I desperately wanted to shake her starting from about halfway in, and towards the end I was hoping against hope that this might not be some kind of deeply unhealthy love story but in fact the story of Ava's self inflicted downfall, but I knew exactly how it'd end very early on. I usually enjoy a complicated protagonist, but they have to have at least some redeeming qualities about them and again, if the author thought it would be enough to make Ava occasionally witty (really not as frequently as she/Dolan thinks she is) then that's not enough for me. The thighs that bugged me most about it: Firstly (and very subjectively), the plot such as it is limps along on the very prominent yet somehow simultaneously very insufficient crutch of Dolan's wit. Review contains some spoilers I'd been looking forward to this book so maybe the disappointment was partly due to high expectations. I greatly enjoyed the nuggets on language with which the book is peppered, and the narration is just lovely.īiggest (literary) disappointment of 2020

As for the ending, given the character development up to that point, it just felt really implausible. Are you only gay when you’re actively with a woman, when you’re back with a man you’re straight again, and the concept of bisexuality doesn’t exist…? For a book that has a fair amount to say on deconstructing stereotypes and heteronormativity, it sure did fall straight (pun intended) into that one. As soon as she’s back to sleeping with a man, this aspect of her vanishes entirely from the narrative. The only time that she, a woman who does a lot of reflecting, reflects on her queerness is at the time that she is actually with a woman. Can the author not write romantic relationships between women or was than intentional? Besides the poorly crafted relationships, I found the portrayal of Ava’s queerness utterly bizarre. Her relationship with Julian at least had chemistry, some edge and complexity of dialogue. As soon as her secret about Julian was out, so too was her flame for Edith.

Her relationship with Edith entirely lacked substance: it felt sappy, two-dimensional and appeared to be founded entirely on Ava’s insecurities, obsessions and borderline pathological inability to tell the truth. I initially found Ava’s self-critique of her slightly dirtbag personality refreshing and entertaining, but after hours of the stuff, compounded by her apparent inability to combine her self-reflection with any actionable change to address those aspects of her character, life, or choices with which she was dissatisfied, this book became a tiresome egotistical mope from a deeply unlikable character. Exhausted by Ava’s tedious self-absorption

Exciting times naoise dolan ending