Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine

by Gail Honeyman

My preference is for fodder that is cheap, quick and simple to procure and prepare, whilst providing the requisite nutrients to enable a person to stay alive.

did briefly consider taking up smoking,’ I admitted, ‘but I thoroughly research all activities before commencement, and smoking did not in the end seem to me to be a viable or sensible pastime. It’s financially rebarbative too,’

The things I’ve seen cannot be unseen. The things I’ve done cannot be undone.

There are scars on my heart, just as thick, as disfiguring as those on my face. I know they’re there. I hope some undamaged tissue remains, a patch through which love can come in and flow out. I hope.

and I’m not consumer-oriented, so the midwinter shopping festival otherwise known as Christmas is of little interest to me.’

Some people, weak people, fear solitude. What they fail to understand is that there’s something very liberating about it; once you realize that you don’t need anyone, you can take care of yourself. That’s the thing: it’s best just to take care of yourself. You can’t protect other people, however hard you try. You try, and you fail, and your world collapses around you, burns down to ashes.

‘People can be … unfathomable,’ I said, stumbling slightly over the word. ‘I often find that I don’t understand why they do and say things.’

perhaps more than most, about loss, about how difficult things must be, and would continue to be. However much you loved someone, it wasn’t always enough. Love alone couldn’t keep them safe