The Friend

This year’s National Book Award winner is fiction that reads like memoir. I suspect at least some of this novel is based on the author’s life, though I know nothing about Sigrid Nunez and have no grounds for saying this. The Friend is about love and loss, but more specifically it’s about suicide and writers and dogs. I like this author’s writing style, and I like the narrator of this audiobook. It’s a book of ideas, not a novel in the traditional sense. There’s so many literary prizes these days, and I don’t know the criteria for each. I won’t say The Friend isn’t deserving of The NBA, but I will say I’ve listened to better audiobooks that were released this year. Overall rating: 3.97 stars

Two pretty tired tropes in fiction are the protagonist who is a writer and stories about dogs. Unfortunately, this novel has both. And, it’s in first person. And, the writer protagonist is writing about the death of her writer friend. Ugh. The only good news is that the dog doesn’t talk.

A college freshman or beginning writer might find something new and revelatory in this book\’s rehash of old ideas about the writing life. Another aging male professor womanizer? Check. The writer\’s struggles to write? Check. Jealousy and ambition? Check. Nothing new to see, nothing especially wise or fresh in the rendition of these experiences. Now, about that Great Dane. This would be a better book if there were more about the dog. Danes have a lot of individualism, a lot of personality. They\’re worth writing about. Needless to say, the dog\’s grief is more moving than the writer\’s.

struggled through half…narration made it more difficult…was expecting story of relationship with woman and pet and sounded like a college literature class

When a book wins a National Book Award, I expect something pretty spectacular. Wow was I disappointed…this author couldn\’t decide whether she was writing a grief novel, a documentary on writers/writing, or a canine/buddy story. The bits with the dog actually take up only about a third of the book, so if you\’re hoping for more, look elsewhere. I won\’t read another of her books.

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