Milkman

By: Anna Burns

Narrated by: Bríd Brennan

Length: 14 hrs and 11 mins

Publisher's summary

In this unnamed city, to be interesting is dangerous. Middle sister, our protagonist, is busy attempting to keep her mother from discovering her maybe-boyfriend and to keep everyone in the dark about her encounter with Milkman. But when first brother-in-law sniffs out her struggle and rumours start to swell, middle sister becomes "interesting" - the last thing she ever wanted to be. To be interesting is to be noticed, and to be noticed is dangerous. Milkman is a tale of gossip and hearsay, silence and deliberate deafness. It is a story of inaction with enormous consequences.

©2018 Dreamscape Media, LLC (P)2018 Dreamscape Media, LLC

Indirect but compelling story

In this unnamed city in an unnamed country, which is nevertheless clearly a city in Northern Ireland during the Troubles, Middle Sister has had the misfortune and the mistake of becoming interesting. This is not a place to be interesting. This is a time and a place to blend in and be just like everyone else in your district. Being different creates problems.

Middle Sister has lost friends, neighbors, and siblings to the Troubles, directly and indirectly. She has tried to shut it all out. She reads while walking--serious reading, including taking notes and underlining, while walking. She's seeing a guy she calls Maybe Boyfriend, because they aren't a fully committed couple. She doesn't gossip. And she becomes interesting to an older man called Milkman. Milkman is a high-ranking Renouncer, i.e., one of the anti-government paramilitary. He's married. Suddenly everyone thinks she's having an affair with him.

This is a very good book, a completely absorbing book. It's also modern literary fiction, the genre that thinks it's not a genre, with conventions it thinks aren't genre conventions, among them not having a coherent plot. It does depart from its genre conventions, though, in that the more you learn of the characters, the more plausible and convincing they are as human beings. We grow to understand why Ma, and Eldest Daughter, and Third Brother-in-Law, and Wee Sisters (three in number, not two, as I initially thought), and Maybe Boyfriend, and Oldest Friend, have made the choices they've made.

And Middle Sister has a lot to learn about herself, and how her own choices have set her up for what happens to her in this story.

Everyone makes choices here, and the choices have consequences, and some are good and some are bad. Middle Sister, eighteen years old, has a lot to learn about herself, as well as about family, friends, and neighbors she thinks she knows everything about. It's hard to know what to say, about a story told in many ways indirectly, and in a less linear way that it seems at first. Yet this is a very compelling look at life in what is a a very strange kind of war zone, where there aren't, mostly, tanks or bombers or pitched battles, but life is very, very dangerous, and informers are everywhere.

You might not necessarily get into this story immediately. It's very much worth giving yourself the time to get into it.

Highly recommended.

I bought this audiobook.

Masterful!

I listen to books (instead of reading) only for convenience, the opportunity to “read” while in the car or walking. But in this case, an excellent book is made even more memorable by an extraordinary reading performance. The narrator’s Irish cadences and the hypnotic rhythms of her reading gave this the quality of a one woman show in the theater. Her voice perfectly captured the word-hungry exuberance and humor of the author.

PS I'm v. glad to see that a few weeks after I wrote this, the Washington Post picked out the narrator's performance as remarkable:

"Anna Burns’s “Milkman” — winner of the Man Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award for fiction — is a brilliant but difficult novel, one that has stymied a number of readers who experienced it in print. Set in Belfast during the 1970s amid Northern Ireland’s Troubles, it is the sardonic, sometimes free-form first-person account of a young woman being stalked by a terrorist and held in suspicion by her own community. At times challenging and slow-going to read in print, it opens itself when delivered by the actor Bríd Brennan, a native of Northern Ireland herself. (Dreamscape, 14¼ hours) She captures the dialogue’s cadence wherein much of the novel’s sense lies, renders the menace palpable, and conveys the narrator’s subtle humor with fitting understatement." Wash Post 2019 Aug 7

Narrator brings the story to life

This brilliant reflection of the inner thoughts of an 18-year-old girl in northern Ireland during the troubles could be a bit of a slog in print, but the reader brings the story and the unnamed narrator's personality to vibrant life. Highly recommend.

Different style of writing

I enjoyed listening and the book had an interesting element of suspense. I will definitely have to give it a second listen because I think that will give me a better understanding. Definitely the type of novel to make you think in a deeper way.

briilant

A truly remarkable story performed to perfection. I found the narrator's brogue added so much color to the tale, which is a darkly wonderful comedy of irish life during the rebellion.

A book that listening while reading aids the enjoyment and understanding

Picked for a book club, I initially started reading the book. It’s unique narrative style made it a slower read, adding the audio in the author’s own voice was a perfect way to move through the story. It was like turning on a light in a dimly lit room. The story is interesting especially for readers who know little of the “troubles” of Ireland.

Amazing book

Amazing writing and use of the ENglish language, intense story of the Troubles in Ireland and ver personal impacts on a young woman. Beautiful lilting reading voice. Often like poetry.

Well-deserved Booker

A great performance of a great work of literature. One for the ages. I started this in print and found that the unusual narrative voice made for a challenging read, best enjoyed in small portions like dark chocolate. But the narrator does a wonderful job with the narrator’s speech and it carried me right along.

From DNF to Indulgence

Almost pulled my hairs in frustration when I began reading this one to the point of literally throwing the book away. The Audio version was worth the redemption.

Great book but you should read it.

I enjoyed this listen, the performance is very good. However, I wish I would have read it. The writing is so visceral and vivid, the wordplay is surprising. This is a great book it deserves to be savored.