My Brilliant Friend (My Brilliant Friend, #1) in The Toast

Dec 14, 2015 Melanie rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: contemporary-lit

I would have never started reading this book based on the cover alone, so I'm glad I finally heard about Ferrante's Neapolitan novels through other sources. What a book! I'm glad I personally do not have a friendship as obsessive as the one depicted in this novel, but I always enjoy reading about complicated relationships between women. ...more

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Oct 08, 2015 Alicia rated it really liked it

http://wordnerdy.blogspot.com/2015/10...

Well, I'm finally reading Ferrante's Neapolitan novels, and they certainly are worthy of the critical acclaim they've received. I will say that this was a little bit of a slow read for me, mainly because the book (and series, I think) centers on a friendship/rivalry between two girls in a small, poor area of Naples as they grow up, and I found the relationship somewhat stressful to read about. Ferrante really brings this neighborhood and its denizens (and ...more

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May 01, 2016 Sarah rated it really liked it

Shelves: contemporaries

I have a confession to make - I don't like Lila. At all. And most of the time I want to shake Elena for linking all the value in her life to whether or not Lila acts like she gives a damn. Their friendship is obsessive, and poisonously unhealty, and intense, and somehow also really, really incredibly compelling.

I disliked Lila, I was always frustrated with Elena, I despised pretty much everyone in their neighborhood - and somehow I managed to really enjoy this book. Ferrante has some serious ski I have a confession to make - I don't like Lila. At all. And most of the time I want to shake Elena for linking all the value in her life to whether or not Lila acts like she gives a damn. Their friendship is obsessive, and poisonously unhealty, and intense, and somehow also really, really incredibly compelling.

I disliked Lila, I was always frustrated with Elena, I despised pretty much everyone in their neighborhood - and somehow I managed to really enjoy this book. Ferrante has some serious skill, and before I knew it I was deeply invested in these people, even if I didn't like them. While everyone is horrible, they are horrible in understandable ways, and it is very clear that they are products of the world that created them. They grew up in a neighborhood steeped in violence and abuse, within post-World War II Italy rife with political conflict, and they are all trying their best to make lives for themselves in situations that objectively suck.

No wonder Elena's obsessive. No wonder Lila is cruel. No wonder they compete and sabotage and vie for each other's attention like it's life and death. They don't know how to connect in any other way. And that's really interesting. It's terrible, and it's sad, and it's interesting.

My Brilliant Friend documents the childhood and adolescence of Elena and Lila, as remembered by an older Elena. Elena's thoughts and feelings are on full display - often almost to the point of too much information, and single days or even hours dragging on into several chapters - and it's a much more detailed and intimate view into the narrator's mind then I'm used to. (I'm told this isn't totally unusual for Italian novels - which I, admittedly, have not read many of). The English translation flows well, and while I can't speak to its accuracy, I can say that it isn't as jarring and obviously a translation as some translated novels.

Also, don't trust the bright and optimistic-looking English covers. They are a lie. This is not a bright and optimistic book. This is the story of a really obsessive friendship in a really violent neighborhood. It's really compelling, and really well-written, but it isn't a happy story. ...more

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