Normal People by Sally Rooney

“Not for the first time Marianne thinks cruelty does not only hurt the victim, but the perpetrator also, and maybe more deeply and more permanently.”

I'm a Sally Rooney fan. I find her work exceptional and always intriguing. I loved Conversations With Friends. So when I saw her next novel was Normal People, my interest was peaked. Then I forgot about it. I'm actually quite forgetful about remembering which books are coming out but thank goodness for the Goodreads app. Someone on my Goodreads timeline had reviewed then book and then I remembered I wanted to read that book! Duh Shannell! I placed a hold for it at the public library and shockingly I was able to pick it up next day.

Marianna and Connell pretend not to know each other. Connell is quite popular and seems sure of himself. Marianne is lonely and very quiet. But one day Connell picks his mother up from cleaning Marianne's house and a relationship grows. One that is forced to stay private. Throughout high school and college, Marianne and Connell seems to circle each other. Constantly in and out of each other's life, but never fully gone. But as Marianne ventures closer and closer to self destruction and Connell into searching for meaning in different places, they must confront how far they are willing to save the other.

I'm going to be honest and say I did not love this novel. I was actually disappointed especially because of how much I love Sally's work. I really resonated with Conversations With Friends and I felt like she truly captured millennials. Which many writers have utterly failed to do. I had such high hopes and by the end of reading this...I was so let down. Many my hopes were too high and maybe I was expecting lightening to strike the same place twice.

I really dislike the "missing each other" trope. I do not like constant horrible communication between characters because that tends to frustrate me. If you're like me, you will not enjoy this book very long. In the beginning, I was really enjoying this novel. I loved the complicated relationship Connell and Marianne had. Being quite young I thought they had a level of maturity I definitely didn't posses in high school. Marianne made my heart hurt reading about how hard her home life was and how lonely she was. Connell seemed very confused about who he was but going along with the status quo. I enjoyed both characters in their younger years and I liked seeing their complicated relationship grow. But once they entered college that all seemed to fade away. I did not enjoy reading about essentially four years of bad communication. I did not like the ending at all either. When I finished the last page I was confused. That's it?! I was questioning my own sanity because it didn't feel like a complete ending to the book. Well the book I thought I had spent the past few days ending. I genuinely felt let down.

This book is not a bad book. It had some very moving parts and I did enjoy the characters for the most part. But this book has tropes that don't work for me as a reader. Judging from the reviews of the book, it worked for many other people. Which is very good and I'm happy it worked for some. I think people should read this book and judge for themselves how they feel. I had a friend that LOVED this book and it really resonated with her. It does touch on some triggering subjects such as alcoholism, abuse, suicide, and other subjects. This is not a romantic book even though it does have a romantic plot line all throughout it. If the tropes I talked about do not bother you, I say read this and enjoy. But as for me, I would rate this a 2 out of 5.

PS-There is a Hulu adaptation of this book coming out on April 26th and I'm pretty sure I'm going to watch it. I'm quite curious of how it turns out and I just like to see books adapted to television. I will definitely update everyone on how I feel about it. Maybe I'll like it better than I liked the book.