NORMAL PEOPLE by SALLY ROONEY dives into the lives and inner monologues of characters Connell and Marianne. The story is told in third person and over the course of years, with chapter time jumps varying by minutes, days, weeks, and months.

The setting takes place in Ireland, first in the pair's small hometown and then at Trinity College in Dublin. I studied abroad here, and it was fun to pick up on the little aspects of the school that made it into the book, like the cricket pitch, which I used to walk by, and the school's use of Latin, which I remember is the only language used during graduation ceremonies.

The inner monologues of the two characters are complex as they are both damaged in their own ways and become increasingly codependent on the other. Their dynamic switches from high school to college as Marianne becomes the popular one and Connell becomes uncool. What follows are their ebbs and flows of life, navigating a world that they both don’t seem to fit in, striving to just be normal people.

Interestingly, the book doesn’t use a single quotation mark, leaving the reader to focus on when the dialogue begins and ends with no indicator. I’ve never seen a book formatted like this and enjoyed it for the third-person perspective.

Their individual abnormalities seem to fit with one another’s souls, so they always find their way back to each other. I found both characters interesting and frustrating at times. But the undying respect that they have for each other’s thoughts and opinions is an obvious theme throughout, emphasizing their connection. The inner monologues of each character make you pause as the reader and wonder about the ways people think of their own lives.

hindsight: perfectly content