Among Other Things, I've Taken Up Smoking: A Novel [Hardcover]

Aoibheann Sweeney (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 19, 2007

An arresting new literary talent addresses the journey of light years-or is it a hop-from an island in Maine to the island of Manhattan

Miranda's father has always seemed to her as obscure and elusive as the thick New England fog that surrounds their isolated island home. When she was three years old, her parents moved from Manhattan to tiny Crab Island off the coast of Maine so he could work on his translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses. Not long after, her mother took the boat out one day, disappeared into the fog, and never came back. Miranda grew up quickly and quietly in the lonely house, caring for her brilliant but troubled father and sustaining herself with fantasies that grew out of the ill-fated stories of lustful nymphs and vengeful gods that he read to her from his manuscript. Aside from a halfhearted friendship with one of the girls at her school, her only true friend was Mr. Blackwell-a fisherman who had helped her father adjust to life on the island all those years ago and whose relationship with her father is-like so much else about her father-complicated and shrouded in mystery.

But when Miranda graduates from high school, her father announces that he has arranged for her to travel to New York to stay with friends from his old life, and Miranda embarks on a journey that will finally reveal the truth about her father's past and open up her world in ways she cannot begin to imagine.

Sweeney's spare, essential writing brings the contrasts of stark, sea-misted Maine and the chaotic blur of Manhattan into striking relief. Hers is a haunting story about loneliness, about the isolation of island life, whether it's a deserted island off Maine or the overcrowded noisy island of Manhattan. Sweeney's remarkable ability to capture the peculiarities of a place and its inhabitants is astonishing, and her delicate rendering of Miranda's own metamorphosis elevates this novel from a typical coming-of-age story to a work of lasting literary value.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Sweeney's debut novel centers around Miranda Donnal, who grows up on Maine's lonely Crab Island, where her father decides to hunker down and work on his translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses. Shortly after their arrival from New York, Miranda's mother dies in a boating mishap, leaving Miranda in the care of her withdrawn father, who is content to keep his nose in his books. A half-Indian local fisherman, Mr. Blackwell, becomes something of a father figure to Miranda, taking on an unusually devoted caretaker role—cooking for the Donnals, taking Miranda to school and serving as her confidante. Yet secrecy also shrouds Mr. Donnal and Mr. Blackwell's evolving relationship. When Miranda graduates from high school, her father dispatches her to New York City and a job at the classical studies institute he was molded by. There she begins to peel away myth after myth of the father she thought she knew as she falls in love and has her own revelations about intimacy and connections. Sweeney's prose effortlessly conveys her characters' isolation and evolution, and her portrayal of the aftermath of life's slights—big and small—make this coming-of-age better than most. (July)
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From Booklist

Miranda Donnal is an infant when her parents move from New York City to a remote island off the coast of Maine so her father can complete a translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses. When her mother takes a boat to town and never returns, Miranda is raised by her reclusive father. She grows up primarily in solitude, save for a friendship with Mr. Blackwell, a fisherman who often acts as Miranda's surrogate father. This endearing bond is complicated by the mysterious relationship between Mr. Blackwell and Miranda's father. After Miranda graduates from high school, her father arranges for her to return to New York to work in the classical-studies library that he helped establish years before her birth. It is here that Miranda begins unraveling the mysteries of her father's past, while pushing beyond the threshold of isolation to discover her own enthralling path in life and love. In Sweeney's debut novel, an accomplished coming-of-age tale, her subtle prose elevates the moments when Miranda shrugs off another layer of loneliness. Strauss, Leah

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Penguin Press HC, The; First Edition edition (July 19, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 9781594201301
• ISBN-13: 978-1594201301
• ASIN: 1594201307
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.7 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,722,363 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars , July 21, 2007

By 

lost in space (all over) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Among Other Things, I've Taken Up Smoking: A Novel (Hardcover)

Where has Aoibheann Sweeney been all these years? I loved this book. it's about Miranda, an odd girl who moves to new York from a small island in New England. Her father is a spaced out academic. He loves whiskey. He ignores his daughter. He never misplaces his pens. Her mother is dead. Poor Miranda is lost in New York, perpetually confused about who she is and where she's going. But everybody loves her nonetheless, and she gets plenty of action in NYC in no time.

Sweeney's writing is amazing. Spare and poetic, but not at all annoyingly so. I hope she gives us another novel soon.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Lyrical Pageturner, August 3, 2007

By 

S. Marion (Middlebury, VT United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Among Other Things, I've Taken Up Smoking: A Novel (Hardcover)

I loved this book! I found it beautiful, gritty, magical, completely moving, and sometimes very funny. It is an unconventional coming-of-age story that is terse and tough-minded but unafraid of portraying raw emotion. It is also a story about art-making, art's entanglement with life, and the imagination's ability to feed, transform and give shape to experience. Finally, it is a terrific read--with all the suspense of a mystery (which it is also), the intrigue and humor of a social satire (which it is also), and the stark lyricism and metaphoric depth of a poem (of the plain-spoken, restrained variety). The characters drive the plot and are totally engaging and idiosyncratic, most especially Miranda, the protagonist. She is a stalwart, dreamy loner whose adventurous impulses seem driven by a desire to break out of her isolation. On route, there is disappointment but ultimately hope and complicated, dogged love--love between men and women, women and women, men and men, father and daughter. Love in Miranda's world is a force that clobbers or saves or sometimes both. Despite these sobering investigations, Sweeney maintains a light touch and a sense of exuberance. Did I mention that Among Other Things... is also a playful feminist revision of The Tempest? Do I need to give you any more reasons to read this book?

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Where's the rest?, December 29, 2007

By 

Katherine Barton "grlsrgn" (turlock, Ca) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Among Other Things, I've Taken Up Smoking: A Novel (Hardcover)

I enjoyed reading this book because her descriptions are vivid, particualarly the view of NYC through a young innocent girl's eyes.. one who has been isolated on an island without any true knowledge of the "real world". However, her character development of this young girl, whose mother died when she was too young too remember and is clouded by mystery, is more outstanding. Her portrayal of Miranda, a lonely creature, is so powerful, you can't help but empathize with her longing for intimacy. Trapped on an island with her emotionally absent father, with her only friend a local fisherman, she descirbes her daydream of becoming a tree with such vividness, that you can visualize the transformation in your minds eye. Her scholarly literary referecnes, particuarly to Ovids Metamorphosis (what her father is translating as his work)is an added bonus. My only complaint is that she didn't seem to finish the book! When I got to the ending, I thought "did she run out of paper?" After such a craftfully mastered piece, her ending seemed rushed... not well-thought out... as if she had a deadline to meet. That is my only dissapointment. I hope she writes another book with Miranda as the main character so the loose ends in this book are tied up.