Conversations with Friends

'Sally Rooney writes with a rare, thrilling confidence, in a lucid and exacting style uncluttered with the sort of steroidal imagery and strobe flashes of figurative language that so many dutifully literary novelists employ. This isn't to say that the novel lacks beauty. Its richness blooms quietly.' New Yorker Frances, Bobbi, Nick and Melissa ask each other endless questions. As their relationships unfold, in person and online, they discuss sex and friendship, art and literature, politics and gender, and, of course, one another. Twenty-one-year-old Frances is at the heart of it all, bringing us this tale of a complex ménage-à-quatre and her affair with Nick, an older married man. You can read Conversations with Friends as a romantic comedy, or you can read it as a feminist text. You can read it as a book about infidelity, about the pleasures and difficulties of intimacy, or about how our minds think about our bodies. However you choose to read it, it is an unforgettable novel about the possibility of love. 'Rooney shares with Plath a knack for particularising a feminine consciousness, and this novel is the best I've read on what it means to be young and female right now.' Daily Mail 'The kind of novel that young women transitioning into adulthood in the early 21st century may one day call "seminal".' Evening Standard 'A novel of ideas that is driven by character; a very compelling combination.' Daily Telegraph, FIVE STARS * * * * * 'Hugely enjoyable romantic comedy' Metro, FIVE STARS * * * * * 'Truly beguiles... Heralds a fresh new voice in fiction' Stylist, FIVE STARS * * * * *