3.5
An Unnecessary Woman
ByPublisher Description
Aaliya is a divorced, childless, and reclusively cranky translator in Beirut nurturing doubts about her latest project: a 900-page avant-garde, linguistically serpentine historiography by a late Chilean existentialist. Honestly, at seventy-two, should she be taking on such a project? Not that Aailiya fears dying. Women in her family live long; her mother is still going crazy. But on this lonely day, hour-by-hour, Aaliya's musings on literature, philosophy, her career, and her aging body, are suddenly invaded by memories of her volatile past. As she tries in vain to ward off these emotional upwellings, Aaliya is faced with an unthinkable disaster that threatens to shatter the little life she has left.
In this "meditation on, among other things, aging, politics, literature, loneliness, grief and resilience" (
), Alameddine conjures "a beguiling narrator . . . who is, like her city, hard to read, hard to take, hard to know and, ultimately, passionately complex" (
). A finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the National Book Award,
is "a fun, and often funny . . . grave, powerful . . . [and] extraordinary"
Books) ode to literature and its power to define who we are. "Read it once, read it twice, read other books for a decade or so, and then pick it up and read it anew. This one's a keeper" (
)
Download the free Fable app
Stay organized
Keep track of what you’re reading, what you’ve finished, and what’s next.
Build a better TBR
Swipe, skip, and save with our smart list-building tool
Rate and review
Share your take with other readers with half stars, emojis, and tags
Curate your feed
Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communitiesStay organized
Keep track of what you’re reading, what you’ve finished, and what’s next.Build a better TBR
Swipe, skip, and save with our smart list-building toolRate and review
Share your take with other readers with half stars, emojis, and tagsCurate your feed
Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communitiesAn Unnecessary Woman Reviews
3.5
“I enjoyed reading An Unnecessary Woman. Aaliyah is a character that will stick with me. Alameddine is a masterful writer. I struggled with the amount of literary references and found myself spending more time than I would have liked researching the references which took from the flow.”“SO BORING GOOD POINTS BUT THIS WRITING IS LIKE EATING SAND”
“This was fine: not something I'm mad to have read, but also not something I was changed by. I don't think it's a good sign when most of the memorable quotes are those the narrator is quoting from famous artists and authors, but the author's depiction of an ageing woman faced with the lack of impact she's had on the world was a narrative I'd love to see more in fiction.”
Start a Book Club
Start a public or private book club with this book on the Fable app today!FAQ
Do I have to buy the ebook to participate in a book club?
Why can’t I buy the ebook on the app?
How is Fable’s reader different from Kindle?
Do you sell physical books too?
Are book clubs free to join on Fable?
How do I start a book club with this book on Fable?
