I absolutely loved this book. Normal People felt like stepping into the private thoughts of two people who are both painfully real and quietly extraordinary. The writing is so simple and clean, but somehow it carries so much weight; like someone whispering something that stays with you for days.
The characters were the soul of the novel for me. Marianne and Connell aren’t perfect, and that’s exactly why I cared about them so much. Their inner worlds were so raw, so introverted; it was like watching two people drift through life while trying, quietly, to hold onto something real. I especially related to Connell. He had his moment in the spotlight, seemed to have it all, and yet ended up isolated in a way that felt disturbingly familiar. Marianne, on the other hand, carried her loneliness in both visible and invisible ways. Her silence was loud.
That chapter where Connell goes to therapy? My favorite. It hit something deep. The emotional honesty there just… stunned me.
There’s a kind of isolation in this book that I actually appreciated; it wasn’t tragic, it was just true. Sometimes you finish a novel and feel satisfied. With Normal People, I finished it and felt exposed. It didn’t offer solutions, just reflections. Real ones.
If I had one small wish, I would’ve loved to see more of Marianne’s relationships with her friends; it felt like a thread Rooney started to pull, but never finished.
I don’t know exactly who I’d recommend this book to; maybe not someone looking for a love story with neat edges. But if you’ve ever sat with a quiet kind of sadness or questioned how two people can understand each other and still be alone… read this.