A(nother) Year in Books

One girl's attempt to keep track of what she reads.

[intrepidgirlreader]

The sound that he’d made, chopping firewood in his driveway, it had grated on Michael. The slow rhythm of the splitting. It had brought Michael up off the couch, to the dining room window, to watch and mutter his curses. Why couldn’t that sound do that again? I thought, in the waking dream of the moment, the unreal state of being still the only one who knew. Why couldn’t that sound summon Michael once more? Needle him, scrape at his ears. Why not? What kind of a person would I be if I didn’t at least try to call him back?

Imagine Me Gone by Adam Haslett

[intrepidgirlreader]

As soon as I spoke, it would be true.

Imagine Me Gone by Adam Haslett

[intrepidgirlreader]

Mama’s smile hadn’t aged. Jazmine could be eight years old again, for all her mother had changed. Her childhood felt close enough to touch.

The Wishing Pool and Other Stories by Tananarive Due

[intrepidgirlreader]

Last names could change, and being a part of a family didn’t mean people wouldn’t hurt you, but it was still something wonderful.

Mislaid in Parts Half-Known by Seanan McGuire

[intrepidgirlreader]

“Almost always” is a very different thing from “always.” Lives are lived and lost in “almost.”

Mislaid in Parts Half-Known by Seanan McGuire

[intrepidgirlreader]

He probably won’t come back, she thinks. Or he will, differently. What they have now they can never have back again. But for her the pain of loneliness will be nothing to the pain that she used to feel, of being unworthy. He brought her goodness like a gift and now it belongs to her.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

No one can be independent of other people completely, so why not give up the attempt, she thought, go running in the other direction, depend on people for everything, allow them to depend on you, why not.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

What’s left for them, then? There doesn’t seem to be a halfway position anymore. Too much has passed between them for that. So it’s over, and they’re just nothing? What would it even mean, to be nothing to her? He could avoid her, but as soon as he saw her again, even if they only glanced at one another outside a lecture hall, the glance could not contain nothing. He could never really want it to. He has sincerely wanted to die, but he has never sincerely wanted Marianne to forget about him. That’s the only part of himself he wants to protect, the part that exists inside her.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

There’s something frightening about her, some huge emptiness in the pit of her being. It’s like waiting for a lift to arrive and when the doors open nothing is there, just the terrible dark emptiness of the elevator shaft, on and on forever. She’s missing some primal instinct, self-defense or self-preservation, which makes other human beings comprehensible. You lean in expecting resistance, and everything just falls away in front of you. Still, he would lie down and die for her at any minute, which is the only thing he knows about himself that makes him feel like a worthwhile person.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

He reaches for her hand and she gives it to him without thinking. For a second he holds it, his thumb moving over her knuckles. Then he lifts her hand to his mouth and kisses it. She feels pleasurably crushed under the weight of his power over her, the vast ecstatic depth of her will to please him.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

It’s funny the decisions you make because you like someone, he says, and then your whole life is different. I think we’re at that weird age where life can change a lot from small decisions. But you’ve been a very good influence on me overall, like I definitely am a better person now, I think. Thanks to you. She lies there breathing. Her eyes are burning but she doesn’t make any move to touch them. When we were together in first year of college, she says, were you lonely then? No. Were you? No. I was frustrated sometimes but not lonely. I never feel lonely when I’m with you.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

While they were driving through Longford they had the radio on, it was playing a White Lies song that had been popular when they were in school, and without touching the dial or raising his voice to be heard over the sound of the radio Connell said: You know I love you. He didn’t say anything else. She said she loved him too and he nodded and continued driving as if nothing at all had happened, which in a way it hadn’t.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

Connell went home that night and read over some notes he had been making for a new story, and he felt the old beat of pleasure inside his body, like watching a perfect goal, like the rustling movement of light through leaves, a phrase of music from the window of a passing car. Life offers up these moments of joy despite everything.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

He’s not sure what friends are allowed to enjoy about each other. In a series of emails they exchanged recently about their own friendship, Marianne expressed her feelings about Connell mainly in terms of her sustained interest in his opinions and beliefs, the curiosity she feels about his life, and her instinct to survey his thoughts whenever she feels conflicted about anything. He expressed himself more in terms of identification, his sense of rooting for her and suffering with her when she suffers, his ability to perceive and sympathise with her motivations. Marianne thought this had something to do with gender roles. I think I just like you a lot as a person, he replied defensively. That’s actually very sweet, she wrote back.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

I hope we can always take each other’s sides.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

She feels that even she doesn’t know what her family are like, that she’s never adequate in her attempts to describe them, that she oscillates between exaggerating their behavior, which makes her feel guilty, or downplaying it, which also makes her feel guilty, but a different guilt, more inwardly directed.

Normal People by Sally Rooney

[intrepidgirlreader]

She felt happy to be surrounded by people she liked, who liked her. She knew that if she wanted to speak, everyone would probably turn around and listen out of sincere interest, and that made her happy too, although she had nothing at all to say.

Normal People by Sally Rooney