Winner of this year’s Bailey’s Women’s prize for fiction Eimear McBride’s famously experimental novel is a little outside of my comfort zone. Overall I have to admit I didn’t really enjoy it (although there were occasional moments when I thought I was beginning to) –therefore I could only rate it as three stars over on goodreads. That isn’t to say I don’t appreciate the accomplishment, it is a hugely accomplished work, and I am not surprised it has received the praise that it has. I am also not at all surprised to see that it has rather divided the ordinary reader, many people saying it is an amazing, astonishing work with others saying they really couldn’t finish it. A Girl is a Half Formed Thing at its very basic level is something of a marmite book.
“For you. You’ll soon. You’ll give her name. In the stitches of her skin she’ll wear your say. Mammy me? Yes you. Bounce the bed, I’d say. I’d say that’s what you did. They lay you down. They cut you round. Wait and hour and day.”
There are moments (these moments I liked a lot) when Eimear McBride’s fractured unconventional sentences become wonderfully lyrical taking on a rhythm of the Irish voice it’s written in. It takes a little settling into – but it becomes possible quite quickly to understand the narrative, and to enter into the mind of the unnamed narrator. To be honest, the structure of the novel, although not a style I particularly like, was not my biggest issue with the novel. Eimear McBride is an exceptional writer, to my mind she is something of a poet.
Written in a stream of conscious which throws many of the conventional rules of English grammar right out the window, A Girl is a Half Formed Thing’ spanning a period of about twenty years, tells the story of young girl and her family in Ireland. Living in a community dominated by the Catholic Church, our narrator is the younger of two children, being brought up by their mother, the father having apparently left some time earlier. The girl’s elder brother suffers a devastating brain cancer when he is a small child, a tumour he was not expected to survive, and continued to affect him throughout his life, in turn affecting his sister and her relationship with him and their mother. A family often in crisis, the children’s mother sometimes struggles to cope there are occasional beatings, maternal expectations that are hard to meet.
“We were moving off now. From each other. As cannot be. Helped. I didn’t want it from that time on. You know. All that. When you said sit with me on the school bus. I said no. That inside world had caught alight and what I wanted. To be left alone. To look at it. To swing the torch into every corner of what he’d we’d done. Know it and wonder what does it mean. I learned to turn it off, the world that was not my own. Stop up my ears and everything. Who are you? You and me were never this. This boy and girl that do not speak. But somehow I’ve left you behind and you’re just looking on.”
One member of the family who has a profound and lasting effect upon the girl is an uncle who lives in England with his wife and daughters; he first visits the family when the girl is thirteen. The horribly abusive relationship that develops between the girl and her uncle is uncompromisingly told, over and over again, it makes for disturbing and deeply uncomfortable reading, and I am sure that is the point. Numbed and damaged by the abuse, the girl begins to deliberately seek out more damaging, dangerous and abusive situations throughout her teenage years and on into early adulthood. This was the element I really didn’t like. I don’t suppose anyone could possibly like this story really, however, the deeply disturbing and unflinching descriptions of rape were such I just wanted to look away, it was all just really too horrible. The reader can’t help but feel slightly assaulted too. I’ll say no more about the reaminder of story, as I don’t want to spoil it for future readers, but suffice to say it doesn’t get any easier, and the final images McBride leaves her readers with are quite heartbreaking.
I may not have entirely like this novel, but I believe Eimear McBride is a very talented writer. The way she has played with language is extraordinary, these deconstructed sentences, tiny fragments that are pieced together, do create a recognisable world, filled with real people. There isn’t however, the depth of character that I particularly like as a reader, and the limited nature of her description, means the images that one is left with are stark and rather brutal, I am sure this is not accidental. I will be interested to read more work by Eimear McBride in the future, but I may still approach it with some caution.
Great review! I too wouldn’t say I enjoyed reading this novel – it’s a brutal story that is often uncomfortable to read – but I agree that Eimear McBride is a very talented writer and the way she has written this book is incredibly powerful.
You really can’t help but wonder what she will come up with next.
Excellent review Ali – although I can read strong stuff, I think this is not for me. It somehow feels too close to the misery memoirs that flood the bookshops and also I would struggle if there wasn’t enough depth of character.
I really don’t think you’d like it Karen.
I have shivers just from reading the two small quotes you provided. This one’s moving up the TBR… thanks for the balanced review!
Oh I really hope you like it. Let me know.
I truly appreciate reviews like this. Even as you are articulating what made you uncomfortable about the work, you very generously acknowledge its merits, too. I always grab a book on the way out the door, and this one, which has been sitting on my desk for a few weeks, is now under my arm.
I do hope you -not sure enjoy is the right word -but appreciate it at least.
Hi again. Just wanted to let you know that I finished the book, found it rough going at times but was glad for the experience, and wrote about it here: http://bookgagabooks.ca/2014/08/13/a-girl-is-a-half-formed-thing-by-eimear-mcbride/ (and linked back here, as I very much appreciated your review).
Thank you.
I was interested to see your experience with this novel. I tend to really enjoy experimental fiction, but have not quite plucked up the courage to read this yet – it winning all those prizes and the like. I love the quotes you’ve picked (I read them to myself in an Irish accent and they did flow), so I must get a move on and read the book!
I think keeping that Irish voice in your head as you read does help.
I just finished this book this week and was also taken way outside of my comfort zone – it is very hard hitting. I also really enjoyed the rhythm aspects you have talked about and found that once I had got into the rhythm, it flowed, but each time I picked up the book I had to readjust. I can’t decide if I am happy that I have read it or not. You have written a great review.
Thank you. It’s certainly a book I think I will remember, whether I want to or not.
I heard Eimar reading excerpts from it on radio and thought it was brilliant. If readers are struggling with it in written form, maybe it would be a great listen, on audiobook. The meaning and different voices were crystal clear when heard aloud, and it flowed beautifully.
Yes I didn’t find it as hard to read as I thought I would it does flow in a quite poetical way.
Hm, my jury is out on this one. I applaud the way she is trying to do something different with her style of writing but there were a couple of points in those quotes that make me feel it can be a bit forced. In normal speech pattern you wouldn’t have the punctuation here:
As cannot be. Helped
I think it’s supposed to be her confused mind rather than speaking directly but I know what you mean. Someone in the book group on Thursday also thought there were times when it seemed a bit forced.
A fair and balanced review of a challenging book – not one for me! It will be interesting to see what she does next, and I’m pleased experimentation is still part of the modern novel!
Yes you wouldn’t like it all all Liz 🙂
I’m not sure if I want to read this or not! I’ve still got Will Self’s ‘Umbrella’ on the shelf unread. I think there can be a point when things are just experimental for the sake of it. I’m wary of things that just want the reader to ‘like’ them; but this may be going the opposite way. There’s so much I haven’t read, 100s of things waiting on the shelves – Turgenev, Dickens, Gaskell novels I haven’t tried – re-reading Iris Murdoch … think they may be a wiser investment of time than this 🙂
Oh yes I think so. I doubt I would have ever read this had it not been for the bool group
It was an interesting experience but I too wonder about the experimental nature of literature. I read Umbrella too, I was reading the booker shortlist that year (probably won’t do that again) I didn’t hate it but I didn’t like it much either.
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Well done you for braving it, I admit I don’t have this one on my shelf, nor do I currently have the energy for it. I have no doubt it is the work of a talented writer/poet and it is wonderful that her work has garnered such recognition.
Yes she is gifted with her use of language, certainly.
Didn’t realise I was reading an old digest of posts! Oh well, one I missed anyway 🙂
This book made my eyes bleed. Ugh.
Oh dear. It’s a difficult read in many wats.