Green Road Whole Book/Spoilers (Aug 2017)

[Casceil]

This thread is for those who have read the entire book to discuss what they thought of it. For those of you who read it in the past but do not plan to reread it, what stayed with you about the book?

[Tamara]

I loved the novel and gave it 5 stars. What stayed with me about the book was the honesty and sensitivity with which she handled the complexities of family relationships. Parent/child relationships and sibling relationships are seldom simple--either in real life or in this novel.

From my review:

The novel is about aging. It is about the things we leave behind and the baggage we carry with us as we journey through life. It is about realizing the bonds we formed in childhood with our siblings can be lost to us as adults. It is about recognizing one’s children may follow paths that lead them far from home in ways we can’t understand. And, finally, it is about fragile attempts to move forward and forge connections based on giving and receiving love.

My full review is posted on goodreads
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

and on my website at www.tamaraaghajaffar.com

[Casceil]

Tamara, that's a great review. You captured a lot of what I liked about the book.

[Tamara]

Casceil wrote: "Tamara, that's a great review. You captured a lot of what I liked about the book."

Thank you, Casceil.

[Hugh]

To be honest I don't remember that much about the detail, what I remember was the quality of the descriptions, and the way that the final section brought together the disparate strands of the story in a way that was very moving.

[Nutmegger]

While I appreciate Enright's style and superb usage of language, I preferred The Gathering over The Green Road. I felt that the two sections of the book were a bit disjointed. They weren't quite connected enough for me.

[Casceil]

I haven't read the Gathering, although I plan to in the future. I'm rereading the Green Road now, but I am still in the first half. I don't find it particularly disjointed. I find it interesting the glimpses we get of other siblings in each chapter. There is a bit of a contrast between the image I get from each character's chapter and the impression I get when a sibling is thinking about him. Emmett is a bully from Hannah's point of view, but not when we see him in his own story. Dan seems to turn up in everyone's stories, and yet he seems to be sort of distant. His chapter is written from the point of view of other characters in New York, while the chapters for Hannah and Constance seem to be written from the point of view of Hannah and Constance.

[Lesley]

I see I gave it 5 stars but didn't write a review. I must re-read it, as I loved The Gathering and read that twice. I am a very fussy reader, but Anne Enright's rhythm, style and pace suit me very well. Her characters are very real.

[Casceil]

I read it a month ago, and have been rereading it over the last week or so. It rereads very well. There is so much there, that I feel like I am picking up more this time.

[Caroline]

I finished the book a few days ago and really enjoyed it. The story didn't feel new or fresh, but I absolutely loved the writing and getting to know the characters (even if I didn't love them).

At first I wasn't sure how to feel about the two separate parts of the book - the first almost being a set of short stories (as I believe Marc pointed out in another thread), and the second having a more cohesive thread. However, the more I read on, the more I appreciated the different perspective points that the different sections offered. In the first, we get one perspective of each character - either of how they view themselves or perhaps how they wished to be viewed by others. In the second, we get more of a sense of how the others view them and their negative or positive characteristics come more into focus.

For example, in Constance's Leaving chapter, Constance seemed very self-confident and proud - of her family, the wealth brought in by her husband, and particularly of her body. However, in the "Coming Home" sections, the family view Constance's body as a point of weakness - it is too big, too jiggly, something over which she should take control, and she appears to be more of a caretaker and worrier.

I think one reason this book really struck a chord with me is because the family reminds me of my father's family from Northern Ireland. No one character totally resembles any of my family members, but there are a series of eerie similarities - from the vocabulary the mother and my grandmother both used, struggles with alcohol, beloved son moving to America, various levels of concern or panic from each family member, and to my grandmother's sudden decision to sell her house without consulting anyone after more than a decade of claiming she was going to do it!

I certainly look forward to reading more of Enright's work.

[Tamara]

Caroline wrote: "I finished the book a few days ago and really enjoyed it. The story didn't feel new or fresh, but I absolutely loved the writing and getting to know the characters (even if I didn't love them).

A..."

A nice summation, Caroline.