OH MY HEART. I have decided that this will be the summer of Strout! I remember reading Olive Kitteridge over a decade ago and it not resonating with me at the time. But over the years I’ve gravitated toward a number of “quiet novels” and Strouts work always comes up as a read alike for some of my favorites like Zorrie by Laird Hunt and Claire Keegan’s work. I absolutely gobbled up Lucy Barton and I plan to read all of her books this summer. There’s just something so moving and intimate about Strout’s prose that makes the mundane extraordinary and just gets under my skin. Maybe I need to revisit Olive too...
“Lonely was the first flavor I had tasted in my life, and it was always there, hidden inside the crevices of my mouth, reminding me.”