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The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky
Kirkus Reviews , "11 Debuts You Need to Pay Attention To"
HelloGiggles, "Books you don't want to miss"
Bustle, "Books you need to know"
An ambitious debut, at once timely and timeless, that captures the complexity and joys of modern womanhood. This novel is gem like—in its precision, its many facets, and its containing multitudes. Following in the footsteps of Virginia Woolf, Rona Jaffe, Maggie Shipstead, and Sheila Heti, Jana Casale writes with bold assurance about the female experience.
We first meet Leda in a coffee shop on an average afternoon, notable only for the fact that it’s the single occasion in her life when she will eat two scones in one day. And for the cute boy reading American Power and the New Mandarins . Leda hopes that, by engaging him, their banter will lead to romance. Their fleeting, awkward exchange stalls before flirtation blooms. But Leda’s left with one imperative she decides she wants to read Noam Chomsky. So she promptly buys a book and never—ever—reads it.
As the days, years, and decades of the rest of her life unfold, we see all of the things Leda does instead, from eating leftover spaghetti in her college apartment, to fumbling through the first days home with her newborn daughter, to attempting (and nearly failing) to garden in her old age. In a collage of these small moments, we see the work—both visible and invisible—of a woman trying to carve out a life of meaning. Over the course of her experiences Leda comes to the universal revelation that the best-laid-plans are not always the path to utter fulfillment and contentment, and in reality there might be no such thing. Lively and disarmingly honest, The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky is a remarkable literary feat—bracingly funny, sometimes heartbreaking, and truly feminist in its insistence that the story it tells is an essential one.
HelloGiggles, "Books you don't want to miss"
Bustle, "Books you need to know"
An ambitious debut, at once timely and timeless, that captures the complexity and joys of modern womanhood. This novel is gem like—in its precision, its many facets, and its containing multitudes. Following in the footsteps of Virginia Woolf, Rona Jaffe, Maggie Shipstead, and Sheila Heti, Jana Casale writes with bold assurance about the female experience.
We first meet Leda in a coffee shop on an average afternoon, notable only for the fact that it’s the single occasion in her life when she will eat two scones in one day. And for the cute boy reading American Power and the New Mandarins . Leda hopes that, by engaging him, their banter will lead to romance. Their fleeting, awkward exchange stalls before flirtation blooms. But Leda’s left with one imperative she decides she wants to read Noam Chomsky. So she promptly buys a book and never—ever—reads it.
As the days, years, and decades of the rest of her life unfold, we see all of the things Leda does instead, from eating leftover spaghetti in her college apartment, to fumbling through the first days home with her newborn daughter, to attempting (and nearly failing) to garden in her old age. In a collage of these small moments, we see the work—both visible and invisible—of a woman trying to carve out a life of meaning. Over the course of her experiences Leda comes to the universal revelation that the best-laid-plans are not always the path to utter fulfillment and contentment, and in reality there might be no such thing. Lively and disarmingly honest, The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky is a remarkable literary feat—bracingly funny, sometimes heartbreaking, and truly feminist in its insistence that the story it tells is an essential one.
368 pages, Paperback
First published April 17, 2018
125 people are currently reading
4789 people want to read
About the author
Jana Casale
2 books228 followersJANA CASALE has a BFA in fiction from Emerson College and an MSt in creative writing from Oxford. Originally from Lexington, Massachusetts, she currently resides in San Francisco with her husband. The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky is her first novel.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 310 reviews
November 22, 2019
I probably would have liked it more if the girl had just read some damn Chomsky
November 10, 2017
This book had an intriguing title but little else to offer. It was like being locked in a room with an entitled teenager who won't stop talking.
November 9, 2017
This is one of the most special and gorgeously understated books I've ever read. If you like Virginia Woolf, Rona Jaffe, or Anita Brookner, or Carol Shields "The Stone Diaries," you will love this book. Every woman I've given it to has been unable to put it down. Most have them have cried. And many have told me how important it was to them, for reasons they can't necessarily put into words. I've tried to, I told one friend that what I think makes this book so special is that it's so radically feminist because it's saying that just this one woman's life is enough. That's enough for a book to be worth reading.
Jana Casale is also extremely funny. Her one-liners are often on a par with Lorrie Moore and Katherine Heiny. You might love this book, you might hate it, but what I can assure is 1. you won't be able to stop reading it 2. it will haunt you 3. you will recognize yourself more wholly in these pages than you ever have in a piece of fiction. And, for some people, that might be uncomfortable. But if you are a reader who welcomes that kind of mirrored revelation, and who looks for sharp, stylish, well-hewn prose, then this book is for you.
Jana Casale is also extremely funny. Her one-liners are often on a par with Lorrie Moore and Katherine Heiny. You might love this book, you might hate it, but what I can assure is 1. you won't be able to stop reading it 2. it will haunt you 3. you will recognize yourself more wholly in these pages than you ever have in a piece of fiction. And, for some people, that might be uncomfortable. But if you are a reader who welcomes that kind of mirrored revelation, and who looks for sharp, stylish, well-hewn prose, then this book is for you.
March 25, 2018
They fill the offices in New York city publishing houses, twenty-somethings who majored in creative writing. They fill the acquisitions department with treacle that resonates with them, so sure that the rest of the reading world will also vibrate to the buzz of a twenty-something creative writing student facing so many taxing problems. Like if she's fat. If her submission to the prestigious literary rag will be accepted. If she should buy a bagel or a jelly doughnut.
We've been here before, haven't we, with THE LIGHT WE LOST.
And like that earlier incarnation, I have given up, but well before page 145.
"What do we have but yet another young New Yorker examining the lint in her navel and imagining that it is fascinating for us all" I said back then, and it's still true in THE GIRL WHO NEVER READ NOAM CHOMSKY. The problems are the same small, petty, insignificant dross. This novel is the bleating of an elitist who has not experienced life. It makes for a boring tale.
Again, the prose is lovely. And again, it's the fecking story. There isn't much there.
To repeat: "Sure there are those who enjoy a soap opera, or those who are twenty-something elitists in New York who believe their problems have deep relevance to the world. I am not one of them. This is not a book for me. Sorry, Penguin Random House. You gave me the book for a review, but I can't finish it. I wouldn't inflict this on anyone I know because they like good books with substance. If you're wondering why book sales are down, well, you can start here."
It still holds true for this particular presentation of elitist problems.
We've been here before, haven't we, with THE LIGHT WE LOST.
And like that earlier incarnation, I have given up, but well before page 145.
"What do we have but yet another young New Yorker examining the lint in her navel and imagining that it is fascinating for us all" I said back then, and it's still true in THE GIRL WHO NEVER READ NOAM CHOMSKY. The problems are the same small, petty, insignificant dross. This novel is the bleating of an elitist who has not experienced life. It makes for a boring tale.
Again, the prose is lovely. And again, it's the fecking story. There isn't much there.
To repeat: "Sure there are those who enjoy a soap opera, or those who are twenty-something elitists in New York who believe their problems have deep relevance to the world. I am not one of them. This is not a book for me. Sorry, Penguin Random House. You gave me the book for a review, but I can't finish it. I wouldn't inflict this on anyone I know because they like good books with substance. If you're wondering why book sales are down, well, you can start here."
It still holds true for this particular presentation of elitist problems.
February 2, 2018
So good and funny with some really beautiful moments. It's almost like if Katherine Heiny wrote The Stone Diaries.
October 12, 2017
You may be tempted to write this book off when you are a few chapters in. That would be a mistake. Once this book started to click for me, I could not put it down. The writing is smart, understated, and so damn charming. One of my top reads of 2017. Stick with it.
June 4, 2018
This is a dreadful book, the first one star review I've given on Goodreads as I don't review a book that I haven't completed. I had to read to the end to see if anything of note happened. It didn't.
I picked this up simply because of its title. I'm not even sure that the author, despite her constant literary name-dropping, understands who Chomsky is as, despite the 'not reading' being a recurrent theme, anyone's name could have been substituted.
A better title for this novel would have been 'A vacuous misanthrope does nothing except procreate and see her pointless life repeated in her daughter's'.
I struggle to believe that the author had any idea where she was going (something that seems to be confirmed by her protagonist's disavowal of planning a piece of writing). Early in the book her husband-to-be has her move across the country to work at Google right out of college (and not even in the Valley, in the City), while at the end he's in his sixties and then dies, and then the main character dies later. What year is that supposed to be? Where are the flying cars?
At points the writing is laughably bad. Witness:
"Elle hung on the word slut for so long it was like she was spelling it. The s, the l, the t all rang out over the phone as if semen were just pumping through her veins." (Pardon me?)
"Leda had planned on saying 'Hi, I'm Leda. I got my BFA in creative writing, but I've been busy raising my daughter and haven't had time to write as much as I'd like, so I'm here trying to get back into it.' When it was her turn she said: 'Hi, I'm Leda. I got my BFA in creative writing, but I've been busy raising my daughter and haven't had time to write as much as I'd like, so I'm here trying to get back into it.'" (Am I at 400 pages yet?)
"'But it's not real,' Annabelle said.
Leda remembered feeling similarly when she was a child [...] At the time she was terrified" (Did you really forget what you just wrote?)
And, for those who've suggesting that Casale's is a feminist voice:
"She'd wished she could [...] make her daughter date someone nice who was taller, so that she could see how great life could be."
Overall, continuing the feminist theme, the one positive decision the protagonist makes in her entire life is to tell her partner: "marry me, despite your doubts, and make me pregnant." Her entire self-image as a writer (unpublished) falls by the wayside as she instead attacks every other woman she meets right up to (seriously) the moment of her death.
I picked this up simply because of its title. I'm not even sure that the author, despite her constant literary name-dropping, understands who Chomsky is as, despite the 'not reading' being a recurrent theme, anyone's name could have been substituted.
A better title for this novel would have been 'A vacuous misanthrope does nothing except procreate and see her pointless life repeated in her daughter's'.
I struggle to believe that the author had any idea where she was going (something that seems to be confirmed by her protagonist's disavowal of planning a piece of writing). Early in the book her husband-to-be has her move across the country to work at Google right out of college (and not even in the Valley, in the City), while at the end he's in his sixties and then dies, and then the main character dies later. What year is that supposed to be? Where are the flying cars?
At points the writing is laughably bad. Witness:
"Elle hung on the word slut for so long it was like she was spelling it. The s, the l, the t all rang out over the phone as if semen were just pumping through her veins." (Pardon me?)
"Leda had planned on saying 'Hi, I'm Leda. I got my BFA in creative writing, but I've been busy raising my daughter and haven't had time to write as much as I'd like, so I'm here trying to get back into it.' When it was her turn she said: 'Hi, I'm Leda. I got my BFA in creative writing, but I've been busy raising my daughter and haven't had time to write as much as I'd like, so I'm here trying to get back into it.'" (Am I at 400 pages yet?)
"'But it's not real,' Annabelle said.
Leda remembered feeling similarly when she was a child [...] At the time she was terrified" (Did you really forget what you just wrote?)
And, for those who've suggesting that Casale's is a feminist voice:
"She'd wished she could [...] make her daughter date someone nice who was taller, so that she could see how great life could be."
Overall, continuing the feminist theme, the one positive decision the protagonist makes in her entire life is to tell her partner: "marry me, despite your doubts, and make me pregnant." Her entire self-image as a writer (unpublished) falls by the wayside as she instead attacks every other woman she meets right up to (seriously) the moment of her death.
May 29, 2018
I love books that attempt a summation of a life and this is an excellent example that approaches it with a strong feminist lens. I found this book intensely relatable even though my life and Leda’s life are quite different. It’s funny and moving and profound and delightful. Think Katherine Heiny meets Emma Straub with a dash of Meg Wolitzer. It’s a rare five star read for me.
October 23, 2017
Thank you to Netgalley for an advanced copy of this book.
DNF. I just couldn’t. It was awful. The writing was pretentious and drawn out. Leda, the main character, was just horrible. I rolled my eyes at least once a page. She’s one of those people who just makes me want to shake and scream, “GIRL PLEASE FIND YOURSELF!!” at them until they find a personality and some confidence.
DNF. I just couldn’t. It was awful. The writing was pretentious and drawn out. Leda, the main character, was just horrible. I rolled my eyes at least once a page. She’s one of those people who just makes me want to shake and scream, “GIRL PLEASE FIND YOURSELF!!” at them until they find a personality and some confidence.
July 4, 2018
Why Noam Chomsky? Not just because he is an intellectual, but because he is an intellectual who teaches that words shape lives. Every word choice is important, and for Leda, one word becomes her mantra: linear. She seeks, above every other adjective that might describe a human being, to become linear (which is indeed an odd adjective for a person). In the context of the story, we understand "linear" to mean a desirable state of thinness, sleekness, elegance. But the word "slender" is what is more commonly used. Why "linear"? The story unfolds on this. It's interesting what the pursuit of the linear does to her once-creative spirit. And though there wasn't, in my opinion, a strong emotional high-point, the vignettes of Leda's life are relatable and keep the reader wanting to know what happens next. If you liked Kate Zambreno's "Green Girl", check this out.
February 21, 2021
ngl I only picked this up because I thought the title was fun, but I was really pleasantly surprised by how good this book was. it's such a solid debut; the story is mundane in a way that feels almost surreal and at the same time incredibly raw, vulnerable and urgent. the experience of ~womanhood~ portrayed in this book is obviously a very specific one -- as is inherently going to be the case with any attempt at portraying something so variable -- but some of the emotions and experiences in this story were imo incredibly common and widely relatable and the author managed to express them soooo well. even the experiences that I couldn't relate to just felt so immediate and real to me -- I feel like this book helped me understand straight women a lot better than I did before! (I'm not even really being sarcastic here.)
January 5, 2019
Reads like the first book of a young author whose life experiences are turned into a narrative. The narrative of growing up white and educated, participating in writing workshops, and thinking about being skinny but calling it linear because that’s a provocative statement on the insanity of the female obsession with weight. Let me repeat: writing about writing workshops.
I finished it while rolling my eyes because I thought with this much acclaim, it surely had some cynical revealing ending or a post modern surprise. Instead I got a scene with the Noam Chomsky book that was mentioned in the first chapter which presumably is a metaphor for the eternal loneliness of a woman’s life.
I finished it while rolling my eyes because I thought with this much acclaim, it surely had some cynical revealing ending or a post modern surprise. Instead I got a scene with the Noam Chomsky book that was mentioned in the first chapter which presumably is a metaphor for the eternal loneliness of a woman’s life.
August 4, 2018
It took me awhile to get into this book, but by the end I was glad I decided to stick with it. I love a life examined & rendered completely, even if Leda made choices I didn’t always agree with. I rooted for her the whole way.
June 24, 2018
This is one of books I have come across in my life that makes such a huge and influential impact on me that its importance can't be understated.
Reach out to me and ask the extent to which this book affected me--it isn't something that feels appropriate to elaborate on here.
I wouldn't say it gave me a whole new unexpected perspective, but the subject matter is so meaningful and truthful and there were a lot of ideas percolating and simmering in my mind throughout the years and this book just crystallized them in such a blatant, clear memorable way that I can't stop thinking about it.
This book is funny as hell from start to finish, and super truthfully honest.
I will note that it does have some problematic unchecked female bias which won't age well. But that's not enough to detract from the five star rating.
I do have a full formal review on RunSpotRun.com available as well.
Reach out to me and ask the extent to which this book affected me--it isn't something that feels appropriate to elaborate on here.
I wouldn't say it gave me a whole new unexpected perspective, but the subject matter is so meaningful and truthful and there were a lot of ideas percolating and simmering in my mind throughout the years and this book just crystallized them in such a blatant, clear memorable way that I can't stop thinking about it.
This book is funny as hell from start to finish, and super truthfully honest.
I will note that it does have some problematic unchecked female bias which won't age well. But that's not enough to detract from the five star rating.
I do have a full formal review on RunSpotRun.com available as well.
March 24, 2019
The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky or Did Much of Anything Except Navel Gaze Until She Died
September 13, 2017
Thank you to NetGalley and Knopf for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. It's difficult to know where to start because this novel is inconsistent, although I enjoyed reading it more and more as it went on.
At the start, Leda, The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky, is a college student studying writing who buys a copy of a Noah Chomsky book that travels with her throughout her life, but that she has never read (although she did open it a number of times). Leda is concerned about her appearance and her body, wanting to be "linear", which I assume means thin. Yet there are multiple descriptions of eating muffins, ice cream and other delicious high calorie foods. Leda doesn't appreciate how beautiful she is until she is older and no longer so.
Ultimately, it is a story of a life, a woman's life, a life like many others describing joys and sorrows, friendship, love, relationships, childhood and parenthood and roles determined by gender. Leda's friendship with Anne throughout the years is a wonderful illustration of how women's friendships can be superficial at the start, yet develop and grow throughout life.
Leda falls in love with John and when he graduates with a tech degree, gives up her own plans to get an advanced degree and follow him to San Francisco where he has gotten a job with Google. Perhaps the most real and gripping chapter in the book deals with John's reluctance to commit to marriage and Leda's increasing desire to follow a life without a career. She wants to be a traditional wife and mother and she succeeds in this.
So is her life happy and fulfilled? She and John seem to have it all, yet they grow apart and bored with each other as that life goes on. I think the Unread Noam Chomsky is the allegory of hard choices not made, more education, writing, lead to a life that seems ultimately empty. But it is a story of a life and one that many people would relate to. She is a loving daughter, a good wife, a wonderful mother. Is that all there is?
Jana Casale's first book is most promising and also filled with humor and sadness. I look forward to seeing more from her.
At the start, Leda, The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky, is a college student studying writing who buys a copy of a Noah Chomsky book that travels with her throughout her life, but that she has never read (although she did open it a number of times). Leda is concerned about her appearance and her body, wanting to be "linear", which I assume means thin. Yet there are multiple descriptions of eating muffins, ice cream and other delicious high calorie foods. Leda doesn't appreciate how beautiful she is until she is older and no longer so.
Ultimately, it is a story of a life, a woman's life, a life like many others describing joys and sorrows, friendship, love, relationships, childhood and parenthood and roles determined by gender. Leda's friendship with Anne throughout the years is a wonderful illustration of how women's friendships can be superficial at the start, yet develop and grow throughout life.
Leda falls in love with John and when he graduates with a tech degree, gives up her own plans to get an advanced degree and follow him to San Francisco where he has gotten a job with Google. Perhaps the most real and gripping chapter in the book deals with John's reluctance to commit to marriage and Leda's increasing desire to follow a life without a career. She wants to be a traditional wife and mother and she succeeds in this.
So is her life happy and fulfilled? She and John seem to have it all, yet they grow apart and bored with each other as that life goes on. I think the Unread Noam Chomsky is the allegory of hard choices not made, more education, writing, lead to a life that seems ultimately empty. But it is a story of a life and one that many people would relate to. She is a loving daughter, a good wife, a wonderful mother. Is that all there is?
Jana Casale's first book is most promising and also filled with humor and sadness. I look forward to seeing more from her.
January 25, 2019
I read a few reviews before reading and I thought "Oh great. A book about a vapid 20-something woman." As it turns out... I guess I enjoy that. The main character *is* constantly obsessing over her body and what other people think of her. But I hear women on a daily basis express concern over their weight and discuss their diets. It's unfortunate, but it's not untrue to real life. I don't think the main character's obsession to be "linear" is vapid; I think it brings awareness to a society that enables & encourages women to constantly body shame themselves. I also appreciate how honest the main character is with her thoughts. I like unlikeable characters. She makes snap judgements. She loathes strangers for absolutely no reason. She's jealous that the Virgin Mary has a baby. She thinks what her life would be life if only she was with that other guy. She felt real. Whatever that means.
About halfway through the book, though, time starts jumping at a rapid pace. I guess that's bound to happen when you cram an entire life into 350+ pages. I lost a lot of the tenderness I felt for the main character. Not because of her life circumstances- I am not put off by the fact that she makes life decisions based on her husband and child. I understand the desire for safety and security. Maybe because the narration lost the daily life quality of the first half due to the huge span of time covered? Maybe it's because I'm not a mother? Maybe both?
About halfway through the book, though, time starts jumping at a rapid pace. I guess that's bound to happen when you cram an entire life into 350+ pages. I lost a lot of the tenderness I felt for the main character. Not because of her life circumstances- I am not put off by the fact that she makes life decisions based on her husband and child. I understand the desire for safety and security. Maybe because the narration lost the daily life quality of the first half due to the huge span of time covered? Maybe it's because I'm not a mother? Maybe both?
July 24, 2018
If I were, for some reason, allowed only 5 books to own on a little shelf in my home I think at this time they would be (and in no particular order):
Atonement, Ian McEwan
The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky, Jana Casale
East of Eden, Steinbeck
Snowflower and the Secret Fan, Lisa See (or well any of her books but that was my first and it holds that irreplaceable placeholder)
and definitely a book of Victorian poetry hopefully a compilation... Tennyson, Rossetti, etc.
I want every woman I know to read and love this book the way I have.
I want to befriend Jana Casale and have tea with her in San Francisco and then order grilled cheeses with brie and disagree about where brie belongs. I want to tell her how she inspired me. How I cried among the pages. Many times. How, for a stint, I stopped shaving my armpits and felt GOOD about being my own kind of woman. How I felt understood. How she is so right about women. How her insight to this new age we live in is uplifting and doesn’t make me feel like crap for being a twenty-first century dweller.
It is the right amount of sad because it is very real.
I would have only four books to my name sitting on their shelf most of the time. I would lend my copy out to this friend and that friend or this girl I met or that woman I am acquainted with or this young lady hitting puberty or this friend who recently lost her mother. It would be a copy worn with much use and love. It would be a well travelled book. It would see various night tables and armchairs, kitchen countertops and picnic blankets. Beaches and backyards both. Its pages stained of crumbs from blueberry jam shortbread cookies, pencil markings, dog eared save-for-later pages.
I love this book.
Atonement, Ian McEwan
The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky, Jana Casale
East of Eden, Steinbeck
Snowflower and the Secret Fan, Lisa See (or well any of her books but that was my first and it holds that irreplaceable placeholder)
and definitely a book of Victorian poetry hopefully a compilation... Tennyson, Rossetti, etc.
I want every woman I know to read and love this book the way I have.
I want to befriend Jana Casale and have tea with her in San Francisco and then order grilled cheeses with brie and disagree about where brie belongs. I want to tell her how she inspired me. How I cried among the pages. Many times. How, for a stint, I stopped shaving my armpits and felt GOOD about being my own kind of woman. How I felt understood. How she is so right about women. How her insight to this new age we live in is uplifting and doesn’t make me feel like crap for being a twenty-first century dweller.
It is the right amount of sad because it is very real.
I would have only four books to my name sitting on their shelf most of the time. I would lend my copy out to this friend and that friend or this girl I met or that woman I am acquainted with or this young lady hitting puberty or this friend who recently lost her mother. It would be a copy worn with much use and love. It would be a well travelled book. It would see various night tables and armchairs, kitchen countertops and picnic blankets. Beaches and backyards both. Its pages stained of crumbs from blueberry jam shortbread cookies, pencil markings, dog eared save-for-later pages.
I love this book.
May 24, 2018
I absolutely love this book. It touches so perfectly on what it's like to be a woman—the constant inner struggles, the feelings of inadequacy and insecurity, the flashes of confidence, the strength of going after your dreams only to be hit by the realities of the world—there was not a single moment in this book that I didn't feel like I could relate to wholeheartedly or (when it flashes forward to parts of Leda's life that I have not yet lived) that I wouldn't one day relate to.
It's heartwarming and poignant, but it's also hilarious. Casale writes with a sharp wit that comes from experience, and each chapter is filled with moments that made me laugh out loud, wipe away tears, and smile in understanding. Ultimately, it's a beautiful debut that truthfully, made me feel less alone in my own thoughts and feelings, and offered a sense of understanding. It's a beautiful portrait of Leda's life, yes, but if I'm being honest, there's a little bit of Leda in all of us, and that's what makes the book so relatable and fabulous.
It's heartwarming and poignant, but it's also hilarious. Casale writes with a sharp wit that comes from experience, and each chapter is filled with moments that made me laugh out loud, wipe away tears, and smile in understanding. Ultimately, it's a beautiful debut that truthfully, made me feel less alone in my own thoughts and feelings, and offered a sense of understanding. It's a beautiful portrait of Leda's life, yes, but if I'm being honest, there's a little bit of Leda in all of us, and that's what makes the book so relatable and fabulous.
September 17, 2017
Many thanks to Netgalley and Knopf Doubleday for a free copy in exchange for an honest review. I tried to get into this book, but just couldn't. It came off as one long, pointless diary entry, the writing trying to sound overly deep and meaningful, but in reality coming off as quite shallow. The constant talking of wanting to be "linear" without ever really explaining what it meant to Leda became repetitive and annoying. The character of Leda seemed to encompass every bad and stereotypical thing about a millennial so that you couldn't take her seriously. Eventually, I had to skim the rest of this piece and was relieved when it was over.
dnf
April 16, 2018I only got to the 5th chapter and had to DNF. The book was just so boring and slow. The writing style and POV were definitely not my favorite either. I’m so sorry to Penguin because I received the book from them but I just can not recommend it.
June 16, 2018
Oh man.
This book had some serious potential. I absolutely LOVED the first part where Leda was in university & trying to figure out her life. I loved it up until she turned into a bridezilla who demanded so much from her partner without taking his emotions into account, all because "she left her life to live with him".
In a few pages, Leda became a selfish and unbearable character. I could not help but cringe as I read it as the chapters just screamed "white privilege". Also what was with the overuse of the word LINEAR!?! I get it - as women we have this unnatural obsession with being thin, but some synonyms would have been nice. I also had difficulty with her overt hatred of men, the character really seemed to lump all men into the same category, including her husband.
Once Leda grew older I did enjoy her more, but I felt like too much damage was done by this point for me to regain any love I initially had for this book. It was far too long and far too self indulgent by the end.
This book had some serious potential. I absolutely LOVED the first part where Leda was in university & trying to figure out her life. I loved it up until she turned into a bridezilla who demanded so much from her partner without taking his emotions into account, all because "she left her life to live with him".
In a few pages, Leda became a selfish and unbearable character. I could not help but cringe as I read it as the chapters just screamed "white privilege". Also what was with the overuse of the word LINEAR!?! I get it - as women we have this unnatural obsession with being thin, but some synonyms would have been nice. I also had difficulty with her overt hatred of men, the character really seemed to lump all men into the same category, including her husband.
Once Leda grew older I did enjoy her more, but I felt like too much damage was done by this point for me to regain any love I initially had for this book. It was far too long and far too self indulgent by the end.
August 10, 2019
There's a subtle, misunderstood brilliance to this book, one easily dismissed as "plotless", "vapid", and "entitled". Which, to be fair, are all valid words to describe this book.
(That's the point.)
Even if I didn't fully like Leda, the main character, I believed her. I recognized facets of her thoughts in my own and saw aspects of her personality in countless people I know. She is deeply, shamefully REAL, so real that it's easy to want to look away, to not confront that same vapid stream-of-conciousness that exists inside our own brains. The critics are LOUD when it comes to this book, with valid reason, but I enjoyed the fresh, millennial take on stream-of-conciousness in a diet-loving, Instagram filter-heavy, fair-weather friend world. This book tackles negative self-talk, body-shaming, generational female insecurity, and the delight and downfall of projecting romantic aspirations onto the artsy boy at a coffee shop.
Delightful and intentional and clever debut. Looking forward to the next book by Jana Casale!
(That's the point.)
Even if I didn't fully like Leda, the main character, I believed her. I recognized facets of her thoughts in my own and saw aspects of her personality in countless people I know. She is deeply, shamefully REAL, so real that it's easy to want to look away, to not confront that same vapid stream-of-conciousness that exists inside our own brains. The critics are LOUD when it comes to this book, with valid reason, but I enjoyed the fresh, millennial take on stream-of-conciousness in a diet-loving, Instagram filter-heavy, fair-weather friend world. This book tackles negative self-talk, body-shaming, generational female insecurity, and the delight and downfall of projecting romantic aspirations onto the artsy boy at a coffee shop.
Delightful and intentional and clever debut. Looking forward to the next book by Jana Casale!
March 31, 2020
This was definitely a book I needed to read right now. At the beginning, I was wondering why I bought this book in the first place but, a few chapters in, I realized that it is captivating, good and relatable. We follow the life of Leda from the beginning of adulthood to her death. It is funny, sad, touching… I feel this book deserves a lot mor love.
February 14, 2025
2.5/5* felt too long. Almost didn’t finish it but wanted to see if it’d get better (but didn’t). Loved her other book but this one was disappointing
January 31, 2018
I would like to thank NetGalley, the publisher and the author for my advanced copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.
I truly wanted to love this book. The synopsis sounded right up my alley. And I have to say, the content, the main story itself, was really good but, unfortunately, the rest fell flat.
We meet Leda as a young adult. She is quirky, she is naive, and she is trying to make her mark in this world. Really, she is all of us. Sadly, the writing style is so all over the place that this overpowers anything we could feel for our heroine. Jana Casale tried too hard and it shines through. Is the book supposed to be whimsical? Is it supposed to be heavy? Is the novel build on language or story? We never find out. Each chapter is sort of different. Is that on purpose? I want to believe it is, but that never becomes clear.
I had a really hard time getting into the story because of the writing. About 50 or so pages in, it picked up and I got excited. I started to relate to Leda. I wanted her to succeed. I loved how honest the story was. I loved 20s Leda. I enjoyed her romance with John. I thought having to decide between career and love was brilliant and something most of us experience at some point in our lives. The struggles between how you imagine your life and how it actually turns out seemed true.
But then, it goes downhill again. We follow Leda through pregnancy, raising a child, growing old, and up until the end of her life. I was so bored toward the last pages I found myself nodding off at times. I've read lifespan books before and enjoyed them, so I don't think it had anything to do with me not being able to relate to a 50-year-old woman for example. I just think Casale missed the mark. This book should've been so important, so relatable for women, and it just isn't.
I am giving it 2 stars because I did enjoy young Leda's life, her beliefs, her struggles, and her needing to grow up. But to me, that was the highlight of this novel.
I do think the author has potential, as she seems to have a keen eye for the mundane and the everyday things. Let's hope her next book comes out soon. I really want her to redeem herself.
See my blog (spoilers possible!) here: https://ichleseblog.wordpress.com/201....
I truly wanted to love this book. The synopsis sounded right up my alley. And I have to say, the content, the main story itself, was really good but, unfortunately, the rest fell flat.
We meet Leda as a young adult. She is quirky, she is naive, and she is trying to make her mark in this world. Really, she is all of us. Sadly, the writing style is so all over the place that this overpowers anything we could feel for our heroine. Jana Casale tried too hard and it shines through. Is the book supposed to be whimsical? Is it supposed to be heavy? Is the novel build on language or story? We never find out. Each chapter is sort of different. Is that on purpose? I want to believe it is, but that never becomes clear.
I had a really hard time getting into the story because of the writing. About 50 or so pages in, it picked up and I got excited. I started to relate to Leda. I wanted her to succeed. I loved how honest the story was. I loved 20s Leda. I enjoyed her romance with John. I thought having to decide between career and love was brilliant and something most of us experience at some point in our lives. The struggles between how you imagine your life and how it actually turns out seemed true.
But then, it goes downhill again. We follow Leda through pregnancy, raising a child, growing old, and up until the end of her life. I was so bored toward the last pages I found myself nodding off at times. I've read lifespan books before and enjoyed them, so I don't think it had anything to do with me not being able to relate to a 50-year-old woman for example. I just think Casale missed the mark. This book should've been so important, so relatable for women, and it just isn't.
I am giving it 2 stars because I did enjoy young Leda's life, her beliefs, her struggles, and her needing to grow up. But to me, that was the highlight of this novel.
I do think the author has potential, as she seems to have a keen eye for the mundane and the everyday things. Let's hope her next book comes out soon. I really want her to redeem herself.
See my blog (spoilers possible!) here: https://ichleseblog.wordpress.com/201....
May 19, 2018
Lefebvre wrote about the idea of “the everyday” in Clearing the Ground.
“In one sense there is nothing more simple and more obvious than everyday life.” It’s full of “banality, triviality, repetitiveness,” etc. But at the same time it couldn’t be more profound: “It is existence and the ‘lived,’ revealed as they are before speculative thought has transcribed them.”
There’s something so significant about the commonplace aspect of The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky. Of course in this novel the everyday life that is the focus of the story is literally transcribed, but it feels so much closer to the ‘lived’ side of things.
Casale doesn’t just inject fresh observations or new and original perspectives into some tired format, but her entire form seems to be made up of a low-level commandeering of reality. Written between the lines about hollandaise sauce and playgroups are not just poetic flights or falls to stark bleakness, but something even deeper; it’s not about finding something special in spite of the mundane.
Maybe the uniqueness here is in how the writing pushes beyond frankness or a distaste for the derivative. There’s irreverence for so much established thought and popular attitude, yet, almost paradoxically, the author also isn’t afraid to say something trite on occasion—if it’s true.
Like the awkward strangers Leda meets at a party convincing themselves they are having fun, a good number of the incidental characters she bumps into in the book suffer from a common struggle: they are lost in some degree of delusion about themselves in the moment-to-moment world they inhabit.
The candor mixes with these characters and produces an honest portrait of the everyday behavior of both little and big dreams. Rising and falling, the daily workings of expectations of self—of a more sensational self than we are—happen in bedrooms and along sidewalks, on the phone with mom and watching commercials on a couch.
It's with all this in sight (and also with lots of beauty, love, and humanity) that The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky gives us a lens not only to examine the sense of self at play in the everyday world of Leda, but also to embrace an unguarded take on the momentary workings of our selves and, in turn, our own lifetimes.
“In one sense there is nothing more simple and more obvious than everyday life.” It’s full of “banality, triviality, repetitiveness,” etc. But at the same time it couldn’t be more profound: “It is existence and the ‘lived,’ revealed as they are before speculative thought has transcribed them.”
There’s something so significant about the commonplace aspect of The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky. Of course in this novel the everyday life that is the focus of the story is literally transcribed, but it feels so much closer to the ‘lived’ side of things.
Casale doesn’t just inject fresh observations or new and original perspectives into some tired format, but her entire form seems to be made up of a low-level commandeering of reality. Written between the lines about hollandaise sauce and playgroups are not just poetic flights or falls to stark bleakness, but something even deeper; it’s not about finding something special in spite of the mundane.
Maybe the uniqueness here is in how the writing pushes beyond frankness or a distaste for the derivative. There’s irreverence for so much established thought and popular attitude, yet, almost paradoxically, the author also isn’t afraid to say something trite on occasion—if it’s true.
Like the awkward strangers Leda meets at a party convincing themselves they are having fun, a good number of the incidental characters she bumps into in the book suffer from a common struggle: they are lost in some degree of delusion about themselves in the moment-to-moment world they inhabit.
The candor mixes with these characters and produces an honest portrait of the everyday behavior of both little and big dreams. Rising and falling, the daily workings of expectations of self—of a more sensational self than we are—happen in bedrooms and along sidewalks, on the phone with mom and watching commercials on a couch.
It's with all this in sight (and also with lots of beauty, love, and humanity) that The Girl Who Never Read Noam Chomsky gives us a lens not only to examine the sense of self at play in the everyday world of Leda, but also to embrace an unguarded take on the momentary workings of our selves and, in turn, our own lifetimes.
December 14, 2018
Beautifully written, and easy to read. (Side note: I don't think the jacket description accurately describes the book or conveys its essence... it makes it sound more like a plot-following novel than it is.) A modern day feminist statement, at times outright and at times subtly delivered, as we accompany Leda's inner consciousness on experiencing and trying to figure out life, as a woman. At first there were many moments were the character felt superficial, a tad obnoxious in her anxieties, judgments, and thoughts--until I realized, "oh, I have totally thought [shallow/ridiculous/undue] things like this too. Damnit." That's where her actual complexity of being an intellectual, independent woman, who could consciously but not emotionally escape cultural standards of beauty, relationships, and life meaning, got real. For some reviewers who complained that her boring, egotistical, unimportant thoughts and choices she deliberates on, such as "if her arms are fat or if she should buy a jelly donut or bagel"... I think they miss the point. Leda presents so many complexities, ironies, contradictions, and real lived experiences of being a girl, young adult, and woman today. The story ends with poignancy. I appreciated reading it as a reflection of the wild, sometimes intense, sometimes mundane, but always moving short lifetime we are given.
April 22, 2019
4.5 stars!
This is a book I would have never picked up had it not been in the “starred new arrivals” part of a bookstore. I don’t care for the title and the cover is very boring. This novel is the tale of a quite average woman’s entire life.
The first part, when the main character Lena is in college, is quite sad and hard to get through, but like the rest of the book, it feels very true. Thankfully, things pick up about 100 pages in and we feel the joy of living again.
I really enjoyed the emphasis on the strength of the female experience — that women are able to experience their feelings more completely, and that the author celebrates that throughout the book. At times I was annoyed at Lena for not following through with some of her ambitions, but I actually ended up really liking that the author treated her character with respect despite the fact that Lena ends up to be a quite unremarkable woman to those outside of her immediate family.
Can’t wait to read more from the author.
This is a book I would have never picked up had it not been in the “starred new arrivals” part of a bookstore. I don’t care for the title and the cover is very boring. This novel is the tale of a quite average woman’s entire life.
The first part, when the main character Lena is in college, is quite sad and hard to get through, but like the rest of the book, it feels very true. Thankfully, things pick up about 100 pages in and we feel the joy of living again.
I really enjoyed the emphasis on the strength of the female experience — that women are able to experience their feelings more completely, and that the author celebrates that throughout the book. At times I was annoyed at Lena for not following through with some of her ambitions, but I actually ended up really liking that the author treated her character with respect despite the fact that Lena ends up to be a quite unremarkable woman to those outside of her immediate family.
Can’t wait to read more from the author.
July 13, 2019
Hard to rate this book. It was often resonant and occasionally beautiful, and I liked the sparse, factual style. I also liked, for the most part, what it said about women’s lives.
What was unbearable about the book was the particular woman at the center of it: not because Leda was not real but because something about her was missing. She captured all the bitterness that women feel towards each other and none of the deep, crucial love. She felt jealous and petty the way we all do but rarely felt joy or wonder about anything outside of her own husband or daughter. Her world was so small: it was actually anxiety provoking for me to read about.
How could a woman who thinks so clearly about some things live in a world so small and so—not empty, but lacking? How can you write about a woman’s life and not write about her relationships with other women?
What was unbearable about the book was the particular woman at the center of it: not because Leda was not real but because something about her was missing. She captured all the bitterness that women feel towards each other and none of the deep, crucial love. She felt jealous and petty the way we all do but rarely felt joy or wonder about anything outside of her own husband or daughter. Her world was so small: it was actually anxiety provoking for me to read about.
How could a woman who thinks so clearly about some things live in a world so small and so—not empty, but lacking? How can you write about a woman’s life and not write about her relationships with other women?
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