false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174439941m/400254.jpg 400254 6 Some novels you nibble away at, half unthinking. Anne Enright's prose bites back. The Irish author of <I>The Portable Virgin</I> and <I>The Wig My Father Wore</I> has produced a third book as unexpected and lively as a miracle child--or is it twins? She tells the story of a Dubliner whose mother died in childbirth. Maria is now 20, living in New York, cleaning houses, taking drugs, sleeping with strangers, and generally being in a funk. In a lover's bag, she finds an old photo of a girl who looks just exactly like herself, dressed in clothes she's never owned, posing with people she's never met. But this isn't some gooey, alternate-reality identity fantasy. Maria has, in fact, a twin sister. Though each is unknown to the other, we learn both their lives inside out as they head toward a giddily inevitable meeting. <p> This twinning tale suits Enright's style right down to the ground: Her mandate is to bump us into awareness, and if it takes double heroines, so be it. Her language does the rest of the work. On the very first page, for instance, she freshens the simple act of holding a baby into a joke: "And they handed her on from arm to arm, with the dip that people make when they give away a baby--letting her body go and guiding her head, as though it might not be attached. Nothing worse than being left holding the baby, they seemed to say, except being left with the baby's head." In fact, Enright is transfixed by the weirdness of the body, as when Maria visits a dairy farm: "She is too old to dip her fingers in the milk and let the calves suck. Though when she does, a feeling she has never had before goes straight up her arm and into her right nipple. Hello, farming." Enright writes fiction meant to surprise. But her message is surprisingly traditional: biology matters. <I>--Claire Dederer</I> 389679 2000 What Are You Like?: A Novel total:69|5:9|4:19|3:27|2:8|1:6| 69 224 134 16 2 1 false false Fri Apr 10 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Apr 10 05:37:09 -0700 2009 Fri Apr 10 05:43:20 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Sun Dec 14 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Sat Dec 20 10:34:11 -0800 2008 Sat Dec 20 10:40:10 -0800 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Fri Mar 13 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Mar 23 08:39:10 -0700 2009 Mon Mar 23 08:41:18 -0700 2009 3 0 false false Thu Jan 29 04:19:37 -0800 2009 Thu Jan 29 04:20:34 -0800 2009 4 0 false false Thu Sep 17 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Tue Sep 15 01:43:02 -0700 2009 Fri Sep 18 23:06:49 -0700 2009 4 0 false false Tue Feb 10 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Wed Nov 05 06:31:05 -0800 2008 Wed Feb 18 07:36:49 -0800 2009
And again with this, she is skilled at painting pictures of largely unhappy and messed up people. A lot of the same themes arise, sadness, depression, birth, death, sex - all of whi...more...]]> 2 0 false false Thu Jul 31 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Mon Aug 04 20:21:59 -0700 2008 Mon Aug 04 20:24:18 -0700 2008 more...]]> 1 0 false false Fri Apr 03 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Mar 30 07:52:11 -0700 2009 Wed Apr 29 08:39:10 -0700 2009 .5 2 0 false false Wed Jun 11 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sun Jun 08 10:34:51 -0700 2008 Wed Jun 11 19:27:54 -0700 2008 4 0 false false Fri Sep 18 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Aug 12 18:40:43 -0700 2009 Fri Sep 18 08:33:22 -0700 2009 5 0 false false Sun Feb 01 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Dec 30 18:27:17 -0800 2008 Tue Feb 17 19:33:02 -0800 2009 ]]> 1 0 false false Tue May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Sun Sep 23 11:43:42 -0700 2007 Sun Sep 23 11:45:13 -0700 2007 4 0 false false Fri Jul 03 16:51:49 -0700 2009 Mon Jan 28 17:39:53 -0800 2008 Fri Jul 03 16:51:49 -0700 2009 1 0 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Wed Aug 22 10:10:58 -0700 2007 Wed Aug 22 10:12:27 -0700 2007 was a well-written book, but the style did not appeal to me at all. ]]> 1 0 false false Mon Aug 20 13:06:55 -0700 2007 Mon Aug 20 13:06:55 -0700 2007 2 0 false false Sun Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2000 Tue Jun 12 21:18:26 -0700 2007 Tue Jun 12 21:18:26 -0700 2007 0 0 false false Tue Nov 17 02:23:58 -0800 2009 Tue Nov 17 02:23:58 -0800 2009 0 0 false false Thu Oct 22 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Thu Oct 22 03:43:11 -0700 2009 Thu Oct 22 13:03:33 -0700 2009 4 0 false false Mon Sep 28 12:40:36 -0700 2009 Mon Sep 28 12:40:36 -0700 2009 0 0 false false Fri Sep 25 17:44:34 -0700 2009 Fri Sep 25 17:44:37 -0700 2009 http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=400254