Welcome to Litsy!

Another cold, rainy day this May 🙄 so the cats and I have opted for naps and reading. A former Litten sent this novel to me years ago, and today, I decided to read it. Hard to say why now! 🤷
The MC has left her life behind and flown to NZ to stay at a farm owned by a poet she met once. She is not okay! The story is moving between her present journey and the past events that led her to run away.
So far, so good.

An introspective novel about the narrator‘s mental unravelling as she steps out of her everyday life. There were some insightful moments where Lacey had interesting things to say about grief and how it makes us behave. However, the narrative just didn‘t really hang together for me. I found it difficult to keep track of timeframes, and the protagonist didn‘t invite my empathy in spite of her deeply challenging circumstances.

I liked this one! A little unconventional. Stream-of-consciousness, but not in an inaccessible way (looking at you, James Joyce). Instead, it‘s more thoughtful and ruminating as Elyria tries to find her place in the world and within herself. #booked2020 #millennialauthor Book 4/12 for #bfc28 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Elyria secretly runs away from her stable life & husband in NYC with a one-way ticket to New Zealand. She travels perilously through the country as her mind swirls more and more out of control. What I remember most about this read is the dizzying run-on sentences that were frequently (and frustratingly) pages long. If you don‘t enjoy stream-of-consciousness writing, steer clear of this one!!
#fallingslowly
#musicalnewyear

The writing in this book was beautiful. Long sentences, sometimes chaotic but that made them all the more meaningful. I often read a paragraph again to fully understand it and make sure I didn‘t miss anything. The story itself was compelling and well-written. A quick read that didn‘t lack depth ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Some remain lost. #3wordbookreview #bookstagram #reading #read2018 #tbrpile #nobodyisevermissing #catherinelacey

Finally finished this little journey. The constant stream of consciousness occasionally got tiresome but only because I feel like the author did an incredible job of capturing the thoughts of someone suffering from PTSD or major anxiety issues in general. The examinations of human interaction and descriptions of slow decay of our relationships was mesmerizing.

I knew the wildebeest in me was a heavy desire to destroy something and maybe Thomas could also see my tiny, smiling hitman, that smug motherfucker sitting in the center of me. I didn‘t want to lust after anything. I didn‘t want to love anything. I was not a person but just some evidence of myself.

I wanted to be responsible for destroying a small-to-medium sized part of him, and this was a somewhat-sick and somewhat-normal thing, I think, everyone wants to feel like they could destroy a small-to-medium-to-large part of someone who loves them, though not everyone can see that ugly want sleeping under the blankets of love and affection and secure attachment.

The wildebeests that everyone has - there is a part of every human brain that just can‘t bear and be, can‘t sit up straight, can‘t look you in the eye, can‘t sit through time ticking, can‘t keep looking at the same person every day and being looked at by the same person and we all sometimes want to walk away like it never happened.

I think that‘s the thing about fiction, that you live in it totally for a little while but you must forget it, sometimes totally forget it, in order to go about the rest of your life.

He turned the music up, lit another cigarette, and opened a beer as we drove up a mountain, making hairpin turns at unadvisable speeds. My organs let me know how much they disapproved of where I was sitting—I couldn't remember why I had ever wanted to go anywhere at all.

I walked into the library and the library smelled like every library I'd ever been in and Dewey decimals were on all the spines, same tiny font, tiny numbers, and I thought, for a moment, that there actually were things you could count on in this world until I realized that the most dependable things in the world are not of any significant use to any substantial problems.

This book is written as a stream-of-consciousness from the very depressed narrator, Elyria. As you can see on the page shown in photo, some sentences were paragraphs long. Unfortunately, I just never cared much for Elyria and could not relate to her bizarre behavior. But I'm giving points for the beautiful and thoughtful prose.

Love when my current read fits the daily prompt perfectly 🤗
#sideprofiles
#jubilantjuly

A young woman leaves all she has behind and flees for New Zealand. Hitchhiking through the country she thinks about her marriage, her family and the 'wildebeest within her'. She hopes to be able to cope by finding solitud.
Lacey writes very well and the way the woman talks about her husband and the reason they married are very touching. You know while reading that the woman is not very stable. Thr story became a bit boring after a while though.

If those cliche feel-good books about women finding themselves (e.g. Eat Pray Love) turn you off, this book is sort of the antithesis. Told in first-person stream-of-consciousness prose, it's a haunting, surreal portrait of a woman who flees to New Zealand in the midst of a personal crisis. Lacey's writing is lyrical and poetic; I found myself dog-earring multiple breathtaking passages and lingering on her stunning, powerful writing.

I'm obsessed with the prose in this book.

Okay, this is definitely more my speed right now.

Enjoyed this, but it's filled with unhealthy, self-destructive trains of thought (that's basically what the book is), so stay away if that type of stuff bothers you.

"Standing in front of me was a man with a bald spot, a sign I could trust this man because he, too, knew loss."

This took me by surprise, since it's about the only funny line in this book...possibly unintentionally. ??

I wanted to bail so bad on this book, but I forced myself to finish it... and it was horrible. Please don't even waste your time.

Starting this one today! (Pardon my stupid kiwi joke please 😋)

Lui aveva perfezionato l'arte del vedere quel che si vuole vedere, perché è più facile vivere così, vedere il mondo come una serie di cose familiari, un posto dove tutti provano quello che provi tu e vedono quello che vedi tu.