In Sally Rooney’s world, love isn’t something that makes you happy. Love makes you sick. It’s all-consuming, dark, often heartbreaking but never middle of the road.
“Normal People” (2018), her debut novel, is the story of the on-again, off-again romance of Connell and Marianne, two high school sweethearts from a small Irish town. The dashing working-class son of a single mother who cleans houses, he’s an improbable combination of popular with the lasses and good at his studies. She’s the equally smart yet troubled upper-middle-class girl scorned by both her classmates and her family. Neither considers themselves “normal people” and both find they can’t live without each other.
The romance/friendship continues as they become students at Trinity and move into young adulthood in Dublin. They break up, reunite, break up again, establish new and ultimately unsatisfactory relationships, and slowly (but unsurely) find their way in the world.
Rooney has the ability to turn what could’ve been a humdrum YA novel into a story of two characters you care about deeply. Her simple, unadorned prose isn’t everyone’s cup of tea (nor are her politics) but for her storytelling and her insights into human behavior, Rooney is second to none.
Next up: see the Hui series of “Normal People” which I fear won’t be as good as the book. But with the luck of the Irish, it just may be. Slainte, people.
I saw the series, but haven’t read the book. I’m going to go out on a limb, and predict that you'll enjoy the video adaptation. I’ll await your review with bated breath and fingers crossed 😃.
I never read the book but I did watch the series on Hulu. The sexual chemistry between Connell and Marianne kept me tuning in and made the pandemic a little more bearable.