Elizabeth Strout

"Strout's iconic heroine Lucy Barton recounts her complex, tender relationship with William, her first husband -- and longtime, on-again-off-again friend and confidante."--

A Novel

Oh William!

kaitlan

I tell you this to explain how we kind of know who we are, without knowing it... What is it that William knew about me and that I knew about him that caused us to get married?

This was a slow read, not because it was bad but because I had to give myself time to think in between paragraphs. Oh William! is a book about old people but also not really- it's a book about what we know and don't know about ourselves, and the people we love, and the people we've fallen out of love with. But who we still love, maybe kind of. I can't really tell you why I liked it so much; nothing really happened. It felt real, though, and sad, and I saw myself in these characters, as I'm sure anyone who reads this book might. It made me think about what life will look when I don't have much of it left. Maybe this review should actually be 5 stars, is what I mean.

(Edit, 3 months later: Okay, so this book has stayed with me for much longer than I ever imagined. 5 stars it is.)

Jeannette Ordas

Oh, how delightful! What a strange thing to say about a book that deals with generational trauma, but it really is wonderfully charming. I didn't know that this was part of a series, but it's easy to jump right in. A nice quick read too.

Megan McMorran

Here Strout writes in what might seem an overly familiar style, as if she’s writing a letter to her best friend, about her exasperating (Oh William!) ex-husband.  Instead of annoying or trite, it’s refreshing and indirectly, brilliantly insightful about the narrator and her ex-husband, and comes off as a welcome development of her character (this is the third in a trilogy about Lucy Barton). Through her chatty discourse, she reveals much about love and unexpected human strengths and deficits and how one can become the other, and we are often—always?—the last to catch on. 

Karen Shimek

I’m still processing this book. I can’t decide if it was brilliant or purposeless. I should give it a three for now, which could be changed to a five or two.

Kourtney

I received an email from the publisher of Oh William! with a blurb that said "because you loved Taylor Jenkins Reid..." - I didn't have to read any more after that. I absolutely loved TJR! I fell in love with Evelyn Hugo, Daisy Jones and enjoyed the ride of Malibu Rising. Couple that with reading how the author of Oh William, Elizabeth Strout, won a Pulitzer Prize for her writing, and I really wanted to give this one a try. 

Oh William is book 3 of a series about Lucy Barton's life. It does read well as a stand alone. Book 1 was made into a Broadway show that starred Laura Linney. I had to see what this was all about!

As a fan of women's fiction, there is a certain pace that I have become accustomed to. Stories can move quickly, and sometimes there are twists and turns you never saw coming. Characters come alive and I look for books that make me want to continue turning the pages. This story's pace was very different from that.

The action in this story is very passive. I did not feel like I was there in the thick of it, but rather I was sitting in a rocking chair on a porch, listening to my grandmother tell stories of her life. Some places Lucy would say "I won't talk about that" and then later she would reminding us that she didn't want to talk about it but in order to make sense of the current story, we had to have a bit of extra information. Having come off of a story that was fast moving and a little bit of a spicy romance, this was an interesting change of pace. 

Strout can weave together a nice story, but you have to be in the right frame of mind for it. I would not call this a quick read or an exciting read, but it was nice to step outside of my story comfort zone and read something new. 

Thank you to the publishers for providing an advanced copy for review via #netgalley

erika s

Francine Corry

Sarah Erle

Allison Ball

Liz Prinz

Maisie MacDonald

Amanda S

Kait Long

Denyse 

Emma Parker

James Haliburton

The Pulitzer Prize-winning, Booker-longlisted, bestselling author returns to her beloved heroine Lucy Barton in a luminous novel about love, loss, and the family secrets that can erupt and bewilder us at any point in life Lucy Barton is a successful writer living in New York, navigating the second half of her life as a recent widow and parent to two adult daughters. A surprise encounter leads her to reconnect with William, her first husband - and longtime, on-again-off-again friend and confidante. Recalling their college years, the birth of their daughters, the painful dissolution of their marriage, and the lives they built with other people, Strout weaves a portrait, stunning in its subtlety, of a tender, complex, decades-long partnership. Oh William! captures the joy and sorrow of watching children grow up and start families of their own; of discovering family secrets, late in life, that alter everything we think we know about those closest to us; and the way people live and love, against all odds. At the heart of this story is the unforgettable, indomitable voice of Lucy Barton, who once again offers a profound, lasting reflection on the mystery of existence. 'This is the way of life,' Lucy says. 'The many things we do not know until it is too late.' 'Elizabeth Strout is one of my very favourite writers, so the fact that Oh William! may well be my favorite of her books is a mathematical equation for joy. The depth, complexity, and love contained in these pages is a miraculous achievement' Ann Patchett 'A superbly gifted storyteller and a craftswoman in a league of her own' Hilary Mantel 'A terrific writer' Zadie Smith 'She gets better with each book' Maggie O'Farrell 'A majestic book. I do not know any other writer who can portray life in this way' Rachel Joyce 'One of America's finest writers' Sunday Times 'An absolute delight of a book' Claire Fuller 'A wonderful book' Emma Healey

From the author of My Name is Lucy Barton

Anna Jacobs

Pulitzer Prize winner Elizabeth Strout explores the mysteries of marriage and the secrets we keep, as a former couple reckons with where they’ve come from—and what they’ve left behind. “Elizabeth Strout is one of my very favorite writers, so the fact that Oh William! may well be my favorite of her books is a mathematical equation for joy. The depth, complexity, and love contained in these pages is a miraculous achievement.”—Ann Patchett, author of The Dutch House I would like to say a few things about my first husband, William. Lucy Barton is a writer, but her ex-husband, William, remains a hard man to read. William, she confesses, has always been a mystery to me. Another mystery is why the two have remained connected after all these years. They just are. So Lucy is both surprised and not surprised when William asks her to join him on a trip to investigate a recently uncovered family secret—one of those secrets that rearrange everything we think we know about the people closest to us. What happens next is nothing less than another example of what Hilary Mantel has called Elizabeth Strout’s “perfect attunement to the human condition.” There are fears and insecurities, simple joys and acts of tenderness, and revelations about affairs and other spouses, parents and their children. On every page of this exquisite novel we learn more about the quiet forces that hold us together—even after we’ve grown apart. At the heart of this story is the indomitable voice of Lucy Barton, who offers a profound, lasting reflection on the very nature of existence. “This is the way of life,” Lucy says: “the many things we do not know until it is too late.”

Oh William! A Novel

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