Reviews

Whereabouts by Jhumpa Lahiri

crickedcactus's review against another edition

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2.0

Short audiobook,it didn't speak much to me. The characters seemed plain,uninteresting, the plot unexisting,and there was no development. I get that it is supposed to be a snapshop of this character's routine,but you know what? her routine is boring. Such a shame because I really really really liked her collection of short stories: The Interpreter of Maladies

abe389's review against another edition

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mysterious reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

4.0

sophandabook's review against another edition

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emotional informative mysterious reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

ladiebuggle's review against another edition

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2.0

I love Lahiri, but this one was disappointing. I found the woman whose whereabouts we’re following to be boring and kind of insufferable.

lit_as_fakh's review against another edition

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reflective
  • Strong character development? It's complicated

4.75

jazzkezz's review against another edition

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reflective relaxing slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.5

meganlatsch's review against another edition

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2.0

Not my type of book

michalow's review against another edition

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5.0

Aimless and melancholy; beautiful and perceptive.

spaces_and_solaces's review against another edition

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4.0

Lahiri is a Pulitzer prize winner & her prose is so poetic and minimalistic that sometimes just a few of her words have the power to cut you to your core.
Her work more often than not focuses on cultural relocation. If you’ve read / or watched The Namesake you’ll know. But, this book is different!
TW: This book may induce melancholy.
Whereabouts is narrated by a woman - unmarried, middle aged writer & a literature professor who has lived in the same city her whole life. (The city is hinted to be Rome several times).
She realizes, in the middle of her life’s journey, that she has lost her way. This story is about her trying to figure out her place in the world.
She deliberately fills her life with routines probably to mask the loneliness.
We follow her as she visits the same trattoria for lunch, swims twice weekly at dinnertime, visits her distant mother twice monthly and contemplates repeatedly about her unhappy childhood.
From the pages you get glimpses of the narrator's vulnerability.
There is a recurring theme of longing and solitude which is even more heartbreaking when the narrator is with her mother, her friends, at the bar or at a party.
Everything fades into darkness for the narrator, the places and the people and she is left with a gaping hole of loneliness that no one can cure.
She is but another nameless woman in a nameless city.

Lahiri’s prose is so delicate and you cannot help but wonder if this is some metaphorical journey into the author’s own mind.

It’s a brilliant story reflective of the urban solitude marked by longing & loneliness.

bleumingpages's review against another edition

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2.0

I decided to pick up this book solely because someone described it as "a breezy evening walk in the park". But having finished it I realised I like books that feel like a blazing furnace much better than a breezy evening walk in the park.