Saturday, July 18, 2020

Book 44: The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrante

After finishing the fourth and final book of this series, I am both glad I read them and also convinced that these particular kind of epics are not my kind of books. I prefer this to the more traditionally swooned over male-centered multigenerational narratives; these are books which care about the interiority of women's lives, and the constant question of what would women's lives be able to be if they had the space and time and weight afforded them like men is extremely valuable and important. But I never felt fully connected to the characters, and I kept wanting something different or more from the central friendship at the heart of them.

I think in part these books made me feel almost like they were too adult for me, like they were describing a life of women that is beyond my experience, even though I am older than the main characters are in the majority of the narrative.

I don't know! These definitely aren't a 'I guess these books are good but I didn't enjoy reading them' series of books, but I don't feel moved by them in the way I had hoped I would. Which happens! It's just a hard thing to know how to feel about. I think the objective quality of the book is one of a Grade A, but my experience of it is not quite.

Grade: B 

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