All Fours had great observations on motherhood, marriage, menopause, and the timeline of sexuality. Miranda July's narration on the audiobook is superb. I love weird books, which this definitely is, but I still didn't like this book overall. I'm all about a flawed protagonist, but I could not stand the main character. It was hard to root for any of the characters actually. And for me there were too many non-sexual cringeworthy descriptions in the book. It seemed like the author was reaching too far for shock value. I also didn't quite buy the Arkanda storyline and the obsession with fetal maternal hemorrhage that (almost but) didn't affect their children
I totally agree on the whole Arkanda storyline - that felt tacked on and extraneous to all of the other issues, and I thought that subplot was forgettable, as opposed to many of the other parts which I keep thinking about long after I finished the book. No doubt there's a lot of shock value in the novel, but I though the parts about mid-life sexuality and trying to find a healthy relationship while navigating all that were issues I haven't seen in fiction before. Maybe this merits a book club discussion? There are so many parts to talk about, good and bad, relatable and non-relatable...
I agree that this would make a fantastic choice for a book club.... I forgot to mention in my comment that the dancing storyline relating to the sexual connection between the main character and Davey was pretty unusual / interesting and was actually a highlight of the book for me
Yeah, and interesting when she is trying to stage the dance and post on social media to get his attention. OK, hopefully you can make next week's meeting and let's see if the others are up for All Fours next - I definitely am!
All Fours had great observations on motherhood, marriage, menopause, and the timeline of sexuality. Miranda July's narration on the audiobook is superb. I love weird books, which this definitely is, but I still didn't like this book overall. I'm all about a flawed protagonist, but I could not stand the main character. It was hard to root for any of the characters actually. And for me there were too many non-sexual cringeworthy descriptions in the book. It seemed like the author was reaching too far for shock value. I also didn't quite buy the Arkanda storyline and the obsession with fetal maternal hemorrhage that (almost but) didn't affect their children
I totally agree on the whole Arkanda storyline - that felt tacked on and extraneous to all of the other issues, and I thought that subplot was forgettable, as opposed to many of the other parts which I keep thinking about long after I finished the book. No doubt there's a lot of shock value in the novel, but I though the parts about mid-life sexuality and trying to find a healthy relationship while navigating all that were issues I haven't seen in fiction before. Maybe this merits a book club discussion? There are so many parts to talk about, good and bad, relatable and non-relatable...
I agree that this would make a fantastic choice for a book club.... I forgot to mention in my comment that the dancing storyline relating to the sexual connection between the main character and Davey was pretty unusual / interesting and was actually a highlight of the book for me
Yeah, and interesting when she is trying to stage the dance and post on social media to get his attention. OK, hopefully you can make next week's meeting and let's see if the others are up for All Fours next - I definitely am!