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A review by amyvl93
Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? by Jeanette Winterson
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
3.5
This was the first book I picked up for my new book club, and I'm glad to have finally been able to read this. A memoir of Jeanette's childhood and adolescence, it covers the events that ultimately inspired the fiction novel <i>Oranges are Not the Only Fruit</i> which I haven't read but am keen to pick up now.
Jeanette grew up in Lancashire in the north of England, adopted into an incredibly religious household - driven largely by her adopted mother, a devout Pentecostal. This memoir reflects on her childhood, where she seeks solace in secret novels and spends hours locked in the coalhouse for various misbehaviours, into her teenage years where she begins to explore her sexuality and into adulthood, and her search for her biological family.
It's a quite affecting memoir - although I think the parts about her childhood were the most impactful for me. The timelines do jump around a lot meaning the reading experience, for me, wasn't always as engaging as I wanted it to be - and I often felt frustrated being pulled out of writing I was enjoying.
Jeanette grew up in Lancashire in the north of England, adopted into an incredibly religious household - driven largely by her adopted mother, a devout Pentecostal. This memoir reflects on her childhood, where she seeks solace in secret novels and spends hours locked in the coalhouse for various misbehaviours, into her teenage years where she begins to explore her sexuality and into adulthood, and her search for her biological family.
It's a quite affecting memoir - although I think the parts about her childhood were the most impactful for me. The timelines do jump around a lot meaning the reading experience, for me, wasn't always as engaging as I wanted it to be - and I often felt frustrated being pulled out of writing I was enjoying.