time with as a reading experience, but I imagine it’ll stay with me. Especially because of that ending.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 3, 2025
Well-written, not too long. Full of social commentary, maybe a bit too full, that's why I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would.
December 14, 2025
Fan fan fan
April 24, 2025
This book will appeal to a very specific type of woman, who grew up in a working-class (possibly Northern?) English town, who left for something new/different, much to the chagrin of some of those she left behind. Basically me.
Or anyone who has an overbearing mother.
Or anyone who has experienced sexism, or abuse.
I rarely underline things in books, but in pretty much every chapter there was a sentence that struck a chord with me.
I don't have the energy for a full review, but I loved this book. You should read it.
Or anyone who has an overbearing mother.
Or anyone who has experienced sexism, or abuse.
I rarely underline things in books, but in pretty much every chapter there was a sentence that struck a chord with me.
I don't have the energy for a full review, but I loved this book. You should read it.
July 29, 2025
In a seaside town that they forgot to close down, two very different women try to deal with multi-layered levels of abuse both historic and current. Sounds bleak, but beautifully poetic, and ultimately hopeful.
March 12, 2025
3.5
A solid read and I will definitely look out for this author in the future.
A solid read and I will definitely look out for this author in the future.
April 18, 2025
I was very conflicted about this book, which is at least a 3.5. First, the writing was gorgeous. It's lush and rather overdone feeling, and that usually annoys me, but then you realize that Ruane is actually layering her words into a great sense of place and atmosphere, with little punches of meaning. It's not just curlicues. Second, it's propulsive. Not much happens, but its rather unputdownable. I couldn't wait to get back to it each evening, staying up too late to finish it last night. Third, both the main characters, stuck in their mid 40s without the lives they might have wanted, are intriguing - Lydia is an ex member of a very briefly famous girl band, struggling with the residue of a lifetime's worth of MeToo moments with men in her professional and personal life, and Joyce is a gothic character from a Bette Davis movie, trapped in a terrifyingly twee tiny apartment with her all controlling mother who dresses them alike in the fashions of yesteryear. Where is this going? The blurb copy promises a fateful encounter between these two women in the vividly depicted crumbling seaside resort that is the book's setting.
Well, all that promise isn't quite realized. Lydia spins through a self-help book's worth of supposedly feminist cliches about agency, forgiveness, self-actualization, internalization and externalization of harm, all of them a bit tired, and many of them contradictory. The word "rape" is rather histrionically kept off stage, and we never learn, exactly, what happened in Lydia's worst relationship, why she remained involved with the guy for years, and why she seems determined to let him off scot-free, when the back drop to the book is the dominance of MeToo and the outing of abusers.
As for Joyce, she's more interesting, but at the end of the day, her story feels unfinished (the implausibility didn't bother me). There's no real encounter between the two women, and the supposedly seminal moment between them doesn't matter much, in the end.
So the whole ended up being less than the sum of the parts. And I shouldn't have read the acknowledgements, where the author castigates herself for a host of privileges, while managing to sound thoroughly whiny about the whole thing. It left a bad taste in my mouth, and the authorial intrusion actually made me like the book less than I had.
Well, all that promise isn't quite realized. Lydia spins through a self-help book's worth of supposedly feminist cliches about agency, forgiveness, self-actualization, internalization and externalization of harm, all of them a bit tired, and many of them contradictory. The word "rape" is rather histrionically kept off stage, and we never learn, exactly, what happened in Lydia's worst relationship, why she remained involved with the guy for years, and why she seems determined to let him off scot-free, when the back drop to the book is the dominance of MeToo and the outing of abusers.
As for Joyce, she's more interesting, but at the end of the day, her story feels unfinished (the implausibility didn't bother me). There's no real encounter between the two women, and the supposedly seminal moment between them doesn't matter much, in the end.
So the whole ended up being less than the sum of the parts. And I shouldn't have read the acknowledgements, where the author castigates herself for a host of privileges, while managing to sound thoroughly whiny about the whole thing. It left a bad taste in my mouth, and the authorial intrusion actually made me like the book less than I had.
June 5, 2025
I find this book quite difficult to review, I've just put it down and I feel conflicted.
On one hand, this story of the parallel lives of two women in a dreary UK seaside town had a lot of potential, I just don't think it quite hit the mark.
The writing, generally, is beautiful - the evocative descriptive prose brought the setting vividly to life. The gloomy, hopeless town by the sea wonderfully imagined with its windswept, battered shop fronts, delapidated faded glory - it all added to the sense of despair.
However, the main characters, Lydia and Joyce just didn't really work for me. Lydia seemed to spend the entire book agonising over things that are hinted to us, but never fully revealed, and after a while it gets a little frustrating. Joyce was entirely different, but utterly unrealistic. I didn't get a sense of her character at all unfortunately - from the writing I couldn't really tell if she was intelligent, simple, attractive, plain.... nothing.
The narrative style was articulate, but I couldn't really believe that either characters would think and feel in this way. There was a mis-match on the deep, thoughtful insights suggested by the author and the way the characters spoke and behaved. And for me, that was a deep flaw in this novel. I got the feeling we were living the story through the lens of someone else. The way Joyce was described to be thinking, it just didn't fit the simple girl who had been sheltered from adult life by her over-bearing mother. I just didn't think the narrative style felt aligned with the character's inner world, and it created distance instead of intimacy.
The chapter from Shandy's perspective completely threw me - someone enlighten me, what was the point of that?
Ultimately, the story fizzles into nothing and when I finished I felt rather unfulfilled. So, I think in the end 2 stars seems right.
On one hand, this story of the parallel lives of two women in a dreary UK seaside town had a lot of potential, I just don't think it quite hit the mark.
The writing, generally, is beautiful - the evocative descriptive prose brought the setting vividly to life. The gloomy, hopeless town by the sea wonderfully imagined with its windswept, battered shop fronts, delapidated faded glory - it all added to the sense of despair.
However, the main characters, Lydia and Joyce just didn't really work for me. Lydia seemed to spend the entire book agonising over things that are hinted to us, but never fully revealed, and after a while it gets a little frustrating. Joyce was entirely different, but utterly unrealistic. I didn't get a sense of her character at all unfortunately - from the writing I couldn't really tell if she was intelligent, simple, attractive, plain.... nothing.
The narrative style was articulate, but I couldn't really believe that either characters would think and feel in this way. There was a mis-match on the deep, thoughtful insights suggested by the author and the way the characters spoke and behaved. And for me, that was a deep flaw in this novel. I got the feeling we were living the story through the lens of someone else. The way Joyce was described to be thinking, it just didn't fit the simple girl who had been sheltered from adult life by her over-bearing mother. I just didn't think the narrative style felt aligned with the character's inner world, and it created distance instead of intimacy.
The chapter from Shandy's perspective completely threw me - someone enlighten me, what was the point of that?
Ultimately, the story fizzles into nothing and when I finished I felt rather unfulfilled. So, I think in the end 2 stars seems right.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Read
June 8, 2024DNF
Writing style isn’t for me
Writing style isn’t for me
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