Sign in with Facebook
Loading...
73rd out of 448 books
—
382 voters
Stir-Fry
by
Emma Donoghue (Goodreads Author)
"Exhilarating...irreverent, and extremely funny,"- Ms.
Seventeen and sure of nothing, Maria has left her parents' small-town grocery for university life in Dublin. An ad in the Student Union - "2 ♀ seek flatmate. No bigots." - leads Maria to a home with warm Ruth and wickedly funny Jael, students who are older and more fascinating than she'd expected.
A poignant, funny, and...more
Seventeen and sure of nothing, Maria has left her parents' small-town grocery for university life in Dublin. An ad in the Student Union - "2 ♀ seek flatmate. No bigots." - leads Maria to a home with warm Ruth and wickedly funny Jael, students who are older and more fascinating than she'd expected.
A poignant, funny, and...more
Paperback, 240 pages
Published
August 16th 2001
by Alyson Books
(first published 1994)
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
1,734)
Dec 03, 2012
Yvensong
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommended to Yvensong by:
BookCrosser
Shelves:
bookcrossing
Donoghue's first novel is a sensitive coming-of-age story of a young girl who has moved to the big city to start college.
The characters are believable, even when they are not particularly likable. Maria, the MC, is attempting to learn who she really is, and how she fits into college life and the world, after having spent her entire life in a small village. She explores the confusing world of relationships through her new flatmates and new college friends, including a couple of young men that sh...more
The characters are believable, even when they are not particularly likable. Maria, the MC, is attempting to learn who she really is, and how she fits into college life and the world, after having spent her entire life in a small village. She explores the confusing world of relationships through her new flatmates and new college friends, including a couple of young men that sh...more
I just read this book over the last few days and I need to read it again I think. I am not sure how I feel about all three characters. I did not have an affinity for any of them. I liked the style, the rhythm of the writing. I just felt the characters were stereotypes I did not truly form an attachment for. I may have also spent too much time thinking about where this story was heading and hoping it wouldn't be cliche. I wanted to love it as it was sent to me from someone I care about, so for th...more
Because I was so captivated by the originality of Donoghue's Room, I have checked out a few of her other books. Slammerkin was also quite good. This one, from much earlier in her career (1994 I believe) is nothing to speak of. It's a dialogue-driven account of a young woman who decides to room with a lesbian couple. In the end, she discovers something about her own sexuality. That's it. That's all that happens. Now if the characters had been rich or the dialogue especially well-crafted, this cou...more
Good not great, this is a debut novel from Emma Donoghue, the author who has gotten much better with time as judging by the more recent excellent Room. Stir Fry takes place in Dublin in mid 90s and is mostly interesting from the anthropological perspective and views on homosexuality at that time and place. This doesn't mean the book isn't well written...it is, and the three female leads are quite complex and authentic, but the story just didn't capture my attention as much as I would have liked....more
I drew up a list culled from a Metafilter posting on happy books to read and this was one of them... This was a charming coming-of-age story set in mid 80s Dublin. Maria is a clueless college freshman from the sticks who movies in with two women who end up being a big part of forming her views on life and relationships. Nothing earth-shattering, just sweet and comfortable (as advertised)
I drew up a list culled from a Metafilter posting on happy books to read and this was one of them... This was a charming coming-of-age story set in mid 80s Dublin. Maria is a clueless college freshman from the sticks who movies in with two women who end up being a big part of forming her views on life and relationships. Nothing earth-shattering, just sweet and comfortable (as advertised)
May 20, 2013
Cheryl in CC NV
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
read-for-mt-tbr-challenge
The writing style is lovely, especially at the beginning, when I could hear in my head the lilting cadence of the Irish speakers, despite no diacritical cues. Lots of slang and other interesting indications of ubiety - in fact, too many, because this is not universal and is already dated. Meaning, that it doesn't feel relevant and therefore interesting, any longer, to me.
The portrayal of the young student was implausible in that she was ever so naive, and ever so disturbed to discover that her...more
The portrayal of the young student was implausible in that she was ever so naive, and ever so disturbed to discover that her...more
A change form my usual serios novels, guess i would classify this as a chick-lit with a difference. It brought back memories of students days; flat-sharing, union pubs, library marathon sessions and time for contemplation.....but with a distinctly irish flavour. it was nice that the ending was delibarately ambiguous
I normally avoid anything that could be described as a 'coming of age' story, but this was charming, if not always comfortable to read. The main characters were not always likeable, but were interesting and flawed. I loved the focus on female friendships, relationships, and sexuality.
Apart from the "gay panic" element (and I have to remind myself that this book is nearly 20 years old) a fun read with believable characters and realistic dialogue. A little stereotypical? Maybe, but stereotypes don't just come from nowhere...
Sweet coming of age novel and love story. Likely not for everyone, but I found the book a wonderful read. Excellent first novel by one of my favorite writers.
Aw.. this made me all nostalgic for my year as a women's studies student in the early 90s.
Its sweet, I like the characters, its pretty insubstantial... but thats fine.
Its sweet, I like the characters, its pretty insubstantial... but thats fine.
Loved it when I read it in first year of college,didn't notice it was written by the woman who wrote Room... Maybe I'll read that too at some stage.
Though this book isn't written for young adults, I think they are the perfect target for this story of a small-town somewhat naive 17-year-old girl who goes off to college in big-city Dublin. She rents a room in a flat shared by two women who turn out to be lovers, which initially shocks her, but doesn't suddenly "turn" her or anything, as she fumbles her way through making friends at school and having an awkward crush on an intellectual guy in one of her classes. I liked that the whole book too...more
My first Emma Donoghue book, after a reccomendation to read 'anything' by her. What a disappointment. Found it flat and uninteresting.
I love books that I can read in a single afternoon and do. I love Emma Donoghue's beautifully observed snippets of life. Very pleasing.
view 1 comment
A sweet story in the Annie on My Mind vein.
A good book. It's not about Asian cooking. Emma Donoghue is an up-and-coming Irish writer.
Jun 04, 2010
Sarah
marked it as to-read
okay so far i hate emma donoghue but this actually looks like it might be okay. MAYBE.
Disappointing after reading her new novel, THE ROOM. This one was her first novel.
i am such a sucker for a good lesbian story, and i think this is one of the best. i remember finishing it over some depressing stint at home and walking around for the rest of the day with a doofy grin on my face. it did however, make me really nervous 3/4ths of the way through because i realized that the way she had set things up, the ending was going to be really important to the story. it wasn't just going to end the story, it was going to completely make or break the story. and fortunately,...more
1 like · like · see review
Still my favourite book
Jan 02, 2010
michelle
added it
can't remember when!
Volop genoten van deze klassieker.
Stir Fry is a novel about a first-year college student in Dublin who is the unknowing third side to a lesbian love triangle. This is Donaghue's first novel, and so the writing is a bit off and sometimes I felt like she was writing the story as though she were transcribing a movie; however, I give it four stars because it does an excellent job of portraying the real struggles and thoughts that go through a person's mind when they begin to realize maybe they like girls and not boys. A quick read.
Turns out I read this five years ago and didn't realize it until I started reading again. I don't know what this says about the book itsself, but after reading Landing and remembering what a wonderful tales Emma Donoghue spins (and it takes a lot to get me through to the end of a romance book), I decided to pick it up. I'm glad I did, because I realized the author had included some references to Stir-Fry in Landing that I would have never recalled had I not revisited it.
I read this because she wrote Room which I enjoyed immmensely. This is totally different. Story of a college freshman who unknowingly takes up lesbian roommates.
I can't believe I read this whole book, and it didn't even have a redeeming ending.
I loved Room and Slammerkin so I gave another of Donoghue's novels a try. The characters in Stir-Fry were boring and the plot was slow so I abandoned it about halfway through. It simply did not hold my attention!
I love this one!! Someone once called it a "comfort book", which I thought was a good description. Real, likeable characters. I sympathize with Maria's awkwardness but am impressed by how self-assured she is. The ending is a nice surprise, but feels right. Sometimes I re-read just the last two pages 'cuz they make me smile :)
There are no discussion topics on this book yet.
Be the first to start one »
Emma is the youngest of eight children of Frances and Denis Donoghue. She attended Catholic convent schools in Dublin, apart from one year in New York at the age of ten. In 1990 she earned a first-class honours BA in English and French from University College Dublin, and in 1997 a PhD (on the concept of friendship between men and women in eighteenth-century English fiction) from the University of...more
More about Emma Donoghue...
Share This Book
1 trivia question
More quizzes & trivia...
“Who knows what we all are before anything happens?”
—
2 people liked it
More quotes…
