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Shine, Pamela! Shine!
Thoroughly divorced but ever the optimist, Pamela faces the realities of aging and the leaps of faith required to put a “sparkle” on her daily life in this humorous short story by Kate Atkinson, the bestselling author of Life After Life.
Pamela is a newly retired teacher with time on her hands. She’s finding it hard to muster enthusiasm for what’s exhausting postdivorce dating rituals and an uneasy relationship with her emotionally stunted, live-at-home son. But for Pamela, there’s a surprise in store that could challenge the status quo and, against all expectations, make life interesting again.
Kate Atkinson’s Shine, Pamela! Shine! is part of Out of Line, an incisive collection of funny, enraging, and hopeful stories of women’s empowerment and escape. Each piece can be read or listened to in a single thought-provoking sitting.
Audible narration by Gwendoline Christie (Game of Thrones)
Pamela is a newly retired teacher with time on her hands. She’s finding it hard to muster enthusiasm for what’s exhausting postdivorce dating rituals and an uneasy relationship with her emotionally stunted, live-at-home son. But for Pamela, there’s a surprise in store that could challenge the status quo and, against all expectations, make life interesting again.
Kate Atkinson’s Shine, Pamela! Shine! is part of Out of Line, an incisive collection of funny, enraging, and hopeful stories of women’s empowerment and escape. Each piece can be read or listened to in a single thought-provoking sitting.
Audible narration by Gwendoline Christie (Game of Thrones)
22 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 1, 2020
About the author
Kate Atkinson
72 books12.7k followersKate Atkinson was born in York and now lives in Edinburgh. Her first novel, Behind the Scenes at the Museum, won the Whitbread Book of the Year Award and she has been a critically acclaimed international bestselling author ever since.
She is the author of a collection of short stories, Not the End of the World, and of the critically acclaimed novels Human Croquet, Emotionally Weird, Case Histories, and One Good Turn.
Case Histories introduced her readers to Jackson Brodie, former police inspector turned private investigator, and won the Saltire Book of the Year Award and the Prix Westminster.
When Will There Be Good News? was voted Richard & Judy Book Best Read of the Year. After Case Histories and One Good Turn, it was her third novel to feature the former private detective Jackson Brodie, who makes a welcome return in Started Early, Took My Dog.
She is the author of a collection of short stories, Not the End of the World, and of the critically acclaimed novels Human Croquet, Emotionally Weird, Case Histories, and One Good Turn.
Case Histories introduced her readers to Jackson Brodie, former police inspector turned private investigator, and won the Saltire Book of the Year Award and the Prix Westminster.
When Will There Be Good News? was voted Richard & Judy Book Best Read of the Year. After Case Histories and One Good Turn, it was her third novel to feature the former private detective Jackson Brodie, who makes a welcome return in Started Early, Took My Dog.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 414 reviews
September 9, 2020
Working on the theory that I would read a shopping list if this author wrote it I purchased this short story from Amazon despite the fact that many people have given it only average reviews. Trust me to be different. I loved it!
It is short and the end arrives very quickly and very suddenly. The Pamela of the title is a middle aged, divorced, retired school teacher. Her daughter is unpleasant, her son, equally unpleasant, still lives at home even though he is thirty years old. I read along just enjoying Atkinson's insights into families, friends and humanity in general.
Then came the ending and I said "What! Did that really happen?" and went back and read the last few pages again. It is a little odd, a lot strange and yet when you examine the details and visualise the possibilities for the future it is perfect.
It is short and the end arrives very quickly and very suddenly. The Pamela of the title is a middle aged, divorced, retired school teacher. Her daughter is unpleasant, her son, equally unpleasant, still lives at home even though he is thirty years old. I read along just enjoying Atkinson's insights into families, friends and humanity in general.
Then came the ending and I said "What! Did that really happen?" and went back and read the last few pages again. It is a little odd, a lot strange and yet when you examine the details and visualise the possibilities for the future it is perfect.
October 3, 2020
Well, this was an unpleasant surprise (thankfully a very short one). Shine, Pamela! Shine!, by Kate Atkinson, is the last Amazon Original Story in the Out of Line Collection. All I can really say for this is that it was a story - not a particularly interesting one, no likable character (sorry Pamela), and with a weird ending - neither clever or logical. I don't like to think why a series would be dedicated to "what happens when women step out of line and take control of their own stories", if they are going to be so pathetic.
The plot (without "spoiling" the ending) tells the story of yet another divorced middle aged woman who flounders. If Pamela had metamorphosed into a woman who took charge of her life or at least found (some) happiness in life I might have warmed to her a little. Instead she seemed to wallow inexplicably into a delusional stupor.
The plot (without "spoiling" the ending) tells the story of yet another divorced middle aged woman who flounders. If Pamela had metamorphosed into a woman who took charge of her life or at least found (some) happiness in life I might have warmed to her a little. Instead she seemed to wallow inexplicably into a delusional stupor.
April 30, 2021
This 21 page short story is part of the Out of Line Collection which is currently available on Kindle Unlimited.
What happens when women step out of line and take control of their own lives?
Pamela is a divorced mother of two who although outwardly optimistic, inwardly you can feel her start to lose hope over her future.
The first few pages I really warmed to Pamela but then I just lost connection to her and couldn't get it back. Probably my least favourite of this collection.
This 7 book collection is exclusive to Amazon and a great way to try out some new authors.
What happens when women step out of line and take control of their own lives?
Pamela is a divorced mother of two who although outwardly optimistic, inwardly you can feel her start to lose hope over her future.
The first few pages I really warmed to Pamela but then I just lost connection to her and couldn't get it back. Probably my least favourite of this collection.
This 7 book collection is exclusive to Amazon and a great way to try out some new authors.
October 5, 2020
I really enjoyed the dry, wry humour of Pamela and liked the middle aged surprising end!!!
November 24, 2020
This was a weird story to end the collection on. I have no idea what was real there with the whole thing with Pamela. I think the story started off okay. Following a woman who is realizing that she doesn't have a long-term partner after her husband left her decades earlier, leaving her to raise their two kids (who kind of suck). But from there the story stagnates and moves into random weirdness that just baffled me in the end.
October 11, 2020
Well, one woman's dream is another woman's nightmare I guess.
September 2, 2020
I'm...not really sure what happened here. The author spent 99% of this story building a character and her backstory and then just decided that she didn't want to write the story anymore? Not sure if the ending was intended to be some kind of shock, but it was just really disappointing and odd.
October 27, 2020
Read: October 2020
Rating: 3/5 stars
I loved the first three quarters of this short story. I found Pamela to be relatable and realistically drawn - which made the whole just seen so ridiculous. It felt like a cheap way to end the story, with no explanation for what had just happened.
The first 75% of this story is a solid 4/5 stars but that ending dragged the rating right down.
Rating: 3/5 stars
I loved the first three quarters of this short story. I found Pamela to be relatable and realistically drawn - which made the whole just seen so ridiculous. It felt like a cheap way to end the story, with no explanation for what had just happened.
The first 75% of this story is a solid 4/5 stars but that ending dragged the rating right down.
September 18, 2020
2 Stars
January 13, 2024
Suprantu tokį mažą įvertinimą, bet man patiko ir twistas, ir stilius, ir humoras. Skaityčiau tokią knygą.
September 22, 2020
I enjoyed the story even though the ending was odd. Still, liked this short story.
September 22, 2020
“… she was a great believer in exclamation marks. They glossed even the dullest statement (“It’s raining!”). They were also useful in turning a negative into a positive, especially when attempting to compliment one’s friends, as in, for example, “Your hair! You’ve changed it!”
Shine, Pamela! Shine! is a short story by award-winning British author, Kate Atkinson. Pamela Barker, fifteen years divorced, with adult children, and recently retired, tries to keep a positive attitude about life, but that’s not always easy. She finds that exclamation marks help her deal with criticism levelled by her snarky daughter and her lazy son.
Pamela’s inner monologue, with an insightful commentary on everyday life, is an utter delight and becomes increasingly funny as the story progresses to its (thoroughly) surprising conclusion. A very small dose of Kate Atkinson that is worth every cent.
Shine, Pamela! Shine! is a short story by award-winning British author, Kate Atkinson. Pamela Barker, fifteen years divorced, with adult children, and recently retired, tries to keep a positive attitude about life, but that’s not always easy. She finds that exclamation marks help her deal with criticism levelled by her snarky daughter and her lazy son.
Pamela’s inner monologue, with an insightful commentary on everyday life, is an utter delight and becomes increasingly funny as the story progresses to its (thoroughly) surprising conclusion. A very small dose of Kate Atkinson that is worth every cent.
December 14, 2022
‘Shine, Pamela Shine!’ by Kate Atkinson is without question the most meh in Amazon’s collection of “Out of Line” short stories. It is a very plain and unadorned short story. However, the ending abruptly goes off the rails into completely absurdity, but it does so very much keeping to the tone of a domestic fiction, and without much explanation.
I have included the book blurb because it is more interesting to read than the story, at least until the end:
”Thoroughly divorced but ever the optimist, Pamela faces the realities of aging and the leaps of faith required to put a “sparkle” on her daily life in this humorous short story by Kate Atkinson, the bestselling author of Life After Life.
Pamela is a newly retired teacher with time on her hands. She’s finding it hard to muster enthusiasm for what’s ahead: exhausting postdivorce dating rituals and an uneasy relationship with her emotionally stunted, live-at-home son. But for Pamela, there’s a surprise in store that could challenge the status quo and, against all expectations, make life interesting again.
Kate Atkinson’s Shine, Pamela! Shine! is part of Out of Line, an incisive collection of funny, enraging, and hopeful stories of women’s empowerment and escape. Each piece can be read or listened to in a single thought-provoking sitting.
It is a domestic story about a very domestic, becoming elderly, woman, once a Church of England teacher of primary school kids. She is trying to keep her head in a happy space above the disappointments of her life - the divorce, her ex-husband’s second family of young kids and a very young trophy wife, her own grown children, especially her youngest, 28-year-old slacker Nicholas (yes, yeah, right, Old Nick, probably pun intended). She is wondering what to do with the rest of her life, she is retired, she is marked physically on her body by all the usual signs of age. While taking a bath, she suddenly becomes aware
I have no idea what this story was supposed to show about women’s empowerment, as it was not about empowering women at all imho. If anything, since the plot is based on a bible prophecy, specifically the Apocalypse, which is basically being brought about by only male antagonists going to war, I can’t figure out what Atkinson was trying to say, other than that Pamela, the narrator, was going to handle it with usual efficient feminine resignation. I really really did not understand what this story was about. Based on what I see on Goodreads by other reviewers, I am not alone in my puzzlement. I suspect it is supposed to be a quietly ironic literary short story, going for genteel chuckles. It is well-written, but without much juice.
I have included a sideways linkage to the title, maybe, a Christian song sung in many church services, a youtube video. I think it suits this really really much too understated short story of mixed biblical messages?
https://youtu.be/BkxoTmKpDcU
I have included the book blurb because it is more interesting to read than the story, at least until the end:
”Thoroughly divorced but ever the optimist, Pamela faces the realities of aging and the leaps of faith required to put a “sparkle” on her daily life in this humorous short story by Kate Atkinson, the bestselling author of Life After Life.
Pamela is a newly retired teacher with time on her hands. She’s finding it hard to muster enthusiasm for what’s ahead: exhausting postdivorce dating rituals and an uneasy relationship with her emotionally stunted, live-at-home son. But for Pamela, there’s a surprise in store that could challenge the status quo and, against all expectations, make life interesting again.
Kate Atkinson’s Shine, Pamela! Shine! is part of Out of Line, an incisive collection of funny, enraging, and hopeful stories of women’s empowerment and escape. Each piece can be read or listened to in a single thought-provoking sitting.
It is a domestic story about a very domestic, becoming elderly, woman, once a Church of England teacher of primary school kids. She is trying to keep her head in a happy space above the disappointments of her life - the divorce, her ex-husband’s second family of young kids and a very young trophy wife, her own grown children, especially her youngest, 28-year-old slacker Nicholas (yes, yeah, right, Old Nick, probably pun intended). She is wondering what to do with the rest of her life, she is retired, she is marked physically on her body by all the usual signs of age. While taking a bath, she suddenly becomes aware
I have no idea what this story was supposed to show about women’s empowerment, as it was not about empowering women at all imho. If anything, since the plot is based on a bible prophecy, specifically the Apocalypse, which is basically being brought about by only male antagonists going to war, I can’t figure out what Atkinson was trying to say, other than that Pamela, the narrator, was going to handle it with usual efficient feminine resignation. I really really did not understand what this story was about. Based on what I see on Goodreads by other reviewers, I am not alone in my puzzlement. I suspect it is supposed to be a quietly ironic literary short story, going for genteel chuckles. It is well-written, but without much juice.
I have included a sideways linkage to the title, maybe, a Christian song sung in many church services, a youtube video. I think it suits this really really much too understated short story of mixed biblical messages?
https://youtu.be/BkxoTmKpDcU
September 5, 2020
I was just getting into it and then it was over. Still trying to figure it out.
August 27, 2026
A very short novel (22 pages) by one of my go to authors. It started well with great background setting and an introduction to dissatisfied divorcee, Pamela, who is living with her disappointing son after her husband has left her for a younger woman.
I enjoyed the descriptions and the snippets of narrative between Pamela, her children and members of her bookclub but the ending is just odd and the story fell flat for me.
I enjoyed the descriptions and the snippets of narrative between Pamela, her children and members of her bookclub but the ending is just odd and the story fell flat for me.
September 7, 2020
This one was hands down the weirdest of Amazon's Out of Line series. Very strange and had me thinking "... What the f*ck?" by the end.
September 12, 2020
I don't know what I just read....
September 14, 2020
I love Kate Atkinson. She has an amazing way of writing believable characters who are genuinely funny. So, when this short story became available on Audible, it was an automatic purchase for me. It was no surprise to me that I loved the first 3/4 of this book and couldn’t understand how it hadn’t gotten great reviews. Then, it just got weird.
I just re-read this short story as a part of “Normal Rules Don’t Apply,” and again, the first 85% is wonderful, but the ending is bizarre without explanation.
I just re-read this short story as a part of “Normal Rules Don’t Apply,” and again, the first 85% is wonderful, but the ending is bizarre without explanation.
September 16, 2020
This short story reminded me why I don't generally like reading short stories. Good buildup, but a completely unsatisfying ending. So many short stories are like that, leaving readers to doubt their own reading comprehension skills or checking to see if the last scene was torn or deleted from the pages. It's like another GR reviewer said, something like, "seemed like the author just decided the story wasn't worth writing anymore."
September 23, 2020
It started out so good!!! But then.... :(
November 12, 2021
Maybe 2.5
I was completely lost in the second half and don't understand what it meant.
Maybe I'll have a revelation from an angel that explains it.
I was completely lost in the second half and don't understand what it meant.
Maybe I'll have a revelation from an angel that explains it.
June 3, 2023
This is a wildly weird and wonderful short story by one of my favorite authors.
Divorced and "Happily so!" Pamela has recently retired from a teaching career where she led her primary school students through annual nativity productions with great cheer and jazz hands support. Her ever-cheerful and exclamation-point-laced enthusiasm made her a favorite. Now, with time on her hands, she is ready to meet the next stage of life with equal confidence but when a seemingly impossible event occurs, she must gather all of her enthusiasm and renewed belief in the divine.
I loved Pamela with her bright outlook on life, even with the unexpected road bumps that life places in her path. This is a beautiful short story.
Divorced and "Happily so!" Pamela has recently retired from a teaching career where she led her primary school students through annual nativity productions with great cheer and jazz hands support. Her ever-cheerful and exclamation-point-laced enthusiasm made her a favorite. Now, with time on her hands, she is ready to meet the next stage of life with equal confidence but when a seemingly impossible event occurs, she must gather all of her enthusiasm and renewed belief in the divine.
I loved Pamela with her bright outlook on life, even with the unexpected road bumps that life places in her path. This is a beautiful short story.
November 14, 2020
*Read for free with Kindle Unlimited*
July 15, 2021
This was an odd short story. I liked it, it was down to earth and had an amusing yet very honest tone throughout. The end was decidedly odd and unexpected, I thought I must have misunderstood what was happening.
As with the other books in the series this is about women, specifically about this woman’s struggles as she ages but also importantly about hope too.
3.5/5 but I’m rounding up because I liked it.
As with the other books in the series this is about women, specifically about this woman’s struggles as she ages but also importantly about hope too.
3.5/5 but I’m rounding up because I liked it.
Read
September 14, 2020What started out as in interesting examination of a later-in-life divorced woman took a weird turn in the last pages. It almost felt like Atkinson wasn't sure how to end it so she just went off the rails a bit then just stopped.
November 25, 2020
The stories in this series all seem to have been written quickly and without much craft. Kate Atkinson can be a masterful writer, but this short story is just offal.
September 2, 2020
I will read anything that Kate Atkinson publishes, but this is not up to her usual excellence.
December 4, 2020
Nəyə görə yazıldığını anlamadığım bir hekayə = ) Yaşlı bir qadının həyatında baş verən bir hadisə nəticəsində özünü yenidən kəşf etmə hekayəsidi, ət tökən yerləri çox oldu mənə görə. Parla, Pamela, parla! amma mənsiz = )
March 20, 2026
Loved this and the humour, just the ending I found odd, but it was, after all, only a short Amazon Original story….
Displaying 1 - 30 of 414 reviews