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hegesteindal74's review against another edition
5.0
"It will either be a success or a failure"- er en av de mange repeterende tankene som gjentas i hovedpersonens evigvarende tankestrøm. Og for de fleste lesere av denne romanen kan det fort bli likedan. Liker du den, er det ganske sannsynlig at du syns den er fantastisk, men misliker du den, kan det fort bli en stjerne og full slakt. Årsaken til denne påstanden ligger i den spesielle skrivestilen. Ellmann har sin helt egen "stream of cousiousness"- teknikk. Den er sikkert ikke for alle. Men finner du ut av den, kan du forvente deg en leseopplevelse av de sjeldne. Fortellingen siver ut i små drypp, og sakte men sikkert trer det frem et bilde av en kvinne og hennes familie, nå og før. Hovedpersonen tenker selv at denne indre monologen kommer til å vare til hun dør, bare avbrutt av søvn og de merkverdige drømmene hennes.
Det kan muligens være verdt å vente på oversettelsen i dette tilfellet, på tross av at en del av Ellmans lek med ord kan fryktes å gå tapt. Den store ordflommen i fri dressur, gjør engelsken vanskeligere enn vanlig, etter mitt syn.
Det kan muligens være verdt å vente på oversettelsen i dette tilfellet, på tross av at en del av Ellmans lek med ord kan fryktes å gå tapt. Den store ordflommen i fri dressur, gjør engelsken vanskeligere enn vanlig, etter mitt syn.
worm_blizzard's review against another edition
5.0
I'm going to miss it so, now that it's done. My immediate inclination is to pick it up and to read it again right away
efg1217's review against another edition
2.0
The most anxiety inducing book I’ve ever had the misfortune of reading.
ainepalmtree's review against another edition
5.0
wowow this was such a tough book but so great and incredibly rewarding to read. not just tough bc big postmodern books are tough (tho that is true) but also tough bc this speaks so directly to the anxieties of life in trump's america (and felt like an amplification of everything going through my noggin rn). can deeply recommend if you love big books & contemporary fiction & women's literary voices
karp76's review against another edition
3.0
The fact that, what are we to make of this? This endlessness of thought, unwielding and broken only by the occasional vignette of a stray mountian lion? How are we to understand this and digest it, either accept or reject it the narrative and its purpose, whatever meaning and whatever effect it seeks to lull to us? Here in the afterwards, the last page closed, the sense is we cannot. There are no small moments to enjoy. No little pockets to examine or to savor. There is only its entirity, the mammoth of its being. The narrative, the fact that that may be too bold of to call it, or if we must define it, the work's breath and expanse of the mundane and Midwestern is so much - pies, chickens, guns, Ohio, musicals, baking - to the point of too much, to the very verge of exceeding the necessary or even extraordinary, that it renders and power of its expermient into the trifleness of gimmick. The fact that, perhaps, just perhaps, this was too much.
davidsteinsaltz's review against another edition
5.0
Before I started reading I worried that I wouldn't be sufficiently engaged with the material or the superficially challenging style to carry me through 1000 pages. I planned to pave myself, reading it over several months. Instead, I rushed headlong through it in a few days, and my main concern is whether I can find other novels satisfying after this experience.
balletbookworm's review against another edition
4.0
Picked this up back when it got on the Booker shortlist in 2019 and just didn't get around to it until now (it's a 1000+ page chunker without real chapter breaks and what seems like no real sentences, so it takes some advance planning).
I figured it would be a good book to work on while at home post-surgery so I popped it on my 23 in 2023 reading list. I worked out that if I concentrated on reading 50+ pages at a time, it would make the book doable. What also helped was the realization that the narrator's stream-of-consciousness internal nattering is broken up approximately every 50-70 pages by parts of a short story about a mother mountain lion who is separated from her cubs; eventually, the narrator's and cat's stories will cross paths.
So I got it read. And it is really interesting in the way that this internal chatter just caroms around from subject to subject almost like the narrator is talking to herself. A lot of it is really relatable - how do we cope with environmental pollution, physical health, children's safety, climate change, gun violence (and WOW, this book having been written largely after the 2016 election and our mass shooting problem has got seemingly worse), women's work, our parents' lives, and on and on. The page edges look like a hedgehog with all the paper tabs I used.
I figured it would be a good book to work on while at home post-surgery so I popped it on my 23 in 2023 reading list. I worked out that if I concentrated on reading 50+ pages at a time, it would make the book doable. What also helped was the realization that the narrator's stream-of-consciousness internal nattering is broken up approximately every 50-70 pages by parts of a short story about a mother mountain lion who is separated from her cubs; eventually, the narrator's and cat's stories will cross paths.
So I got it read. And it is really interesting in the way that this internal chatter just caroms around from subject to subject almost like the narrator is talking to herself. A lot of it is really relatable - how do we cope with environmental pollution, physical health, children's safety, climate change, gun violence (and WOW, this book having been written largely after the 2016 election and our mass shooting problem has got seemingly worse), women's work, our parents' lives, and on and on. The page edges look like a hedgehog with all the paper tabs I used.
justin_zigenis's review against another edition
5.0
Me oh my! The fact that this book was passed up for the Handmaid’s Tale sequel to win the Booker Prize is unbelievable, unthinkable, undrinkable water, underwear, bullshit, the fact that those judges have to read so many books they probably didn’t have time to finish it anyway, the fact that who am I to judge them, prizes, money, “what America’s all about,” the fact that Americans rarely win the Booker Prize anyway, so, but is Margaret Atwood an American? Oh wait...Canadian! The fact that, regarding her writing style, Lucy Ellmann not Margaret Atwood, in an interview she said she was simply trying to write as close to the way she thinks the mind works, and dammit, but I shouldn’t curse, I think she did it! The fact that this book was as much entertainment as it was a meditation for me, and that’s why I dragged on so long reading it, to savor the meditative experience it; the fact that the interviewer asked if she hates men...but she speaks so kindly of her husband, Leo, that I can’t understand where he came up with the question, rapists, mass shootings, guns and Donald Trump, yes, but not men; stupid question, stupid Booker Prize, stupid 2020, stupid virus, stupid social media, man hater, pussy grabber, echo chamber, stupid Facebook, stupid Twitter, stupid quarantine, the fact that why do mature adults not understand what social media is doing to this country? Why can’t they just verbalize their political opinions, communicate, and ignore all the memes, maturity, modernity, grandparents mothers, fathers, extended family...go read a book! Read this book.
rosalind14's review against another edition
5.0
Two weeks after finishing Ducks, Newburyport, I still feel the narrator in the back of my mind. I think she'll be there a while, coming out whenever I come across certain words or phrases, whenever I read news articles about violence and misogyny, certainly whenever I make pie.
I'd encourage anyone who's (understandably) on the fence about reading this to give it a try--once you get into a certain zone it reads incredibly quickly, and by the end it felt totally worth it.
Also, this has made me really curious about diversity of inner monologues--this definitely isn't what my own inner monologue sounds like, but I'm sure it rings true for some. Apparently many people don't even have an inner monologue, and I really wonder what they would make of this book.
I'd encourage anyone who's (understandably) on the fence about reading this to give it a try--once you get into a certain zone it reads incredibly quickly, and by the end it felt totally worth it.
Also, this has made me really curious about diversity of inner monologues--this definitely isn't what my own inner monologue sounds like, but I'm sure it rings true for some. Apparently many people don't even have an inner monologue, and I really wonder what they would make of this book.