Alice Munro

A poignant portrayal of a young girl's youth in a Canadian town and her awakening to womanhood in the 1940s follows Del Jordan as she explores the dark and bright sides of womanhood and records the frustrations, joys, triumphs, and trials of small-town life. Reprint. 20,000 first printing.

Lives of Girls and Women

Ioana Kardos

Del's evolution is influenced by the women around her. She is an outsider and doesn't fit in a box, her memory is outstanding and everybody thinks she'll turn out differently, she'll not follow the footsteps of the women around. But her struggles are similar, her unbridled adolescence doesn't pass without her falling in love. Munro astutely jots down anxieties and worries, insights that follow Del's relationships. The book is divided into chapters, each has a theme that raise questions worth pondering over: death, God, friends, sex and an unassailable drive for something more. 
On faith  She wants to feel, to belong and tussles with stereotypes about religion and God.
On becoming an adolescent: 
On ambition < We could not get away from the Jubilee belief that there are great, supernatural, dangers attached to boasting, or having high hopes of yourself. Yet what drew and kept us togethere were these hopes, both denied and admitted, both ridiculed and respected in each other. 251 >

After all, enquiries that children have from early stages onward to adolescence seem to be universal, but the way we struggle and deal with them differs. We are not alike, but not at all different. We build our ambitions on our own terms, come to terms with our mistakes and possibly learn from them. The zillion of questions that arise at different stages in one's life need answers and by reading books and living, one gets the answers only to realize they will never end, and that's the beauty of growing.

Amy Thibodeau

I read this for a book club I belong to. The writing was beautiful, but as a novel, I didn't ever feel like there was forward thrust to the story. It felt hard to get into and if I wasn't reading it for a book club, I suspect I would have abandoned it. 

I love Alice Munro's short stories.

Pavonini

I felt like I was living someone else's life. Just incredible. So many small details that made it endlessly fascinating.

(Note: I couldn't find the edition that I was reading, which was published by The Women's Press. I assume it's the same though.)

Kaitlyn Schmidt

This book isn’t a fast paced read, it doesn’t have a riveting plot line but that’s the good thing about it. The reader is following along with the girl’s life and is getting her inner thoughts about what is happening as she grows into a woman. These are all thoughts and some experiences I have had as a young woman growing up and it made it easy to connect. 

I think this book is for all females to read and would allow growing girls a resource to help figure out what they’re experiencing. If I ever have a daughter I would definitely recommend it to her.

Lives of Girls and Women

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