![]() It’s similar to Rooney’s debut novel, Conversations with Friends (Hogarth, 2018) in terms of character dynamics both novels are, depending on one’s point of view, either love stories or stories about characters who needlessly complicate their own lives in pursuit of a dubious connection adjacent to love. The novel tracks nearly five years of the relationship between Connell and Marianne, two students in the west of Ireland. Normal People is inarguably interesting, regardless of how aware a reader is about Rooney’s rise to fame the opinion of this reviewer is that the book is also a formidable literary achievement. ![]() The temptation to disclaim, then, that an opinion rightly takes into consideration this entire life-cycle of criticism can threaten to occlude the basic question of whether or not the work is, in itself, interesting. Rooney’s second novel, Normal People is, by virtue of her obvious talent and easy marketability (critics have taken to labeling her a “millennial novelist”), an enormous literary event, and as such it’s inspired nearly every critical evaluation imaginable. ![]() To review Sally Rooney‘s latest work almost necessitates a kind of self-conscious disclaimer, even when the review itself is effusive. ![]()
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