Milkman

Written by Anna Burns

Narrated by Bríd Brennan

Centered on the Irish Troubles, this novel is a tale of gossip and hearsay, silence and deliberate deafness. It is a story of inaction with enormous consequences.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dreamscape Media
• Release date: Dec 4, 2018
• ISBN: 9781666575026

Anna Burns

Anna Burns was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland. She is the author of two novels, No Bones and Little Constructions, and of the novella Mostly Hero. No Bones won the Winifred Holtby Memorial Prize and was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. She lives in East Sussex, England.

Reviews for Milkman

[tracy · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was brilliant! The referring to characters by relationship or role was fantastic. Surprisingly easy to keep track of who was who without the mess of names. And the mix of vernacular with the glorious vocabulary of a main character who reads constantly was delicious. The narrative carries the reader deep into the trauma without acknowledging the drama, which is how the main character experiences it. Brilliant!

[Leah Barton Tew · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book definitely represents the style of writing I enjoy the most, but think I would like it more if I had been able to follow it better. I had trouble with some of the dialect (example, “beyond the pale” evidently means having odd or unusual behaviors that make the individual stand out, or something to that effect), and I admittedly know very little about the situation or culture in Northern Ireland in the 70s to 80s. My ignorance made it difficult to understand what was going on at times, or at least I had to try hard to keep it pieced together.

Contributing to my confusion was how the water anonymized the characters by giving them references rather than names - example, “oldest best friend” instead of “Molly” (or whatever) or “Milkman” vs. “The Real Milkman”. The writer made interesting use of this technique to create a strong sense of ranking and importance for the speaker, which well-supported the overall feel and style of the book; the book would be remarkably different otherwise. However, it also made me just not care as much about any of the characters or what happened to them because I couldn’t really connect with them. I know that is intentional. It’s just that when the book ended, my overall response was “Well, ok”, rather than “What else has this author written?”, although I will likely give this author another chance.