August Is a Wicked Month

by Edna O'Brien

Separated from her husband, Ellen finds herself living alone in a city she dislikes - a place that denies her past and offers no hope for her future. Determined to change her life, she decides to go south in search of sun and companionship.

Genres: Fiction, Ireland, Irish Literature, Novels, France, Classics, Literature

168 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1965

About the author

Edna O’Brien was an award-winning Irish author of novels, plays, and short stories. She has been hailed as one of the greatest chroniclers of the female experience in the twentieth century. She was the 2011 recipient of the Frank O’Connor Prize, awarded for her short story collection Saints and Sinners. She also received, among other honors, the Irish PEN Award for Literature, the Ulysses Medal from University College Dublin, and a lifetime achievement award from the Irish Literary Academy. Her 1960 debut novel, The Country Girls, was banned in her native Ireland for its groundbreaking depictions of female sexuality. Notable works also include August Is a Wicked Month (1965), A Pagan Place (1970), Lantern Slides (1990), and The Light of Evening (2006). O’Brien lived in London until her death.

Reviews

[Julie G · Rating 3 out of 5]

There I was, feeling the beginnings of a mid-life crisis starting to emerge. . . contemplating the merits of a navel piercing. . . or worse. . . when, suddenly, I spotted a black and white book cover featuring a snarky gal with a cigarette dangling from her mouth. A definite look of devil-may-care sitting snug around the corners of her mouth.

The blurb for the book reads something like. . . failed marriage. . . sexual discovery. . . liaisons in France.

Hey, I thought, it would be way cheaper to read a story of wanton lasciviousness than to get an infected belly button (and a lot less painful, too).

So, I splurged and found myself a lovely first edition of this book, a hardcover which smells like the 1960s, which is just when this novel happened to have been written by Irish author, Edna O'Brian.

I was that determined that I'd be living vicariously through the licentious protagonist, Ellen, and I figured we'd be friends for years.

Er. . . uh. . . no. No. No!

I have only been this wrong about a book, once before, when I thought The Vet's Daughter by Barbara Comyns was a “light romance.” Boy, was that a mistake.

This was another mistake.

It's not that this wasn't readable. It was. I did keep reading it, for reasons unknown even to me.

But this is NOT A SCINTILLATING SEXUAL READ!!!! Let's call it what it is, blurb writer, it's a bleak, depressing tale of a young woman, who has abuse in her background, who can not be in a healthy relationship with. . . well, anyone.

The sex here is awkward and sad. . . and very unhealthy. There's also a totally unexpected and where-in-the-hell-did-that-come-from tragedy, that I found unnecessary to the plot and weird.

The character of Ellen is so unformed, her hair color keeps changing, and I don't mean because she dyes it. It's like the author didn't even care enough to remember. Her eye color changes, too. What the hell?

The dialogue is awful, character development is non-existent, and there is not one worthy sex scene in the book.

No post-coital cigarette for me, folks. Anyone want a free book?

[Shovelmonkey1 · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this up thinking, ooh a nice summery read, something on the 1001 books list and possible some guilt-free, liberated and escapist, pseudo-feminist sex frolics (somewhere in a middle ground that is neither the weird dirty old man kinkiness of Michel Houllebecq and isn't Jilly Cooper either) . Ha ha. Wrong. But first to address what is possibly the funniest and most patronising review I've ever read on the back of a book. I give you... Mr Gavin Ewart of the Evening Standard...

"This is a terrific novel; it arouses sympathy and compassion like nobody's business. Miss O'Brien is an expert on girls and their feelings... No writer in English is so good at putting the reader inside the skin of a woman".

Cheers for that Gav, "an expert on girls (and you know he would have pronounced it 'gals') and their feelings". I'm pretty sure that Miss O'Brien considered that this was a novel written for women, not gals and one can only speculate with lines like that, that this is a close as Gavin has ever gotten to being inside a woman, er inside the skin of a woman.

This started out in a light hearted way - a sticky August, the beginnings of a potentially stickier liaison and then the decision to abandon London and head to Cannes where a holiday might promise the luxury of fast men, faster cars and nights of heady passion as surf crashes on beaches and the Moroccan zephyr flutters the luxuriant drapes of the master bedroom. Ah us ladies can only dream. The novel trundles in this direction long enough to lull you into a false sense of security but is swiftly overtaken by the harsher realities of life. Not all men look like Daniel Craig, you're not always the prettiest one in the room and then even harsher news from home breaks the last threads of the spell and before you know it, you've tried to shag half the men in the resort to no avail, suffered a massive personal tragedy, financially ruined yourself and the only souvenir you're taking home is a massive overdraft and suspected syphilis. Bon vacance indeed!

By the time I'd finished this I was feeling so depressed I headed off into the kitchen to hide all the sharp implements and cracked open another bottle of wine. Apparently Catholic guilt can get you even if you're not Catholic.

[K.D. Absolutely · Rating 2 out of 5]

Don't be misled by the sexy photo on the cover of the book. Although this book is about a lonely 28-y/o housewife, Ellen, she is not really your sex-starved character who sleeps with men from one bed to another. This book was Edna O'Brien's (born 1930) follow up to the controversial and banned first novel, The Country Girls Trilogy. The trilogy was banned in Ireland because of its broke the silence on sexual matters and social issues during the repressive period in Ireland history after World War II. I've read the trilogy's first book and I thought that O'Brien once again captured the inner feelings of women in Ireland during the time particularly their relationships with men and their place in society as a whole.

Ellen in the story is separated from her husband who is an ex-army. One afternoon, the husband takes away his son to spend days with him. When she is alreadddy alone in the house, the milk boy comes and she takes fancy on him. Not contented, she decides to go to Paris with the idea of having sex from anonymous men. There, she meets all sorts of people including lesbians and gay men but she realizes that she is not really looking for sex because she does not get interested even on a good-looking actor. Also she oftentimes remembers her son and whenever she does, she loses interest on the man who is raring to go to bed with her.

Back at home front, a tragedy strikes and the husband, not knowing where his wife is, does the thing on his own. Something that Ellen will definitely regret.

The "wicked" in the title of the book refers to the sex skills of Ellen's lover. For example, on page 7, Ellen tells the milk boy that she has never opened wide (maybe her heart or her thighs or her vagina) to a man before. The milk boy answers: "In that case, I ought to bring you to bed and teach you all my wicked ways." There are at least two sentences like this that refers to the bed's performance of the man as being wicked. This book was originally published in 1965. It's good that it was in 1900 when L. Frank Baum published The Wonderful Wizard of Oz so there was at least half a century being the book. Otherwise, I would have wondered if the Wicked Witch of the East would have some kind of sexual prowess or power as a witch too.

And the month of August in the title? Everything happens in the month of August. That's just it.

[Fiona MacDonald · Rating 4 out of 5]

A strange book, sort of surreal. I haven't really read much Edna O 'Brien (although i seem to be collecting a number of her books). 'August is a wicked month' was banned in several countries and burned in several more. This shows the incredible power of the written word. It has the capacity to induce violence among ignorant people.
Ellen is bored at home in London, bored with her straight-laced sexual encounters and bored with life in general. Her ex husband has taken their son away on holiday and Ellen decides that maybe a holiday is what she also needs.
She escapes to the French Riviera and meets a new range of people, all the time realising that she is yearning for something that cannot be experienced through meaningless sex.
I suppose it was rather daring for its day, but it's still nothing shocking in my opinion. O'Brien has an exciting way of showing her character's flaws, lumps and bumps without taking away any of their mystique. I will be reading more of her.

[Wanda Pedersen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Under the soft skin and behind the big, melting eyes her heart was like a nutmeg. Some of it had been grated away by life but the very centre never really surrendered to anyone…

I struggle with Edna O'Brien's writing. Despite her wonderful technique, I often feel that I am missing the point. I'd liked the descriptions of this novel—a divorced woman goes to France in search of sun and sex. What could be wrong with that premise? Lots, apparently. Perhaps because I'm not Irish Catholic, I don't feel sufficiently guilty about life to truly understand Ellen. She is a divorcee with a child, but still seems to be incredibly naïve.

For a while, I thought maybe O'Brien was showing the emptiness of a life based on liquor, sex, and celebrity. Ellen spends much of the book in the company of various men and is too nice to turn them down. By accident it seems, she ends up in the posse of a movie star, Bobby, whom she seems to actually want, especially as he holds himself aloof. O'Brien just kept throwing test after test at poor ineffectual Ellen, who by the book's end is finally starting to take her life in hand and be adult enough to handle large hotel bills, physical ills, grief, and getting rid of men who really mean nothing to her. Is that the point, that if we are lucky we can grow up and take the reins?

I don't regret reading this slim volume, but I can't say that I will be recommending it to very many people either. I had a hunt to find this copy, but it won't be staying in my home library. I will give it freedom to join another reader who appreciates it more than I do.

Cross posted at my blog:

https://wanda-thenextfifty.blogspot.c...

[Cynthia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love that publishers are bringing back these vintage titles. This one was originally published in 1965. That’s not to say the story is dated. It’s about a young Irish woman with an eight year old son who’s been separated from her husband for a year. She’s also gone without sex for at least that long and she’s missing it. When her husband takes their son on a camping trip she bounces around her house for a bit, has a desultory sexual encounter with a conflicted neighbor, and then decides to go somewhere exciting. That place is the South of France, in August, of course. There she meets men she finds attractive who aren’t interested in her or misguided men who find her attractive though she’s not vaguely tempted by to them. All around her is the lure of sex but still it eludes her. She meets a younger American girl who’s just run into a famous Hollywood actor in their hotel. The actor and his hangers on stop by their table at the bar and they’re swept into a party at someone’s mansion. There’s a tragedy concerning someone outside their party and the group forced to head back to town.

They goto a burlesque show and the flirting and innuendos continue but Ellen is really only interested in the actor. The problem is so is her friend. The actor flirts with both women. Ellen feels angst over this until something far, far worse happens. She receives word of something that turns her world to black. She languishes on in France where flirting now becomes a compulsive distraction as well as a physical need.

I loved O’Brien’s character, Ellen. She’s not a girl though not quite a woman. She’s trying to figure out how to define herself and how to live the rest of her life. This isn’t a happy book but it’s also not maudlin. A few plot points are a bit over the top but for all that it’s still a realistic portrayal of a woman in Ellen’s predicament and at her time in life. In my opinion O’Brien is a less happy and less moral Barbara Pym, she’s a MUCH happier and sexier Anita Brookner and for some reason I want to throw in W. Somerset Maugham as well, specifically his “Up at the Villa” though maybe that’s more for the similar settings.


This review is based on an e-galley supplied by the publisher.

4.5/5 stars

[Anita Pomerantz · Rating 4 out of 5]

More of a novella, O'Brien does a tremendous job of bringing us inside the mind of a woman, Ellen, who is hurting and insecure after a divorce. In an effort to forget, Ellen takes a holiday in France, and basically behaves in a way that ends up reinforcing her sadness and depression. I loved the way this book was written. O'Brien really takes you inside Ellen's mind the entire time, and it is hard not to empathize with her feelings and situation and her deep deep loneliness. You feel like you are watching a girlfriend do all sorts of things that you know are bad for her, and you just want her say please stop doing this to yourself, but you also know she won't listen.

Unfortunately, the novel takes one misstep (in my opinion), and it's a pretty big one. Hence the four stars instead of five. But because I think the rest of the book is so exquisitely rendered, it really didn't diminish my enjoyment of the writing for long. Just a little "seriously?" came into my mind at this point. It's hard to share without spoiling.

So if you require books be uplifting in order to enjoy them, don't pick this one up. If you want to see how a masterful author can develop a character so real seeming that you want to befriend, help, and guide her, this book does that and more.

[A. Mary · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's no one like Edna O'Brien to burst the fantasy bubble of the fairy tale romance. People who fall in love stagger out the other side stunned gutted disillusioned awakened. O'Brien's skills are consistent from book to book, and the story isn't sensationally told. This novel might be made into an independent movie, but it could never be a mainstream Hollywood film with Julia Roberts. She wouldn't touch it with a stick. O'Brien's protagonist is a young, divorced, mother, who decides to go on a frisky holiday for the week her child is away with his father. But, her fantasy comes up against human beings and human existence, and she gets nothing of the raunchy or tender fling that she envisioned. Dreams and reality have absolutely nothing in common in this story. No rose-coloured glasses here, no unspoiled interlude. Life is as it is in all its miserable possibility. Prince Charming doesn't show up. Some readers might feel a sense of release in the honesty of this book; others might resent the needle pressed against the balloon.

[Peter · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ellen is a 27-year-old Irishwoman separated from her husband and living in London. When Ellen’s husband takes their seven-year-old young son — whom they share custody for — on a camping trip to Wales, Ellen is free to enjoy her own summer break from her job as a theatre critic. A week into her leave, she goes to bed with a male friend but when returns home to his live-in lover she is left frustrated and decides to book a trip to the south of France in search of sun and sex.

In France she flirts with almost every male she sees, including the man sitting beside her on the plane, but her her choices are poor and nothing works out as she would. Then something happens that reminds Ellen that her independence comes at a cost.

First published in 1965 this book was initially banned in Ireland because of its sexual content but by today's standards it is pretty tame. O'Brien writes beautifully about being on holiday and experiencing new things, and it was fascinating to read about a woman’ sexual desires and her hunger to live life to the fullest. But it was the sudden mood swing midway through that really made an impression on me. Suddenly the whole story took on a very different slant. It left me with very mixed feelings about Ellen, whilst she was in France I wanted to go up on her, shake by the shoulders and tell her not to be so stupid but whilst in the UK I wanted to give her a big hug. However, I have to say overall I found this an OK read rather than a particularly gripping one.

[George · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Another well written Edna O'Brien novel, but not as entertaining and charming and the first two in the Country Girl series. The protagonist, Ellen, is in her late 20s and no longer living with her husband. She is looking after her 8 year old son in London in the 1960s. O'Brien very effectively describes a woman who is hurting, insecure and unsure of what she wants. She decides on the spur of the moment to fly to France for a short one week holiday whilst her ex-husband has taken their son on a camping holiday. It's a sad story that gives a very good view on life from Ellen's perspective in the 1960s.

[Maria · Rating 2 out of 5]

Waste of time

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sometimes life can be lonely and isolating. Sometimes you feel the loneliest in a group of people.
I am still thinking about this book and the progression of events. I am impressed with how well Edna O'Brien conveys emotional peaks and valleys, how she can expose the depths of loneliness, sadness and grief.

Rather than spend a lonely summer in London, Ellen decides to take herself on a lovely vacation to the French Riviera only to walk into a comedy of errors. After being brought as low as possible, Ellen does find her way back to herself and living her life.

This is not a happy or easy book, but that is not a bad thing as life is about exploring the good, the bad and the ugly. This is not a book I will recommend to most people as many of my friends do not like unsavory characters and negative emotions.

[Maureen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This must have been audacious stuff back in 1965, with its frank depiction of feminine carnality, but today it seems dated. Holidaying in France and eating an artichoke is no longer the height of decadence - and please, please do not describe a penis as resembling 'a foxglove in a secret glade'.

[Book Mitch · Rating 1 out of 5]

I found this book to be nonsensically written. Zero plot. No connection to character. Good thing it was a very short read, otherwise I don't think I could've finished it. This writing style is just not for me.

[Dimitris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Φυσικά και θα το διάβαζα Αύγουστο...

Όταν θέλω να διαβάσω πραγματική γυναικεία λογοτεχνία εστιάζω πάντα σε δύο αγαπημένα ονόματα της γενιάς της μάνας μου: Φρανσουάζ Σαγκάν και Έντνα Ο΄Μπράιαν. Αναζητήστε τες αν θέλετε να καταλάβετε πώς πραγματικά αισθάνονταν και τι ονειρεύονταν οι νεαρές μανάδες μας στα 60ς.

Αυτό εδώ είναι από τα πρώτα-πρώτα βιβλία της Ο΄Μπράιαν (ακμαιότατη ακόμα και σήμερα που κοντεύει τα 95!), εκδοθέν το μακρινό πια 1965 και υπέροχα ρετρό. Δύσκολα πιστεύει κανείς πως τότε είχε απαγορευτεί σε πολλές Ευρωπαϊκές χώρες ως αισχρό. Πόσο «προχώρησε» ο κόσμος μας...

Μέσα σε 167 σελίδες ανατέμνει απόλυτα την ψυχοσύνθεση μιας εικοσιοκτάχρονης χωρισμένης μάνας που είναι μόνη, επιθυμεί τον περιστασιακό έρωτα, νοιώθει τύψεις για τον γιο της, έχει κατάλοιπα Καθολικισμού, αποδρά και ζει τη ζωή της στο φουλ για 20 Αυγουστιάτικες μέρες στην Κυανή Ακτή, το πληρώνει ακριβά στο τελευταίο δραματικό κομμάτι της νουβέλας.

Πλημμυρισμένο από το φως της Μεσογείου μα πολύ σκοτεινό στο βάθος του. Η γραφή της πρωτότυπη, κοφτή, ρεαλιστική, σκληρή, λακωνικότατη, έστω και μέσα από τη μέτρια μετάφραση. Τι διαφορά από τις σημερινές φεμινιστικές φωνές που θα έπαιρναν το θέμα και θα το ξεχείλωναν σε 600 βαρετές περιγραφικότατες σελίδες με 10 διαφορετικά, ανούσια sub-plots! Κυρίες μου, μάθετε μπαλίτσα από την Έντα.

[Mia˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ · Rating 1 out of 5]

At least give me something to care about

[Jovana Autumn · Rating 2 out of 5]

I usually like novels about fed-up women going on self-discovery journies in exotic places only to find that the problem lies in themselves and that they need to figure out what they want from life in order to be able to pursue their individual happiness and meaning.

What I don't like is writing a novel in such a dry tone that bores the reader, in this case, me. It's been 4 days and this short book put me in a reading slump, so it, indeed, fulfills the promise of making August a wicked month.

We follow Ellen on her abovementioned journey. She is separated from her husband, lonely, and still figuring out what she wants in life - which is fine, normal, and should be talked about, especially at the time it was published in 1965.

This book explores the complex feelings of balancing your identity between your inner self, a self who is a wife, and a mother.
The narrative tone is the biggest issue for me. It felt almost like a draft of a novel. Often times I would find myself losing focus on what I was reading and having to read some passages again.

A sensitive topic - he death of a child, was jumbled into the narration...out of the blue. Grief isn't the same for everyone, I am not judging Ellen's reaction to the news, but what I am confused about is how the writer managed to implement the event in the novel.

In short, the novel bored me to death. Maybe another Edna O'Brien book might be better but this one wasn't it for me. It can be summarized as:

"Irish, cottage, poor, typical, pink cheeks, came to be a nurse in London, loved by all the patients, loved being loved, ran from the operating theatre because one of those patients who had a cancer, was just opened and closed again, met a man who liked the nursemaid in me, married him in a registry office, threw away the faith, one son soon after. Over the years the love turned into something else and we broke up. Exit the nice girl.’ She bowed on the last three words."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
I need a moment to recover from the dullness of the narrative in this one. Review to come.

[Judy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This review is a complete spoiler, so if you have not read the book and plan to, you might want to read it first. If you don't plan to, you can read this as a plot summary.

I love Edna O'Brien so much. I just get her and I feel she gets me. She turned 90 on December 15, 2020. Just the other day.

This was her next novel after The Country Girls Trilogy. Ellen, formerly of Ireland, lives in London and is divorced. She and her ex share a son who is eight years old. He mostly lives with Ellen but has weekends with his dad. Oh how I remember those times with my boys and my ex. That did not turn out well for us but things went worse for Ellen.

When the dad takes the boy for a week long summer camping trip, Ellen decides to go on holiday herself. A fling to assuage her sorrows and to celebrate her freedom. Wild parties on the Riviera with wild people.

Then disaster. She gets the news that her son was killed by a truck on the side of a road. She stays on the Riviera for a few more weeks. It is August. She enters into an orgy of sex, eating, drinking and swimming with a mysterious guy. That all ends when he disappears and she develops what she fears may be gonorrhea. Worst nightmare scenario.

She finally goes home and works it all out, lets go of loss and failure and resolves to move on. I remember resolving the same.

[Frank · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was terrific. A new voice, not the same Kate of The Country Girls trilogy, a slightly older but much more mature woman. Ellen Sage is, like Kate, the divorced mother of a young son. Her estranged husband and child go on a camping holiday to Wales and rather than sit around stuffy London, Ellen books a flight to the Côte d'Azure, looking for sex—pure and simple. But as Oscar Wilde said of truth, it is rarely pure and never simple. After a number of false starts with hotel staff, Ellen falls in with a louche crowd of hangers-on surrounding an American film star. And then she learns her son has been killed by a car crossing a road.

There is something about the entire book that reminded me of La dolce vita. I see it in black-and-white (despite the colour that O'Brien uses frequently and forcefully). This may in part have to do with the jacket illustration. Nevertheless, there is a new level of ennui and resignation, of displacement and alienation that in some ways reminded me of—and anticipates—Joan Didion's early fiction: Play It as It Lays and Book of Common Prayer.

[Marg Casey · Rating 5 out of 5]

A novel about thirty-something Londoner Ellen who, while estranged from her husband, has a meaningless vacation affair on the French Riviera. A brilliant and prescient 1965 exploration of the darker aspects of the 1960s sexual revolution and how it introduced new oppressions for women, in particular: seemingly mandatory promiscuity and a stress on slimness that causes neurotic calorie-counting. In this novel, squashed strawberries “leak blood” and flowers have “no smell” - there is a dystopian conjoining of artificiality, decadence, diseased bodily effluvia, and consumerism (of women’s bodies as well as goods) despite the glamorous continental setting and the wealth on display. A fabulous counter to the male-authored portraits of the 1960s as liberation. This is more of a precursor to the Charles Manson darkness with which that decade culminated than a celebration of excess.

[Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

A lushly written voyage of self discovery! INTO A SWAMP OF CATHOLIC GUILT. I guess in the early 1960s a nice irish lady couldn't buy a plane ticket and some scandalous trousers and head to France for anonymous holiday sex without a Severe God Smiting. Make a note of it, sluts who like carmine polish on your toes. Make a note of it and keep those knees together lest your sin kill your kid and net you a nice case of trichomoniasis.

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

oH my goodness -Edna O`Briens writing is so unique and beautiful.An adventure and a very sad book,sometimes what you seek is not what you think.This book was banned in some countries when it came out- faintly scandalous now. Great tale about how what we have never seems enough and then we are disappointed with our dreams at times.

[John Purcell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can see why it was banned. How uncomfortable this book would have made certain men feel. And some women, too, I suppose. I kept having to remind myself that it was written in the early sixties. So fresh and new it feels. Reminded me of Kate Chopin's The Awakening. Completely different era, same defiance. Loved it.

[Lucia Nieto Navarro · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nuestra protagonista ellen es una joven irlandesa de 27 años, separada de su marido el cual vive en londres. cuando este se lleva a su hijo de acampada, ella queda libre para disfrutar de sus vacaciones, y entre unas cosas y otras viaja al sur de francia en busca de sol y sexo.

Publicado en 1965, este libro fue prohibido inicialmente en irlanda por su gran contenido sexual, (aunque a dia de hoy y visto lo visto es bastante light) y por los temas sociales que trata durante el periodo represivo de la historia de Irlanda tras la segunda guerra mundial.

Un libro que refleja perfectamente como una mujer puede perfectamente estar de vacaciones, experimentar cosas nuevas, y vivir la vida todo lo que pueda, pero también me impresiono su cambio de actitud cuando vuelve de esas vacaciones.

Un libro con el que no he llegado a empatizar, diferente y que tiene una gran crítica social detrás de la historia. Muy cortito y rápido de leer, diferente, y que si te gusta como aborda el tema de la mujer seguro que gusta.

[Aoibheann · Rating 3 out of 5]

My first book by this author and I really enjoyed the writing style which is a very languid stream of consciousness! 3.5 stars

[neon ghouls · Rating 2 out of 5]

????

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ellen, like so many other women, is dissatisfied with her life. She has left her husband, taking their son with her. When he comes to take the boy on holiday, she makes her own to the south of France, spending her days in a haze of decadance and forgetfulness.
 
If you are looking for a book with a lot of plot, then you best skip this book. It is an homage to internal thought and introspection, reminding me in many ways of Kate Chopin's The Awakening, Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse, and Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar. The language has a slow, langurious quality to it, in which everything seems to be happening in the half-realized manner of a dream, interspersed with the frenetic quality of extreme loneliness. This book filled me with an incredible sense of sadness, as in some ways I found myself in complete undersranding of ellen's emotions. I felt a keen sympathy with her. The author's characterization was incredibly well-done. It was as if I was living Ellen's story myself. 
 
I found it quite a different type of read from the same author's The Country Girls Trilogy, and look forward to reading more by her to see if she is yet again able to sucessfully make another stylistic change, or if it will more closely match one or the other of her books I have already completed. As needs must with novels of this type it was quite short, only 138 pages long, so if you are unsure of it at least it will not be a lot of time spent. If you enjoy novels of the variety I mentioned earlier in my review, then this is definitely one you should read. If not, then I highly recommend you take a pass.

[Jeremy · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I'd actually give this something like 3 1/2 stars, I bumped it up to 4 because even lesser O'Brien beats so much of what I've read lately - and this book is nearly as old as I am. A short novel, it is nevertheless jam-packed with the O'Brien's trademark haunting prose - in her best works (House of Splendid Isolation, In the Forest), her trance-like writing is both comforting and harrowing - often at the very same time. August... is a quiet glimpse into the life of a woman who is starved for love - emotionally, and (shockingly for 1965 readers) physically. The central character is so lost, that you ache for her while at the same time you'd like to slap her and tell her to get over it (though I can't honestly say my choices would have been any different). As a character study, it excels even as its contrived plot interferes and says "young author." A good introduction to O'Brien for those who don't know her work, and a yearning look back at her early work for those who do.

[Joselito Honestly and Brilliantly · Rating 3 out of 5]

August is a wicked month because when Ellen's son went on a camping trip with his father [Ellen's estranged husband who hated her:] Ellen was so lonely, as she has been lonely since her marriage broke up, that she had sex with a married man who has a mistress he couldn't leave and who didn't call her anymore after they've had sex during their third meeting, so Ellen, on a whim went to a holiday in France hoping to find love and sex there, as she was just 28, but all she found there was frustration and bad sex, the last one of which even gave her venereal disease, and all along, during those misadventures, he didn't know that her son had been ran over by a vehicle and her estranged husband didn't know where to look for her so he buried there son without her, and she went home broke and sick.

That is why August is a wicked month. It all happened in August.

[Inês Gomes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Saído à rua em 1965. Inevitavelmente é uma Edna O’Brien menos madura. Mas a sua essência está lá. Embora a escrita seja muito mais simples e linear, a sua capacidade de surpreender e de tocar aspectos brutais da vida de uma forma crua e ao mesmo tempo tão verdadeira que nos arrebata, está cá.