Eggshells

Vivian Lawlor is the sort of person you see – and try to avoid.She’s the person in a coffee shop who starts a conversation that doesn’t make sense. She wears clothes that look like they belong to someone else or that are on inside out or need a trip to a washing machine.In short, Vivian doesn’t fit in, doesn’t belong and doesn’t know the ropes.Vivian’s parents believe she is odd because she is a changeling. They tried to force her (in life-threatening and other ways) to go back to the other side with the fairies and odd ones.She spends much of her days walking Dublin looking for portals of thin spots where she could cross over. She looks for patterns, in the last words of books, street names or graffiti. She takes note whether clocks in public space keep the correct time. She goes to thrift stores and leaves money in the pockets of sweaters.In its own odd way, this prize-winning book works. Vivian, who clearly has an obsessive-compulsive disorder, is an endearing character.Her descriptions of her tramps around Dublin – the statues of poets in the parks, odd kiosks, arched doorways between neighborhoods – are fascinating. Her efforts to learn how to fit in are earnest, touching and often funny.This is a lovely book. Author Caitriona Lally’s word-play is delightful.

The writing is very good, giving you an insight into the main character and her foibles - Asperger's. I really liked the first third or so, where she's introduced and we get to know her and her daily life. But then nothing more happens, it's just more days in her life with only minor differences. I was hoping for more of an overall arc to the story, or at least some narrative movement. After reading several other reviews with the same complaint, I gave up.

Songs that get into your head are called earworms. What do you call books that do the same thing? _Eggshells_ by Caitriona Lally (the book by the Dublin janitor who won the prestigious Rooney writing award) contains prose that sinks into your psyche like a witch's spell. It was a new experience in reading for me. Below are some quotes that I pulled. Note that they won't have the full impact without the rest of the words that surround them, but it will give you a sense of her lyrical style:“My lone silence has the quality of marshmallows, padded with sugary dough, but other people’s silence is punctured with pointy, jagged blades” (222).“A shelf at the top contains hardback books by famous people about how they overcame hardships to conquer their parts of the world: half-lies from gleaming smiles. I want to read the stories they left out: the childhoods with enough to eat, the friends in school not the bullying, the connections to power not the start-from-scratch” (242).“[M]y life soundtrack is more of a nursery rhyme with three repeated notes” (231).“He speaks in italics, all slant and emphasis….He wants nice tidy reasons for concrete problems that are solvable in this world” (205).The story is not for everyone. Linguists and those who are familiar with Irish literary traditions will probably get more out of it than others. That said, I'm neither of those, but I love words and think a decent amount about numbers. This book was a wow for me. I wouldn't be surprised if you hate it, though.

I have great admiration for authors who delve into the minds of the 'misfits' and 'loners'. It provides opportunities for the reader to polish their own lens on the world and nurture acceptance of differences. Ms Lally does a great job with the peculiarities and compulsions of Vivian as she strives to make a place for herself in the world. This may have been overplayed a bit, with compulsive listing taking up half a page and endless descriptions of routes around Dublin. Vivian seemed to have a never-ending supply of money (with no job) that required me to suspend belief a little too much. I also found this tale lacked plot and Vivian doesn't seem to progress much. She is the same at the end as at the beginning, except that she maybe has a plan to travel a bit further afield. 'Eggshells' read like a collection of short stories about an individual. Chapters could have been named 'Vivian Goes to the Beach', 'Vivian Gets a Haircut', 'Vivian Visits a Museum', etc. I wish I'd felt a greater sense of purpose in this story but the writing is beautiful and the reader will look at ordinary events and objects in a new light thanks to Vivian.

Viv is a special needs person who is functioning in her unique way. As she says, “my life soundtrack is more of a nursery rhyme with three repeated notes.” But what a symphony she composes from these notes. Viv (or VIV or Vivian) is a great character who totally inhabits her skin and we see everything through her eyes. The humor occurs at piquant moments, elevating the narrative into a mythical realm. And she is at home in Dublin. “I like living in a city where I am mostly unknown, and going into small places where I am known.” She writes in a notebook of her daily journeys and makes lists of things she notices or likes. Her tour of Dublin is more than a spoof of James Joyce’s Ulysses. While radically different, it is just as revelatory about humanity and myth-making.

I read a while then put it down to take a break. The first few pages are interesting in terms of a different type of story, but then I grew weary. It's written in the first person, present tense, which is fine with me. Just different. The main character is very intense and self-contained, for lack of a better word. She loves lists, and I love lists, but I skimmed the lists - too many and too much. My favorite scene is her conversation with a telephone solicitor. Our Vivian needs unambiguous questions and was afraid she'd be frozen in time if she gives him her age in the fixed brackets he's given her. I finally skimmed the book to finish it. I was looking for the plot or growth in the main character, but I got lost in all the words telling me things.

Vivian was not quite wired right. She has no friends, she avoids mirrors, she tells unwelcome truths and fighters children. She has inherited her aunt's house, freeing her of the need to work, so she spends her days searching for a portal into the fairy world in which she believes she belongs.Vivian has a distinctive voice that does remain consistent to the end. Initially this is beguiling; the reader wants to diagnose Vivian, perhaps cure her. The reader hovers uneasily between horror and humour as Vivian fails to comply with society's norms. Some of her actions are endearing - advertising for a friend called Penelope - and some are irritating - making long lists of words that the reader soon learns to skip. There is also a strong sense of pscho-geography with walks around Dublin, peeling street signs appearing to have been edited by fairies, and a tour of the various modes of public transport - we even get to go to the airport even though Vivian is not flying anywhere.However, for a short book this feels very long. The unvarying voice and lack of narrative arc become very fatiguing. Perhaps there is supposed to be an unravelling of Vivian's sad background but it seemed quite obvious from an early stage. That left the whole thing feeling like a short story told over and over again, never going anywhere and certainly never arriving.

EGGSHELLSBYCAITRIONA LALLYVivian Lawlor is searching for friendship and companionship as she struggles to find her place in this world, a world in which she believes she does not belong in.‘It’s that space between kingdoms where transformation occurs, that thin place that I am trying to find’.She has been left her recently deceased Aunt Maud’s house on the North Circular road in Dublin. Vivian does not find it easy to wallow in the habitual. She finds daily life frightening.‘I don’t know why people talk of the terror of being buried alive-surely the terror is in being alive’.Vivian’s daily quests to find her true place in the world take her out through the streets of Dublin where she searches for:‘The places that contain fairytales and magic portals to another world, a world my parents believed I came from’.Vivian visits graveyards where she reads the headstones of the ‘Dearly Beloved or the Sadly Missed.‘Death brings out the worst of lies’.She didn’t cry when her father died; she cried when he was alive. Despite all this gloom and doom the account of Vivian and Penelope’s friendship is uplifting and very funny.It has been a long time since I have read a book so captivating and emotionally exhausting. I cannot praise this book enough. To me it is like a national treasure and I thank Caitriona Lally for creating a magnificent magical portal to an intriguing world.In my opinion this is a work so precious I can barely begin to quantify this book’s impact on me. Suffice it to say I will be recommending this little literary gem to everyone.

This is a totally charming story! Caitriona uses beautiful and colourful descriptive language to illustrate the story of Vivian who does not fit into the world with any great ease. Vivian looks at life from a perspective different to anyone else whom she knows. She is misunderstood. She is not afraid to try to be what she thinks she is - a changeling looking for her right path. It is localised in Dublin, bringing me to consider some likeness to the writing of Joyce and Beckett, particularly in the language style and the free association. The roads and streets of Dublin come to new life as do the people on the streets as we walk and travel with Vivian. I look forward to the next book from Caitriona Lally.

Wonderfully original story and interesting heroine. Even the long lists she occasionally creates have a freshness about them. However I am 70 pages in and wondering where the book is going take me or is it going to wander along endlessly but eloquently like our protagonist. Hope it starts moving along soon.

This could have been a brilliant, Eleanor Oliphant-esque story… instead, it was 95% (literally) repetition of Vivian’s daily outings, her different ways of interacting with people and how she views the world… with no substance.The book’s description says that someone should ask “is Vivian ok?” - but nobody does! What?! Vivian clearly has a tragic past and uncertain future, but this isn’t explored at all.I hate to leave a negative review, but I’d really suggest not bothering with this book, unfortunately.