A review by aywebster
Parakeet by Marie-Helene Bertino

2.0

The style of this book just may not be for me, but I had a couple of big problems with it. The biggest of which is the dialogue- every character seems to speak the same way as the protagonist’s inner dialogue, which means mostly in metaphors and extensions of the protagonist’s own thoughts. I understand that this book is centered on the protagonist reflecting on who she really is and what she wants or doesn’t want out of life, so this is almost definitely done purposely for the introspective tone- but that doesn’t make me like it. This book feels almost poetic and I’ve never been a fan of poetry, so it simply isn’t for me. Would recommend for people who enjoy living in a character’s head, nearly-Lynchian vignettes, and not being able to tell what did or didn’t really happen in the story.