Time and Tide [Mass Market Paperback]

Edna O'Brien (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 1999

Edna O'Brien's most personal and most powerful novel in print from Plume for the first time.

In a poignant, heart-felt exploration of one woman's struggle to be true to herself yet hold on to the things dearest to her, award-winning author Edna O'Brien tracks the life of Nell Steadman, an innocent "country girl" desperate to gain experience in whatever manner possible. Escaping from her overbearing family into an equally stifling marriage, Nell must fight for her freedom and custody of her children.

Passionate, raw, and gorgeously written, Time and Tide is a profound exploration of the primal undertow of motherhood.

"Brilliantly expressed...O'Brien is one of the great writers of stories in the English-speaking world." --The New York Times Book Review

"Time and Tide is O'Brien's harshest yet most beautiful work. O'Brien brings together the earthly and the delicately poetic: she has the soul of Molly Bloom and the skills of Virginia Woolf." --Newsweek

"Adjectives for Edna O'Brien's fiction inevitably include rich, raw, bleak, and relentless. As always in Ms. O'Brien's work, there is wonderful writing about passion." --The Wall Street Journal

"Sharp, perfectly observed, true." --The Boston Globe

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

O'Brien's current fame rests largely on short stories in the New Yorker vein. But it was novels like The Country Girls ( LJ 2/15/60) and Girls in Their Married Bliss ( LJ 1/15/68) that launched her highly publicized career in the 1960s, and the loyal readership of her longer works will not be disappointed by her latest. Once naive adolescents preyed upon by society, O'Brien's characters are now battle-weary women preyed upon by society. Time and Tide ups the stakes by sending its protagonist to hell: separation from marriage and children precipitate her descent into a surreal underworld of therapy, drugs, and sexual assault. The power of the novel lies less in its hallucinatory effects than in its sustained evocation of alienation. It used to be said that O'Brien's fiction was a manual in survival tactics, but Time and Tide is not so helpful. Its expression of personal isolation and defeat registers in prose of new intensity and vigor.
- John P. Harrington, Cooper Union, New York
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Plume (June 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0452280516
• ISBN-13: 978-0452280519
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 2.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #444,352 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Edna O'Brien, the author of "The Country Girls" Trilogy, "The Light of Evening," and "Byron in Love," is the recipient of the James Joyce Ulysses Medal, and an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. She lives in London.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars All bleakness and despair ... a book to cut your wrists by !, January 2, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Time and Tide (Mass Market Paperback)

Edna O'Brien has written a novel so bleak and despairing I'd call it a book to cut your wrists by. Is the experience of womanhood all about pain, deprivation and loss ? Is there no joy in the bargain ? You wouldn't think so, judging by the experience of Nell. The cruelty of her husband drives her to seek emotional refuge in her two sons but when they leave the nest, she turns in desperation to a series of unreliable lovers who bring her more misery. The relentless feeling of despair beating upon Nell reaches its climax when she loses Paddy, but by then, the reader is too numb to care. It doesn't help that O'Brien's prose is often dense and turgid. Some critics call it poetic or lyrical, which may be so, but the jerkiness of some of the episodes (eg, in the middle section, with her lovers) makes the narrative difficult to follow. It is sometimes even hard to tell who she's writing about. Her characterisation is also weak, though this may be deliberate. O'Brien isn't interested in anybody other than Nell. The supporting cast of characters are only there to help create the soundtrack playing through Nell's mind. The message that O'Brien delivers on motherhood isn't redemptive either. Paddy's and Tristan's alienation from Nell is, not surprisingly, reminiscent of Nell's estrangement from her own mother. The horror of Nell's emotional existence reaches a crescendo when she stares at a half crazed baglady one day on the streets and sees the ravaged face of her once young housemaid, Rita. There is no more powerful image depicting the madness and despair that will take hold of Nell. "Time and Tide" is emotionally exhausting to read. It isn't quite the artistic failure it is made out to be, but O'Brien could have lightened her touch a tad ! This is not a book for everyone.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Not for me.., June 4, 2006

By 

Kris (Norwich, CT USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Time and Tide (Mass Market Paperback)

Edna O'Brien is a different style writer then I am used to. She has a kind of poetic style in her writing which made it way to confusing to keep up with. I understood the points that she was trying to make and the gist of the story. I think 90% of the book was a lot of mumble jumble. Didn't interest me in the least, but I wanted to read it through till the end but was very disapointed.

5.0 out of 5 stars Emotional, November 6, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Time and Tide (Mass Market Paperback)

"Time and Tide" is an excellent literary novel, very emotional in style and essence. I was deeply touched by this book, and I am very grateful to one of my friends for recommending me Edna O'Brien as an author. Snip: (...)