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This is a slow, contemplative look at not writing a novel, an examination into the writing process, and an inconclusive investigation into why Stevens failed at the task she'd set for herself. This is not a novel, not quite a memoir, nor is it nature writing. It is a strange, uncategorizable amalgam of all three. Full review at http://booknaround.blogspot.com/2022/04/review-bleaker-house-by-nell-stevens.htm...

I think the kindest thing I can say is I am not the target audience. Sadly, there were no funny anecdotes with penguins, no funny anecdotes at all, and barely any penguins. Part memoir and part advertisement for dubious short stories. If you are a writer with anxiety about writing you may gain something from this. I think the author gained something from writing it. As a reader, I gained nothing. Those with ED or in recovery may be triggered.

This was a pleasant enough memoir about a writing student on a fellowship to write a novel in the Falklands. I could have done without the chapters of her failed novel, but I liked learning about what it was like to write when you‘re truly alone.

Trying to stay cool😎❄️🐧

Next up.

I had a hankering for a book with someone living alone in an isolated place - and my internet rabbithole led me to this book about a young writer who takes up a residence in a tiny island called Bleaker, part of the Falkland Islands. It‘s part memoir and the other part is little scraps of fiction she wrote while she was there. I loved the memoir parts but the fictional bits didn‘t add anything for me.⬇️

First, this book made me hungry and cold. I enjoyed the short stories interspersed through the memoir. I think the most interesting insight gained by the author was on the nature of loneliness and how it relates to being alone.

This is the last book I read that was set on an island. Bleaker Island is not an #IslandintheSun though! #SongsofSummer

This is a mix of memoir, short stories (or book excerpts), and travel journal. I enjoyed reading it, even as I wondered why she'd choose this place to work on her book. (She sort of provides an answer.)

A charming blend of fiction and nonfiction that follows the author as she tries to force herself to write a book while living alone on the Falkland Islands. Great audiobook narration, too.

#memoir #audiobook #booksaboutbooks #readtheworld

Just starting this story of a writer‘s visit to the #FalklandIslands. #ReadingTheWorld

This is a memoir in the genre of “I go some place to find myself and it doesn‘t turn out like I expected” - in this instance, a young writer goes to the Falklands to have solitude and write her novel but the book turns out a bit different than what she wanted. An interesting blend of memoir, travelogue, writing, and fiction since Stevens included some of her short stories and excerpts from the novel she was trying to write.

I'm working the polls for a special election in WV today and this is the stack of books that I packed. I'm halfway through Bleaker House already and we still have 6 hours to go! 😂

Books read in August. Despite getting off to a slow start this month, I'm still averaging one a week. Bleaker House was my absolute favorite!

I absolutely loved this honest, reflective, gentle memoir. Looking forward to her future books.

I loved everything about this book and I'm sad that it's over. ❤️

This is a memoir by a writer who spent 3 months in the Falklands in order to write a novel. To my knowledge, she hasn't finished the novel, but her memoir is so far delightful.

Finished Poisonwood Bible during my weekend road trip. Onto this one!

I had to get this one!

While this is an easy read, and definitely relatable it just wasn't exactly what I was hoping for...

When I read an early review on this book last summer, I knew I wanted a copy! I was prepared to buy a copy when it came out a couple of weeks ago, but instead won a finished copy from Goodreads. It arrived today! Can't wait to get started. #bookmail #bookhaul

I was captivated by this memoir of a writer not completing her novel on an isolated island in the Falklands. "Charming" is overused but is appropriate here, for there's no other way to describe her voice. Stevens shares her other fiction interspersed with her memoir, which I enjoyed. Her anxieties about writing echo my own and I was so taken with her honesty about her experiences. Looking forward to her novel, when it comes!

I'm so in love with BLEAKER HOUSE. Stevens is charming and honest, and I'm envious of her boldness and appreciative of it, too. She intersperses her recollections of life on the Falkland Islands with tidbits of her novel, her grant applications, etc. Undoubtedly this will be a 2017 fav.

"I walk for hours and see only monosyllables: cliffs, birds, waves, sand, sheep, rock, moss."

I am so loving this book already!

I think I expected a little more humor, maybe some goofy penguins, and a little more madcap adventure from this. Instead, it's fairly serious in tone, VERY introspective and navel-gazey, and not a little hand-wringy.

In other words: the premise seemed fun, but the execution wasn't really. Plus, the food thing almost made me throw it across the room. Meh.

I think I'm reading this too close to Wild. The memoir of a single woman deciding to do a Big Adventure and then being woefully underprepared for its realities is making me cranky. Seriously?! Because you know what's really good for concentration while writing your novel? Starving.

A wonderful memoir about a woman who goes to Bleaker island, in the Falklands, to write a book, and has her plans go awry in the best way. A great look at writing, not writing, and failing to write; at solitude, and loneliness; also, some penguins. Definitely recommended.

This book really SPEAKS to me and I think it should STOP

Really charming and fun so far, even if it causes a small voice in the back of my head to say, over and over, "*I* wanna do a book like this..."

"Each time I read a novel it leaves me with two stories at the end. There is the one the book deliberately tells, it's plot, characters and settings, and then there is the story of my reading, the time, place and atmosphere around me as I turn the pages."

I wonder how productive, how focused, how effective I can be...I want to know how good at life I can be in a place where there are no distractions.

This woman is literally living my dream: 3 months on a bleak, lonely island to write and think. If there really is a Dickens connection on top of it I may have found my most Wheel-Housey memoir of all time.