Sally Rooney

Alice, a novelist, meets Felix, who works in a warehouse, and asks him if he’d like to travel to Rome with her. In Dublin, her best friend, Eileen, is getting over a break-up and slips back into flirting with Simon, a man she has known since childhood. Alice, Felix, Eileen, and Simon are still young—but life is catching up with them. They desire each other, they delude each other, they get together, they break apart. They have sex, they worry about sex, they worry about their friendships and the world they live in. Are they standing in the last lighted room before the darkness, bearing witness to something? Will they find a way to believe in a beautiful world?

A sharply intelligent novel about two college students and the strange, unexpected connection they forge with a married couple. Frances is twenty-one years old, cool-headed, and darkly observant. A college student and aspiring writer, she devotes herself to a life of the mind--and to the beautiful and endlessly self-possessed Bobbi, her best friend and comrade-in-arms. Lovers at school, the two young women now perform spoken-word poetry together in Dublin, where a journalist named Melissa spots their potential. Drawn into Melissa's orbit, Frances is reluctantly impressed by the older woman's sophisticated home and tall, handsome husband. Private property, Frances believes, is a cultural evil--and Nick, a bored actor who never quite lived up to his potential, looks like patriarchy made flesh. But however amusing their flirtation seems at first, it gives way to a strange intimacy neither of them expect. As Frances tries to keep her life in check, her relationships increasingly resist her control: with Nick, with her difficult and unhappy father, and finally even with Bobbi. Desperate to reconcile herself to the desires and vulnerabilities of her body, Frances's intellectual certainties begin to yield to something new: a painful and disorienting way of living from moment to moment. Written with gem-like precision and probing intelligence, Conversations With Friends is wonderfully alive to the pleasures and dangers of youth."

Connell e Marianne frequentano la stessa scuola di Carricklea, un piccolo centro dell’Irlanda rurale appena fuori Sligo. A parte questo, non hanno niente in comune. Lei appartiene a una famiglia agiata e guasta che non le fa mancare nulla tranne i fondamenti dell’amore e del rispetto. Lui è il figlio di una donna pratica e premurosa che per mantenerlo fa la domestica in casa d’altri (quella della madre di Marianne). Nell’inventario di vantaggi e svantaggi, l’inferiorità economica di Connell è bilanciata sul piano sociale. Lui è il bel centravanti della squadra di calcio della scuola e fra i compagni è molto amato, mentre Marianne, che nella pausa pranzo legge da sola Proust davanti agli armadietti, è quella strana ed evitata da tutti. Se la loro fosse una battaglia, o anche solo una sequenza di scaramucce amorose, si potrebbe dire che le frecce al loro arco si equivalgono. Ma Connell e Marianne sono «come due pianticelle che condividono lo stesso pezzo di terra, crescendo l’una vicino all’altra, contorcendosi per farsi spazio, assumendo posizioni improbabili»: nella loro crescita, si appoggiano e si scavalcano, si fanno molto male ma anche molto bene, e la sofferenza che si procurano non è che boicottaggio di sé. Certo, la ferocia informa tutti i rapporti di potere che vigono fra i personaggi, nella piccola scuola di provincia come nel prestigioso Trinity College cui entrambi i ragazzi accedono, nelle dinamiche di genere come negli equilibri famigliari. Perfino in quelle dicotomie sommarie che tanto Connell quanto Marianne subiscono, e in cui essi stessi indulgono: quelle fra persone gentili e persone crudeli, fra brave persone e persone cattive, corrotte, sbagliate, fra persone strane e persone normali. In un modo o nell’altro entrambi aspirano alla normalità, Connell per un’innata benché riprovevole pulsione di conformità, Marianne forse per sfuggire a quella cruda e pervasiva sensibilità che tanto dolore le causa e che facilmente vira all’autodistruttività. C’è Jane Austen in queste pagine, la forza del suo dialogo, la violenza sotterranea delle sue relazioni, e l’omonimia di Marianne con l’eroina del suo romanzo più celebre ne è un indizio. Per anni Marianne e Connell si ruotano intorno «come pattinatori di figura», rischiando la vita e salvandosela, chiedendosi, promettendosi, negandosi, dimostrandosi che quella che li lega è una storia d’amore. La conclusione è un capolavoro di tenera e dolente maturità, per un’autrice oggi ventottenne che a ogni nuovo passo sbaraglia tutte le aspettative.

Two stories about the uncertainties of attraction, from the acclaimed author of Normal People and Conversations with Friends . Mr Salary is Nathan. Sukie moved in with him years ago because her mother was dead and her father was difficult, and she had nowhere else to go. Now they are on the brink of the inevitable. My love for him felt so total and so annihilating that it was often impossible for me to see him clearly at all. In Colour and Light , Aidan and Pauline watch a firework display together. They are almost strangers. But their stumbling connection pains Aidan more than any casual flirtation. He now feels utterly confused as to why they seem to be arguing, confused to the point of abrupt despair.

У школі Маріанна з Коннеллом вдають, наче не знають одне одного. Він — популярний та улюблений усіма, вона — самотня дивачка, з якої відкрито насміхаються. Однак між ними виникає дивовижний зв’язок, який вони вирішують тримати в таємниці і який відтоді назавжди змінює їхні життя. Пізніше, у дублінському коледжі, Маріанна впевнено вписується у тамтешнє товариство, а Коннелл незграбно шукає своє місце серед столичної богеми. За роки навчання вони постійно кружляють одне довкола одного, то віддаляються, то зближуються, але все одно між ними лишається щось, що неймовірним чином притягує їх одне до одного. Поміж іншими стосунками, Маріанниним потягом до саморуйнування, Коннелловою депресією вони випробовують, як далеко можуть зайти у своєму прагненні бути просто собі нормальними людьми і врешті — несподівано врятувати одне одного.

An exquisitely moving story about grief, love, and family, from the global phenomenon Sally Rooney. Aside from the fact that they are brothers, Peter and Ivan Koubek seem to have little in common. Peter is a Dublin lawyer in his thirties—successful, competent, and apparently unassailable. But in the wake of their father’s death, he’s medicating himself to sleep and struggling to manage his relationships with two very different women—his enduring first love, Sylvia, and Naomi, a college student for whom life is one long joke. Ivan is a twenty-two-year-old competitive chess player. He has always seen himself as socially awkward, a loner, the antithesis of his glib elder brother. Now, in the early weeks of his bereavement, Ivan meets Margaret, an older woman emerging from her own turbulent past, and their lives become rapidly and intensely intertwined. For two grieving brothers and the people they love, this is a new interlude—a period of desire, despair, and possibility; a chance to find out how much one life might hold inside itself without breaking.

Alice trifft Felix. Sie ist eine erfolgreiche Schriftstellerin, er arbeitet entfremdet in einer Lagerhalle. Sie begehren einander, doch können sie einander auch trauen? Alice' beste Freundin Eileen hat eine schmerzvolle Trennung hinter sich und fühlt sich aufs Neue zu Simon hingezogen, mit dem sie seit ihrer Kindheit eng verbunden ist. Sie lieben sich, doch ist der Versuch der Liebe den möglichen Verlust ihrer Freundschaft wert? Zwischen Dublin und einem kleinen Ort an der irischen Küste entfaltet Sally Rooney eine Geschichte von vier jungen Menschen, die sich nahe sind, die einander verletzen, die sich austauschen: über Sex, über Ungleichheit und was sie mit Beziehungen macht, über die Welt, in der sie leben. Schöne Welt, wo bist du ist eine universelle Geschichte über den Raum zwischen Alleinsein und Einsamkeit und über die Freiheit, sein Leben mit anderen zu teilen – überwältigend klug, voller Klarheit und Trost.

Download the first chapter of a new novel by Sally Rooney, the bestselling author of Normal People and Conversations with Friends.Alice, a novelist, meets Felix, who works in a warehouse, and asks him if he’d like to travel to Rome with her. In Dublin, her best friend, Eileen, is getting over a break-up, and slips back into flirting with Simon, a man she has known since childhood.Alice, Felix, Eileen, and Simon are still young—but life is catching up with them. They desire each other, they delude each other, they get together, they break apart. They have sex, they worry about sex, they worry about their friendships and the world they live in. Are they standing in the last lighted room before the darkness, bearing witness to something? Will they find a way to believe in a beautiful world?

Connell og Marianne vokser opp i den samme irske småbyen, men der ender likheten dem imellom. De kommer fra hver sin verden, og ingen lar dem så mye som et øyeblikk glemme sin plass i det lille samfunnet. Den gnistrende tiltrekningen mellom skolens kjekkeste gutt og den smarte, rike, venneløse jenta er og forblir deres hemmelighet. Og da de møtes igjen på universitetet i Dublin er rollene byttet om, men tiltrekningen mellom dem like komplisert og elektrisk. Alle andre er en kjærlighetsroman, en fortelling om hvordan et menneske kan forandre livet til den andre. Den viser oss hvor vanskelig det er forandre den vi dypest sett er. Hvordan stolthet og usikkerhet gir grobunn for misforståelser som aldri kan rettes opp. Med hjerteskjærende ømhet avslører den forholdet mellom sex og makt, mellom ønsket om å såre og bli såret, ønsket om å elske og bli elsket. Vinner av Costa-prisen 2018

At school Connell and Marianne pretend not to know each other. He’s popular and well-adjusted, star of the school soccer team while she is lonely, proud, and intensely private. But when Connell comes to pick his mother up from her housekeeping job at Marianne’s house, a strange and indelible connection grows between the two teenagers - one they are determined to conceal. A year later, they’re both studying at Trinity College in Dublin. Marianne has found her feet in a new social world while Connell hangs at the sidelines, shy and uncertain. Throughout their years in college, Marianne and Connell circle one another, straying toward other people and possibilities but always magnetically, irresistibly drawn back together. Then, as she veers into self-destruction and he begins to search for meaning elsewhere, each must confront how far they are willing to go to save the other. Sally Rooney brings her brilliant psychological acuity and perfectly spare prose to a story that explores the subtleties of class, the electricity of first love, and the complex entanglements of family and friendship.

Frances è una ragazza acuta e razionale, analizza ogni istante della sua esistenza e decide qual è la posizione più adatta da assumere per sembrare a proprio agio. Anche se forse non si è mai interrogata su cosa significhi essere davvero a proprio agio con se stessa. Frequenta l'università a Dublino, e scrive poesie che la sua amica Bobbi mette in scena durante serate frequentate da un'umanità molto attenta a occupare il posto giusto. Frances ha con Bobbi, che è lesbica, un rapporto strano, fatto di ammirazione e sudditanza; Bobbi le sembra così certa del suo ruolo, quasi non lo stesse soltanto recitando. Durante uno dei loro reading incontrano Melissa, una fotografa e scrittrice molto apprezzata. E iniziano a frequentare lei e il marito Nick, un attore di una certa fama. Parlano tra di loro di qualsiasi cosa: sesso, politica, arte, religione, convinti di potersi mettere al riparo dai sentimenti che intanto dentro di loro crescono. Sono belli, intelligenti, votati al successo e anticonformisti, pensano che le piccole meschinità dei rapporti umani non li riguardino, e invece scopriranno di essere soggetti alle stesse irrazionali leggi emotive di chiunque altro. E scopriranno di potersi fare molto male.

Marianne y Connell son compañeros de instituto pero no se cruzan palabra. Él es uno de los populares y ella, una chica solitaria que ha aprendido a mantenerse alejada del resto de la gente. Todos saben que Marianne vive en una mansión y que la madre de Connell se encarga de su limpieza, pero nadie imagina que cada tarde los dos jóvenes coinciden. Uno de esos días, una conversación torpe dará comienzo a una relación que podría cambiar sus vidas. Gente normal es una historia de fascinación mutua, de amistad y de amor entre dos personas que no consiguen encontrarse, una reflexión sobre la dificultad de cambiar quienes somos. La segunda novela de Sally Rooney acompaña durante años a dos protagonistas magnéticos y complejos, dos jóvenes que llegamos a entender hasta en su contradicción más sonada y en sus más graves malentendidos. Esta es una historia agridulce que muestra como nos conforman el sexo y el poder, el deseo de herir y ser herido, de amar y ser amado. Nuestras relaciones son una conversación a lo largo del tiempo. Nuestros silencios, lo que las define.

Delve deeper into the Emmy- and Golden Globe–nominated Hulu series based on Sally Rooney's bestselling novel with this must-have collection of the Normal People scripts, featuring behind-the-scenes photos and an introduction by director Lenny Abrahamson. “You know, I did used to think that I could read your mind at times.” “In bed you mean.” “Yeah. And afterwards but I dunno maybe that's normal.” “It’s not.” Connell and Marianne grow up in the same small town in the west of Ireland, but the similarities end there. In school, Connell is popular. Marianne is a loner. But when the two strike up a conversation, something life-changing begins. With an introduction by director Lenny Abrahamson and featuring iconic images from the show, Normal The Scripts contains the complete screenplays of the acclaimed Emmy- and Golden Globe–nominated television drama that The New York Times called “ an unusually thoughtful and moving depiction of young people’s emotional lives.”

My love for him felt so total and so annihilating that it was often impossible for me to see him clearly at all. Years ago, Sukie moved in with Nathan because her mother was dead and her father was difficult, and she had nowhere else to go. Now they are on the brink of the inevitable. Sally Rooney is one of the most acclaimed young talents of recent years. With her minute attention to the power dynamics in everyday speech, she builds up sexual tension and throws a deceptively low-key glance at love and death.