No One Is Talking About This: Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2021, Shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2021

1.5★s

No One Is Talking About This is a genre-defying book by American editor and author, Patricia Lockwood. Part One, which comprises over half the book, seems to be the stream-of-consciousness thoughts of an unnamed protagonist, a social media poster whose followers avidly latch onto "Can a dog be twins?", and includes a generous helping of sips from social media, but it reads like the unedited, unarranged author's notes for a work-in-progress. It is so disjointed that connecting with characters or events is difficult.

While there are plenty of pleasing turns of phrase and descriptive prose, and phrases like "Something in the back of her head hurt. It was her new class consciousness" may appeal to net-savvy millennials, to readers of the baby boomer generation it likely resembles pretentious drivel that lacks much substance.

Making sense of "The comforting thing about movies was that she could watch bodies that were not feeling they were bodies. Moving effortlessly through graveyards, even uphill, wearing clothing whose tags did not itch, there was never a stray hair caught in the lip gloss, the frictionlessness of bodies in heaven. Sliding over each other like transparencies, riding love as picturesquely as prairie horses, the sex scenes like blouses brushing against slacks in a closet, not feeling and not feeling all the things she would miss in the clear blue space" is a challenge.

Only that it is mercifully short may prompt readers of a certain vintage to reach part two, which actually has some substance, although by then, many will have lost interest, be resenting time spent, or become apathetic about the protagonist's fate. This Man Booker prize and Womens' Prize for Fiction nominee is not for everyone.