Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine

by Gail Honeyman

Tiny slivers of life—they all added up and helped you to feel that you too could be a fragment, a little piece of humanity who usefully filled a space, however minuscule.

The voice in my own head—my own voice—was actually quite sensible, and rational, I’d begun to realize.

I was getting to quite like my own voice, my own thoughts. I wanted more of them. They made me feel good, calm even. They made me feel like me.

Three words, Ignis aurum probat. “Fire tests gold.” The rest of the phrase: “. . . and adversity tests the brave.” How true.

“Go on then, get in there, give ’em hell!”