to think that Sally Rooney and her mates must be really bloody boring company? NO SPOILERS PLEASE

[PorkySisyphus]

Am currently 10 eps into Coversations With Friends.

How are all of her characters so interminably navel-gazey, muttery and downright boring? Her lead females especially. Jesus, this new one is the drippiest drip that ever dripped.

And the love interest? Eurgh. All the charisma of a lumpy bowl of yesterday's porridge. He also looks like Zach from Gilmore Girls if he were a try hard actor (emphasis on the or) which is tickling me every time he comes on screen.

I'm Irish. I'm not young and have zero experience of Dublin uni life. If these shows are reflective of it then I'm pretty glad about that.

QUB circa 1999 was much better craic with actual parties and fun and people not living in phone-glued-to-hand, frumpy jumper clad perma-misery over their own shitty relationship choices.

Its all so bloody draining and avoidable.

I know I can just not watch but I'm sick and need distraction.

Also it's my birthday but I can't eat. Please send virtual cake.

The TV version of Normal People was really well cast and watchable, but I lasted about 10 pages into the book before it went into the box for the charity shop.

Awful awful writing. I've been meaning to watch this new one.......... and was hoping it would be the same.

@Elsiebear90 it's 'nevertheless' and it's one word

Okay 🙄

Excellent- thank you.

I liked the book and I really liked both the book & TV adaptation of Normal People, but I think I'll give it a miss. I hated Beautiful World Where Are You? so much it's put me off her forever. Her central female characters are all the same and it all got a bit dull and smug.
I'm also Irish and went to QUB in the 1990s, and it was good craic. Not a fucking dinner party to be had!
She's not an anti-semite though, what a stupid and nasty thing to say.

Dull as fuck and everyone is about as likeable as Saddam Hussein. About to turn off episode two three minutes in, before Frances and Taylor Swift’s boyfriend start their inane twaddlings and bore me rigid.

Nothing remotely "normal" about Connel or Marianne. Would love to read a book when the main characters aren't ridiculously smart and not only at a top university but excelling.

No she's not.

You should feel foolish for making a mistake or ashamed for telling a lie. You can decide which.

One of the actresses said she found it difficult at first because it was blatantly obvious it was 'marriage written by a 20 yr old'.

That is such a good description of CWF.

Thanks.

Absolutely this. The dullest book I have picked up in a long time. I got half way through and gave up!

Maybe life is bland and boring but that's definitely how I find her books.I'm not sure why liking or not liking her books is so contentious.

This!

Writing about people with dull or mundane lives can be a literary thing and can be done amazingly well. There are short stories by Alice Munro that are about minutiae of someone’s dull life that are things of beauty and brilliant writing. And there are novels about mundanity, loneliness and the boredom of life, but they are exploring that deliberately.

I thought the article linked to earlier was interesting as it does suggest she has a deliberate agenda and is writing like this for a reason, rather than just being an accidentally bad, dull chick lit writer or similar. But the writing does seem hard to get through, now I’ve looked at some extracts. And the navel-gazing might be a symptom of the time, so if you’re under 30 or so it seems normal and if you’re older it grates on you (as a generalisation).

Amor Towles covers decades of the minutiae of a man in captivity in' A Gentleman in Moscow'.
The slow pace of the book is actually elegiac and beautiful.
Life's too short for reading books you don't enjoy and I can't say I'll read any more Rooney novels but all credit to her for hitting on some sort of winning formula in terms of literary popularity.

Who would have thought a winning formula would consist of two unlikely stories with endings ,about deeply unlikeable characters from dysfunctional families that seem troubled and depressed the whole time.
Chuck in Trinity College and a trip abroad for no apparent reason.

I agree the books are shit. I like the TV shows for all the sex as it brightens up my own middle aged dull and mundane life. However only on iplayer so I can fast forward over the boring bits.

Well in book publishing, the winning formula is always a thing of mystery. Who would have thought screeds of excruciating, unbelievably badly written BDSM soft porn would suddenly be a massive bestseller for example. Countless bestsellers are terrible and mystifying. Then because they were bestsellers, they start a trend and loads of other people write like that for a few years.

Ha ha. I do love her books, but I also always wonder about her friendships. In Beautiful World it actually ramps up the discussions because main character and her friend have loads of email discussions- and l cannot imagine anybody I know having the patience for those deep philosophical chats. The craic is weak.

@PorkySisyphus I was also at QUB in 1999, and the level of mad sarcasm and wild banter I'd have got if I'd even started into some sort of deep chat would have been hilarious. My friends would still be taking the piss out of me now.

Yes, there's some proper awful stuff out there, and people love it. Weird.

I thought someone interested in reading would want to know!

"How are all of her characters so interminably navel-gazey, muttery and downright boring? Her lead females especially. Jesus, this new one is the drippiest drip that ever dripped."

They really are, OP!

Frances was pure Marianne at points. Nick marginally better than Connell though, he said actual words much more.

Bit off topic but I saw an article about NP's Paul Mescal the other day. He's sporting quite an unattractive 'tache and going to yoga with Phoebe Bridgers his gf/fiancee depending on what you read. He was set for great things, but not sure what happened to the films etc.

I went to QUB in the 2000s and my best friend went to Trinity. We both think it's quite an accurate depiction of Trinity life, the dinner parties, the conversations, even down to the clothing (lots of rich kids in thrifted jumpers). I like normal people, wasn't fussed on cwf. The shots of dublin then suddenly they're in established or general merchants in belfast is very distracting too.

Oh I will check it out

Enjoyed the book, and liked the tv version of NP which was very true to the book I thought