Girl, Woman, Other

It's a polyphonic collection of 12 short, loosely interconnected stories of Black, British women ranging in age from 19 to 93. We've got Amma hitting the big time with a play opening at The National after years of scrappy outsider productions. Her daughter Yazz pushes up against her mother's brand of Boomer feminism with her own rules and concerns. Dominique enters into a lesbian relationship and is quickly skirted away to a “wimmin's commune” and we even have a Black British farmer. I appreciate the representation, certainly at this moment it feels all the more important to have a book wholly dedicated to these voices. In hindsight the dual Booker manages to balance Atwood's brand of white feminism against Evaristo's Black and Intersectional feminism.

I enjoyed the collection and seeing the connections however slight as it is bookended by Amma's play “The Last Amazon of Dahomey.” It doesn't really resolve any larger narrative tension when it finishes but collectively the stories work together to paint a rich world with characters we don't often see on the page.

Evaristo crafted some of the most realistic characters I've ever read. After reading both the winners of the 2019 Booker Prize, there is absolutely no comparison between the quality. Girl Woman, Other should have been the sole winner. I highly recommend it.

I absolutely loved this book.

Wow. Wow. Wow. I feel like I just attended a party with some of the coolest women in the world and I got to really know them over a brief period of time. Not everyone's story was as fascinating as Hattie's (but come on! How great is she?) but each one was full of wisdom. I thought to myself at one point, this book could literally go on forever-introducing new characters and letting them intersect here and there and I would continue to read it.
I loved this book. I think I'll probably reread it at a slower pace sometime in the future as I was under a time crunch because of library holds and the goal set by myself to read all of the Tournament of Books books by March 1st.

RTC

A well deserved winner of the Booker Prize.

Perhaps my favorite thing about Girl, Woman, Other is how Bernardine Evaristo gives a unique voice and perspective to the twelve subjects. Hearing that the story focuses almost entirely women who are black and British, I worried that the author would push a particular perspective or agenda. Certainly, in these interconnected stories, there's bound to be some overlap, but Evaristo really presents a wide spectrum, giving substance to each and every voice regardless of her personal views. This is a skill that needs to be applauded as many talented authors choose not to (or refuse to) implement such diversity in their work.

The structure—a sort of hybrid of prose and poetry—is a little off-putting at first, but quickly becomes natural. The language is gorgeous, but not overly ornate.

The overarching story is masterful in regards to some smaller arcs, but really weak in regards to others. That's perhaps this novel's most notable weakness—if you can call it that. The individual stories are all strong, though. Some of them were particularly moving, but all of them kept my interest.

Girl, Woman, Other is a particularly strong piece of fiction because it gets so much right—it's wise and entertaining, honest and sensitive, sharp and meandering, pause and movement. It may lean towards being driven by character and language, but it is quite well balanced with story. I doubt that I'll read this novel again (as re-reads are vary rare in my world), but it's certainly one that I'd consider giving another look in the distant future. I feel like this novel would only improve with a subsequent, more focused reading.


Advanced Reader Copy provided through Edelweiss.