Lives of Girls and Women: A Novel

Not your typical girl-comes-of-age-in-a-small-Ontario-town story, this novel contains plenty of quirky and well developed characters, and relentlessly honest depictions of a girl's first sexual experiences. The title may seem trite, but every woman who reads it will find a theme or experience that resonates and, thanks to Munro's simple prose, will linger...more

Not your typical girl-comes-of-age-in-a-small-Ontario-town story, this novel contains plenty of quirky and well developed characters, and relentlessly honest depictions of a girl's first sexual experiences. The title may seem trite, but every woman who reads it will find a theme or experience that resonates and, thanks to Munro's simple prose, will linger in the memory long after the book is finished.   hide

This was very evocative for me of what my childhood was like, even though it took place 20 years later.

Hard to get into, but once past the first chapter, it was very good.

My favorite book of all time

Storytelling at its finest. Goddamn she's good!

Although this is technically a collection of short stories, I feel it reads like a novel. I love how she doesn't sentimentalize everything to really exhibit the limitations imposed on this girl's life.

Munro's voice in this is, as always, plainly profound. She writes through the small-town veils established by so many of her characters.

This is really close to my own growing up in some ways. She is more interested in "truth" than reality. Very interesting.

One of my favorite books of all time. I love Alice Munro. There is so much contained in each sentence.