Prize Readers discussion

Just picked this up from the library yesterday. I'm about 50 pages in and...oh, boy, it reminds me a lot of Milkman because of how insular and repetitive it is. It's fairly challenging and obscure. I know in the other thread we discussed Milkman not being stream-of-consciousness, and this book shares many of its traits, but I honestly don't know how else to describe it. It's the interior monologue of someone's thoughts as they meander and traipse and call-back a recent memory, interspersed with interruptions of the current moment. I don't know if I like that kind of book yet here I am powering through...I really don't want to read this for more than 2 days--Milkman took me 3 weeks and it was barely 300 pages. If a book takes me that long to read it's usually 700-1000 pages (A Little Life, Overstory, etc.). Here's hoping I can knock it out and makes sense of it!

I didn’t much like Milkman. I listened to the audio because it was in the Booker list. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have gotten through it in print. If I can get audio for this I’ll give it a go otherwise I’m going to wait and see if it makes the shortlist before I decide if I want to take it on. I used to be all about difficult and/or experimental fiction but somewhere along the way I lost my patience for it. I’ll be curious to see what you think.

Doesn’t look like audio exists for this title but the ebook is available on hoopla so I’ll read a few pages and see if I can keep you company on this one.

Amanda wrote: "...see if I can keep you company on this one."

Oh, no! Sorry to say, but I'm bailing on this book today. I made it halfway but was struggling so much with it I lapsed into indifference. Lemme know how it goes for you

It’s going the exact same place. At first I thought ok this could work by about 20% I was bored and now at 30% I’ve lost all interest. I guess this book had fans but I sure would have rather seen Freshwater on the list!

Amanda wrote: "I guess this book had fans but I sure would have rather seen F..."

For sure, I would've loved for the group to discuss Oliver Loving--but it looks like we got another book that deals w the aftermath of a school shooting instead.

Oo I LOVED Oliver Loving. Disappointed that wasn’t on the list.