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Girl, Woman, Other

by Bernardine Evaristo

Other authors: See the other authors section.

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingConversations / Mentions
3,2461354,127 (4.25)1 / 311
"Girl, Woman, Other is a celebration of the diversity of Black British experience. Moving, hopeful, and inventive, this extraordinary novel is a vivid portrait of the state of contemporary Britain and the legacy of Britain's colonial history in Africa and the Caribbean. The twelve central characters of this multi-voiced novel lead vastly different lives: Amma is a newly acclaimed playwright whose work often explores her black lesbian identity; her old friend Shirley is a teacher, jaded after decades of work in London's funding-deprived schools; Carole, one of Shirley's former students, works hard to earn a degree from Oxford and becomes an investment banker; Carole's mother Bummi works as a cleaner and worries about her daughter's lack of rootedness despite her obvious achievements. From a nonbinary social media influencer to a 93-year-old woman living on a farm in Northern England, these unforgettable characters also intersect in shared aspects of their identities, from age to race to sexuality to class. Sparklingly witty and filled with emotion, centering voices we often see othered, and written in an innovative and fast-moving form that borrows from poetry, Girl, Woman, Other is a polyphonic and richly textured social novel that reminds us of everything that connects us to our neighbors, even in times when we are encouraged to be split apart"--… (more)
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» See also 311 mentions

English (124)  Dutch (4)  German (2)  Portuguese (Brazil) (1)  Danish (1)  All languages (132)
Showing 1-5 of 124 (next | show all)
Reason read; Booker winner 2019. I really enjoyed this book and given the fact that there is a lot of sex, violence, and gender identity topics, that is saying something. This book is well written. Of course I listened to it so that makes the unique style not difficult. I enjoyed the different women's stories and I learned stuff. This is about 12 women, mostly black women, who's lives are all connected in some way. It starts with Anna at her theater presentation and it ends with the theater presentation but in-between there are the stories of all these women. It was well done, not heavy handed in anyway and not pushing any agenda. All the women are different just as you would expect people to be different from each other.
Bernardine Anne Mobolaji Evaristo OBE FRSL FRSA is a British author and academic. Her novel Girl, Woman, Other jointly won the Booker Prize in 2019 alongside Margaret Atwood's The Testaments, making her the first Black woman to win the Booker. ( )
  Kristelh | May 19, 2024 |
This book wasn't quite what I expected - a bit more of a collection of disparate character studies, rather than anything more plot-directed, despite the interwoven threads of the character's lives. That interweaving was really intriguing, I love seeing people from different angles and points of view, and the way they crossed and recrossed each others' lives was so well done and fascinating.

There were some content notes I would have appreciated knowing about beforehand, honestly (infidelity, drugs, quite a few sexual violence happenings or references, some of which were handled in such a way that skirted very near triggers for me).

The poetry-prose hybrid style gave it a unique feel. Personally the lack of any full stops anywhere in the book, and the likewise lack of anything to denote beginnings or ends of sentences, made it tiring to read at times. The use of linebreaks midsentence and as a stylistic point was really well done practically everywhere it was used and had a good impact.

I didn't like the book, but it was interesting. I winced through some portions of it (large swathes of Morgan's story, for example) and while sometimes the uncomfortable or bigoted/judgemental views seemed true to characters' perspectives, sometimes there seemed to be something bleeding through from the author's perspective herself. ( )
  Kalira | May 15, 2024 |
Unequivocally the best book I have read this year.

Every page is perfect, every sentence, gosh, every word. Evaristo takes twelve vastly different women, connected in ways obvious and subtle, profiling their lives, their agonies, their battles and loves, self-deceptions, losses, doubts, and triumphs. Throughout she maintains that delicate ironic tone that characterises much of the best of British literature.

This is a book very much of the now, touching on numerous current cultural debates, in a manner that feels authentic and precise. It is a truly polyphonic experience. This is great literature but also very much a novel in every sense of the word.

I cannot recommend highly enough. ( )
  therebelprince | Apr 21, 2024 |
The style of a different character being the focus of each chapter is not one I’m a big fan of generally, but other than that this book has a lot going for it - well written with a style just unusual enough to be interesting, empathy for all its characters, telling the story of black British women through several generations, engaging contemporary questions of gender and sexuality in a compelling way. I even misted up a bit on that touching last page, which was unexpected! ( )
  lelandleslie | Feb 24, 2024 |
Delicioso.
Tudo o que quer saber sobre o universo feminino homossexual do mundo artístico de Londres.
A escrita é totalmente inovadora. Mas cativante. Entramos na cabeça da autora. Muito bom.
O racismo, o machismo e a luta pela sobrevivência estão sempre nas imensas histórias que Bernardine nos conta de forma magistral.
Não surpreende ter vencido o Booker prize em 2019.
( )
  jpedro_1966 | Jan 23, 2024 |
Showing 1-5 of 124 (next | show all)
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» Add other authors (14 possible)

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Evaristo, Bernardineprimary authorall editionsconfirmed
Bravery, RichardCover designersecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Campbell, AliCover artistsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Nabirye, Anna-MariaNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Singh, KaranCover artistsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Vos, LetteTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed

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Epigraph
Dedication
For the sisters & the sistas & the sistahs & the sistren & the women & the womxn & the wimmin & the womyn & our brethren & our bredrin & our brothers & our bruvs & our men & our mandem & the LGBTQI+ members of the human family.
First words
Amma

is walking along the promenade of the waterway that bisects her city, a few early morning barges cruise slowly by

to her left is the nautical-themed footbridge with its deck-like walkway and sailing mast pylons

to her right is the bend in the river as it heads east past Waterloo Bridge towards the dome of St Paul's

she feels the sun begin to rise, the air still breezy before the city clogs up with heat and fumes

a violinist plays something suitably uplifting further along the promenade

Amma's play, The Last Amazon of Dahomey, opens at the National tonight
Quotations
when they leave uni it's gonna be with a huge debt and crazy competitions for jobs and the outrageous rental prices out there mean that her generation will have to move back home forever, which will lead to even more of them despairing of the future and what with the plant about to go shit with the United Kingdom soon to be disunited from Europe which itself is hurtling down the reactionary road and making fascism fashionable again and it's so crazy that the disgusting perma-tanned biliionaire has set a new intellectual and moral low by being president of America and basically it all means that the older generation has ruined everything and her generation is dooooooomed
this metal-haired wild creature from the bush with the piercingly feral eyes
is her mother
this is she
this is her
who cares about her colour? why on earth did Penelope ever think it mattered
a mouth that holds all her misery like a drawstring tightened around a pouch
Last words
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
Disambiguation notice
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Original language
Canonical DDC/MDS
Canonical LCC

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"Girl, Woman, Other is a celebration of the diversity of Black British experience. Moving, hopeful, and inventive, this extraordinary novel is a vivid portrait of the state of contemporary Britain and the legacy of Britain's colonial history in Africa and the Caribbean. The twelve central characters of this multi-voiced novel lead vastly different lives: Amma is a newly acclaimed playwright whose work often explores her black lesbian identity; her old friend Shirley is a teacher, jaded after decades of work in London's funding-deprived schools; Carole, one of Shirley's former students, works hard to earn a degree from Oxford and becomes an investment banker; Carole's mother Bummi works as a cleaner and worries about her daughter's lack of rootedness despite her obvious achievements. From a nonbinary social media influencer to a 93-year-old woman living on a farm in Northern England, these unforgettable characters also intersect in shared aspects of their identities, from age to race to sexuality to class. Sparklingly witty and filled with emotion, centering voices we often see othered, and written in an innovative and fast-moving form that borrows from poetry, Girl, Woman, Other is a polyphonic and richly textured social novel that reminds us of everything that connects us to our neighbors, even in times when we are encouraged to be split apart"--

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Book description
Teeming with energy, humour and heart, a love song to black Britain told by twelve very different people.

Winner of the Booker Prize 2019.

Grace is a Victorian orphan dreaming of the mysterious African father she will never meet.

Winsome is a young Windrush bride, recently arrived from Barbados.

Amma is the fierce queen of her 1980s squatters' palace.

Morgan, who used to be Megan, is blowing up on social media, the newest activist-influencer on the block.

Twelve very different people, mostly black and female, more than a hundred years of change, and one sweeping, vibrant, glorious portrait of contemporary Britain. Bernardine Evaristo presents a gloriously new kind of history for this old country: ever-dynamic, ever-expanding and utterly irresistible.
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