The Women's Prize For Fiction 2014
June 6, 2014 4:41 PM Subscribe
This year's Women's Prize For Fiction has been won by A Girl Is A Half-Formed Thing by Eimear McBride.
"Aged 27, she wrote her novel, A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing, in six feverish months. This week, 10 years later and after a stack of rejections, it won the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction (formerly the Orange prize), beating big, brilliant novels by established literary stars Donna Tartt, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Jhumpa Lahiri."
"Aged 27, she wrote her novel, A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing, in six feverish months. This week, 10 years later and after a stack of rejections, it won the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction (formerly the Orange prize), beating big, brilliant novels by established literary stars Donna Tartt, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Jhumpa Lahiri."
Here, for example, are the opening lines: "For you. You'll soon. You'll give her name. In the stitches of her skin she'll wear your say."
That's more than a little unusual.
posted by BrotherCaine at 6:54 PM on June 6, 2014
That's more than a little unusual.
posted by BrotherCaine at 6:54 PM on June 6, 2014
It's a really beautifully written book (although completely heartbreaking and harrowing) and the rhythms and the flow of the half broken language in it make perfect sense when read fully. I don't think it works so well in single sentences, or at least, looks like it will be more work than it is.
All the reviews seem to go on about how difficult the book is (in terms of style rather than content), but that seems a little patronising and demeaning to me - to the book and also to people who read books, with the assumption that anything that's slightly different in style is somehow a challenge.
posted by dng at 1:12 AM on June 7, 2014
All the reviews seem to go on about how difficult the book is (in terms of style rather than content), but that seems a little patronising and demeaning to me - to the book and also to people who read books, with the assumption that anything that's slightly different in style is somehow a challenge.
posted by dng at 1:12 AM on June 7, 2014
For you. You'll soon. You'll give her name. In the stitches of her skin she'll wear your say.
Reminiscent of Selah Saterstrom.
posted by shakespeherian at 6:42 AM on June 7, 2014
Reminiscent of Selah Saterstrom.
posted by shakespeherian at 6:42 AM on June 7, 2014
Worth the hype? Far too soon to say. Ask again in twenty years.
posted by IndigoJones at 7:41 AM on June 7, 2014
posted by IndigoJones at 7:41 AM on June 7, 2014
Looks quite interesting. I love that she kept at it for nine years of rejections. That is persistence! Just added to my to- read list.
posted by honeyx at 6:25 AM on June 8, 2014
posted by honeyx at 6:25 AM on June 8, 2014
US edition isn't scheduled to come out until September. Wonder if (and hope) this will push it forward.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 7:27 AM on June 8, 2014
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 7:27 AM on June 8, 2014
« Older Dramatic Safety Videos from the US Chemical Safety... | It was a miracle of rare device Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
(The book was eventually published by Galley Beggar Press, a tiny publisher which is run out of an absolutely wonderful independent bookshop - The Book Hive - in Norwich, the town where Eimear McBride lives.)
posted by dng at 4:47 PM on June 6, 2014