Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine Book Ny Times Review
For aspiring writers out there, Gail Honeyman's road to publication is the stuff of dreams. Motivated by turning forty, the Scottish writer wrote her debut novel Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine in snatched moments outside her full-fourth dimension job. While it was however a piece of work in progress, she won the Scottish Book Trust'south Next Chapter Award. The novel has since sold in 27 territories to date and was shortlisted for the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize, the Bridport Prize and longlisted for BBC Radio 4's Opening Lines.
For Eleanor Oliphant, Honeyman'south unfortunate and hugely sympathetic protagonist, living is the stuff of nightmares. The 30-yr-old ekes out an existence that relies on rigid routine for survival. Working in the accounts section of a production company for the by nine years, Eleanor is the office oddball, a lonesome figure maligned by her colleagues for her quirks and inflexibility. Cleaved into three sections outlined in the contents (a spoiler of sorts), the novel charts Eleanor's journey from her traumatised past to a time to come where she might "have a life, not just an existence".
In a plot that pitches simply the correct amount of action with character evolution, two things kickstart Eleanor's journey. The commencement is the arrival of a new colleague in piece of work, kindly lowest Ray, who sees through Eleanor's stony facade as they bail while helping a pensioner.
The second is Eleanor'southward conclusion to get herself a man, someone who "Mummy" will approve of, which forces her out of her routine of work, solitary meal deal lunches, listening to The Archers in the evenings, and drinking two bottles of vodka every weekend lonely in her firm.
It is this mysterious fact that elevates Honeyman's novel from the off, hooking readers as they long to detect what trauma occurred in Eleanor's past that has prompted such a frequent need for oblivion.
Hilarious snootiness
The overindulgence is at odds with her character the residual of the time, a frugal, near Victorian personality with a hilarious snootiness. Eleanor finds it "much, much easier" to practice the cryptic crossword than read expressions on faces. She takes language literally and speaks in a comical blowsy register, signing her emails "Miss Oliphant" and prefacing attempts at small-scale talk with "I essayed some chitchat". An inaugural trip to a Bobbi Brown counter to get her make-up done leaves her delighted with the result: "'I await like a small Madagascan primate, or perhaps a North American raccoon,' I said. 'It's charming!'"
Merely as Patty Yumi Cottrell and Paula Cocozza accept done with debuts before this summer, Honeyman successfully uses her oddball narrator to poke fun at seemingly normal social conventions. She is specially sharp on the beauty manufacture. Eleanor's beginning bikini wax is depicted literally – "Kayla continued to dip and rip" – with a laugh-out-loud exchange following the end event of the Hollywood. Readers go the benefit of the full makeover effect beloved of romantic fiction heroines, served upwards with a dose of reality: "The goal, ultimately, was successful camouflage every bit a human being adult female … Did men ever await in the mirror, I wondered, and observe themselves wanting in deeply fundamental ways?"
Her superiority is funny because information technology's so at odds with her situation. Eleanor is a truthsayer who can't run into the sad truths almost her own life
The observational humour contrasts brilliantly with the darker plot of trauma in a novel that hits the attainable literary sugariness spot. As Eleanor endures weekly phone conversations with her incarcerated Mummy, readers are presented with a ghastly character who is cleverly incorporated past Honeyman to add suspense. Abuse, loss and death are part of Eleanor'due south past simply the clues are expertly dangled: "Mummy wouldn't exist able to propose. She doesn't get to make up one's mind what she eats." Echoes of Rachel Elliot's acclaimed 2015 debut Whispers Through a Megaphone come through in the warped mother-girl relationship and subject of trauma recovery.
Caustic view
Mummy'due south caustic view of the world has been inherited by Eleanor, minus the evil undertones. Eleanor's remarks are often condescending: "Duffle glaze! Surely they were the preserve of children and small bears?" On wedding gift lists: "They choose things like plates, bowls and cutlery – I hateful, what are they doing at the moment: shovelling food from packets into their mouths with their bare hands?" Her superiority is funny because it's so at odds with her situation. Eleanor is a truthsayer who tin't encounter the deplorable truths nearly her own life.
Honeyman is excellent on the "bad days". Low is a "fearful, incurable affair, and so horrifying that you dare not mention it; other people don't desire to hear the word spoken aloud for fright that they might too exist affected". Eleanor notices that "when you're struggling difficult to manage your ain emotions, information technology becomes unbearable to have to witness other people's, to have to try and manage theirs too".
The human being need for connection, initially scorned past Eleanor, is this heart-rending novel's central theme. Eleanor Oliphant is most definitely not completely fine, but she is one of the most unusual and idea-provoking heroines of recent contemporary fiction.
Source: https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/eleanor-oliphant-is-a-most-unusual-and-thought-provoking-heroine-1.3157828
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