When to Walk

by Rebecca Gowers

One part Melissa Bank and another part George Saunders, When to Walk is a laceratingly funny and deeply compassionate take on how one woman reinvents herself and learns that, no matter how late, there can always be a new beginning in life. When Ramble’s husband calls her an “autistic vampire” and abruptly ends their marriage over lunch, she isn’t quite sure what to do. She has no rent money, a looming deadline for work, and new neighbors who seem to have involved her in petty crime. Faced with the dissolution of a life she hadn’t really wanted, Ramble takes stock of what she has left. In Rebecca Gowers’s sharp debut, Ramble begins to reconsider everything her screwy family and unreliable but loyal friends have taught her so far. She spends a week taking apart her life and deciding which parts she wants to keep. Called “a mercurial delight” by the New Statesman and “brilliant . . . unforgettable” by Scotland on Sunday, When to Walk is a disarmingly honest portrayal of a young woman coming into her own—lit with hope, rich in magnificent characters, and hilariously wise.

Genres: Fiction, Novels

240 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2007

Reviews

[MJ Nicholls · Rating 4 out of 5]

One thing I resent about chick-lit is there is no male equivalent, no dick-lit. Sure, there’s Andy McNab and the action thriller, but where are the clumsy males seeking handsome girl suitors, the wacky adventures of hapless guys going on shopping sprees to Dixons? One thing that’s bereft in trashy male lit is humour. Kathy Lette may be as funny as a drowning kitten but at least she tries. Andy McNab couldn’t raise a titter in a laughing gas factory.

This novel isn’t chick-lit but it’s written in a style exclusive, it seems, to women writers. Sure, we have our Sam Lipsytes, our George Saunderses, but these gents are more preoccupied with broader, universal explanations for the culture and its behaviour. Where are the despairing men in overheated flats musing on etymology? Telling dreadful Victorian jokes? A crazy neighbour, anyone?

This book concerns an eccentric hack with a spinal condition whose husband leaves her at the weekend. Over seven days, she ambles around chatting to her Cockernee neighbour, her senile mother and her bisexual best friend, while trying to complete an article on an icy holiday resort. The writer puts digression to the test, pulling the reader into the protagonist’s fertile history and knowledge of Victorian trivia. Some dialogue is a tad ropey, but the prose sings lie SuBo on steroids.

[Don · Rating 5 out of 5]

When to Walk is a fantastic read, but you wouldn't know it from a back-cover blurb or review synopsis: We're told that Ramble's marriage suddenly ends over lunch, her husband calling her an "autistic vampire", how does she go on, blah blah blah. One is forced to (rightly) wonder: Surely this isn't compelling stuff? Is there really anything original left to say on this subject?

What's most surprising is what the blurbs don't say: namely, how extraordinarily FUNNY the book is! Ramble, deaf in one ear and with "a dysfunctional pelvis", has a mind that's both brilliant and bent; her attention to detail is almost panoptical, and her tendency towards digression, reflection, and bewildering interpretation is no less hysterical than it is astounding. Her internal dialogue can make the strangest sidesteps - as when the sudden appearance of someone surprises her, and she promptly recalls the earliest OED citation (c. 1513) of the word "wow".

This is the tenor of the novel's narration, and you'll either love it or hate it. The lunchtime pronouncement is a clear illustration, as it's not what the husband said, so much as her instant rewording: "He didn't put it like this, didn't use either of the words I'm about to use, but I found he was telling me that in the person of his wife, I have degraded into an autistic vampire." She's incredibly intelligent, possibly gifted, hopelessly internal in her workings, and one gets the sense of her being slightly surprised by most everything - if only for a second. At one point her husband complains that she spends too much time inside her own head, and we're annoyed to concede that he might have a point. (Not that this makes him any less of a bastard.)

The novel takes place over a single week - each of the seven chapters comprising a single day - and, given the kind of story it is, doesn't have the greatest amount of plot. This has seemingly frustrated some readers, but I had no quarrel with that fact; Ramble's character and voice are such a singular mixture of ridiculous and affecting, that my only complaint was that it ended at all: I gladly would have read many more weeks' worth of her strange and comical misadventures.

When to Walk is Rebecca Gowers' first novel, and it's an astonishing debut. I'll be anxiously awaiting her second.

[stillme · Rating 4 out of 5]

Exactly my kind of book - quirky characters, random tangents about the origin of words, musings about the mundane world jut outside the window...all taking place in London.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really funny.

[Jane E · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. Very literate with a love of words - when a word was first used and what it originally meant. The whole story was gripping and the central character so well described. I don’t understand why others are not as enthralled as me.

[Betty · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had a hard time concentrating on this book at the outset. The book covers 1 week (each day a chapter) in the life of Ramble (how aptly named she is!) Saturday left me very confused and seemed more erratic than necessary, but by Monday I was just getting into how it flows. The first part of the book was definitely difficult, and left me mostly confused and wondering when it could possibly garner some cohesion. It took me fewer days to get through the rest of the book, but the first part I really dragged through. Once a bond was made with a neighbor, Ramble began to become more real to me. Once you get into the convoluted mind of Ramble, you can begin to enjoy her non-adventures as a travel writer who never goes anywhere. She definitely has an interesting command of the English language and her research methods are quite fascinating. For the full week her mind narrates the book, but I for one felt that the end was rather predictable. The book in itself is an interesting scenario of how a mind can work, but do we ever really know who she is by the end? I would have to leave that to future readers. Nevertheless, it is a very different book, full of unorthodox ideas and fun as well. I don't think I would necessarily recommend it to the average reader, but certainly to someone who is more interested in the psyche, and how people react to various crises. I believe Ramble is stronger than she knows and her current predicament is somewhat of a blessing. An unusual book, well researched in an odd way.

[Catyche · Rating 4 out of 5]

My opinion on this novel sometimes fluctuated wildly from terrible boredom to comeplete enthrallment. The book deals with a week in the life of Ramble, a disabled young woman who has just been dumped by her husband because she is an autistic vampire or, in other words, she stays too much inside her own head all day and is sucking the life out of Con, her husband. I really related to her disabilities which include deafness in one ear, a dysfunctional pelvis and septic arthritis. As someone who is also disabled, I could understand the frustration of planning the logistics of going out, of the isolation that can sometimes be a result of a disability, and of the need to sometimes not take medication because of its knock-out properties and its ineffective pain treatment qualities. I also really loved the love scene between her and her gay best friend Johnson; it was beautiful and very realistic in terms of modern day relationships. Overall, I would very much recommend this sweet and thoughtful novel.

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

The best news about this book is that it didn't suck. It sure could have. Another story about a chick who managed to make it all the way to adulthood without a scrap of self-esteem or backbone (proportionally, way too many of these books are also British). What saved it was the narrator's interesting voice, which was rather scattered and tangential. That started out being a bit annoying, but as I got used to it, I realized that it's how people really think. Okay, I only know how my brain works, I've never gotten to hang out inside anyone else's, but I'm always mentally going off on tangents and stories while in the middle of something else entirely. Since I could identify with her mental-narrative style, it helped make up for the fact that I couldn't identify with her life or choices, at least until she was forced to start doing things for herself.

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is marvelous. I enjoyed being in Rambles head as she talks of her daily life, shares family ancedotes, writes her made-up travel articles, informs on the history of words and tells bad jokes. For a first novel Rebbeca Gowers did exceptional work and I hope to see more in the future. #readingwomen2014

[Esther · Rating 3 out of 5]

strange, a woman's husband leaves her. She's semi-autistic, half crippled and the book is her interior monologue mostly, with brief snippets of dialogue on the few days which follow. All very 'original' but slightly self consciously too clever with its prose by half.

[Elizabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

I thought/felt all of the things that were listed or talked about by the reviewers quoted on the back of the book ... Author demonstrated a love of language, there were funny parts, etc. ... But I'm still not entirely sure what the purpose of the book was.

[Elizabeth · Rating 1 out of 5]

Awful. Just awful. It may appeal to someone with self-esteem issues or feeling very depressed but I have no desire to read about a character so completely devoid of any ambition or interest. I couldn't even finish it.

[Joan · Rating 1 out of 5]

I only read the first few chapters - I could not get into it, did not relate to the main character.

[Su Dryden]

Reading other's reviews, I was expecting to be bored and disappointed. Actually, I thought it was well crafted, engaging and clever. Also, it has a very charming cover!

[Sara]

07 long list-orange prize

[Clare Coffey · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did try to finish this book but I just could not. I did not enjoy it. The characters were awful. I thought that the main character was a pain and no wonder her husband left her.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't comment much yet as I'm only four chapters in - and because I can;t sit here while there's more of it to read! Such a character, such a mind - and laugh out loud funny.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Darkly funny, extremely well-written.

[Judy · Rating 1 out of 5]

I didn't get very far into this book before giving up from boredom.

[Deanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a good fast read - could have been a bit more something but I would recommend it.

[Heather Clemons-Porter · Rating 2 out of 5]

Blech

[Devon · Rating 2 out of 5]

Boring. Couldn't finish it