Emotionally Weird: A Novel (Hardcover)

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Amazon.com Review
Readers who survive the first 20 pages of this dense and playful novel, with its three different openings, constant jokes, and crowded cast of characters, will find themselves rewarded with a leisurely postmodern romp through the student ferment and bodily indulgences of the early 1970s. Although the publisher has called Emotionally Weird a comic novel, it is essentially unclassifiable, both further-reaching and less "meaningful" than it first appears. Kate Atkinson's book begins with chapter 1 of a bad murder mystery being written by Effie Andrews for a creative-writing course at the University of Dundee in 1972. But the action soon shifts to a wintry island in the Hebrides, where Effie is trying to elicit the story of her parentage from her single mother, Nora, while spinning a humorous first-person narrative of her college life. Only near the end of the book does she finally wrench the story from her mother: Effie's bizarre origins; the identity of her father; and the whole unlikely tale of her mother's family.

Like a Borgesian labyrinth, with other stories thrown in, including a laughably convenient introduction of magic realism, it is impossible to know what to take seriously--or "jocoseriously," to paraphrase another of Atkinson's influences: the Joyce of Ulysses and Finnegans Wake. In her third novel, much of Atkinson's humor is incidental, even parenthetical. (We are told in passing, for example, that Effie's dissertation is called "Henry James: Man or Maze?") She is at her best when introducing her eccentric characters, such as the elderly Professor Cousins, who is sometimes lucid, sometimes not. "As with anyone in the department," Effie explains, "it wasn't always easy to distinguish between the two states. The university's strict laws of tenure dictated that he had to be dead at least three months before he could be removed from behind his desk." Professor Cousins, like the author, enjoys word games along the order of those in Alice in Wonderland, and Atkinson's use of Scottish idiom comes to function as a sort of word game. She also brings in a few killjoys (a militant feminist, a militant Christian, a literary theorist) to complicate an already loopy narrative and to spike the punch.

Janice smelt of piety and coal tar soap. She had recently become a Christian, a neophyte of a student Christian fellowship whose members roamed the corridors of Airlie, Belmont and Chalmers Halls looking for likely converts (the afraid, the alone, the abandoned) and those who needed to use the Bible to fill in the spaces where their personalities should have been.

As Emotionally Weird develops, Atkinson relies more and more on the postmodern gag of characters commenting on the unfolding action. There is no telling how she finally draws these disparate threads onto a single spool, but in the end, even the slightest subplots are neatly tied up and the most transient characters accounted for. --Regina Marler

From Publishers Weekly
When Atkinson's first novel, Behind the Scenes at the Museum, beat out Salman Rushdie's The Moor's Last Sigh for the 1995 Whitbread Book of the Year Award, a controversy in the British press ensued. But this imaginative and unconventional writer strikes back at her detractors in her third book (after Human Croquet), skewering the academic literary establishment with understated but spot-on humor, while telling an imaginative tale both outrageously funny and poignantly human: Tom Robbins meets John Irving. Euphemia "Effie" Andrews, a 21-year-old Scot and student at the University of Dundee, arrives at a remote, barren Scottish island to swap life stories with her mother, Nora. Effie comes with a slew of tales about the free-love and druggy chaos of her early 1970s college life, and also armed with questions for Nora, determined to learn the truth about their family history. That is, if Nora is her mother, and if any of the stories either of them tell are true ("My mother is a virgin"). These are unreliable narrators in top form, keeping readers guessing delightedly throughout. The author uses different fonts to intertwine several narratives, including hilarious entries from Effie's, and her classmates', novels-in-progress, while these excerpts are interrupted by Nora's snide commentary. Effie's academic hijinks may be a bit exaggerated, since she's slogging along on a paper on George Eliot while living with occasional electricity and a continually stoned boyfriend. But truly alarming things are happening in Dundee: someone is killing residents of a retirement home, and a strange woman is following Effie. While the narrators' constant backtalk can be tiresome, Atkinson's clever and sophisticated prose preserves the voices' sparkling energy. Readers may guess the family secret before it is revealed, but that doesn't steal any thunder from the unsettling and utterly original denouement. (June)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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30 Reviews 5 star:  (10) 4 star:  (1) 3 star:  (9) 2 star:  (4) 1 star:  (6)           Average Customer Review 3.2 out of 5 stars (30 customer reviews)		Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
Most Helpful Customer Reviews   11 of 11 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars Don't let the first 20 or so pages fool you, July 29, 2003 By  jmz "jzarate12" (Fremont, ca United States) - See all my reviews    This review is from: Emotionally Weird: A Novel (Paperback) I will admit, it was really hard to continue reading Emotionally Weird by Kate Atkinson. You're immediately thrown into several stories -- stories that are told within stories and stories that aren't. It's hard to figure out what's going on when, who is who, why you're even reading the book. But believe me, you must continue reading...it's worth it in every way. I think the parts that I love the most are when Effie's "mother" Nora interrupts her story telling of her experience at the University. Nora's quips are perfect ("does this story have a plot?," "There are too many characters and I can't keep them straight," and "No! Don't kill of Olivia!") for how I felt as a reader. Effie's story (which is a huge chunk of the book) is really funny. Atkinson holds a dry wit that just continues to roll with each page. And the end...yes, there is an ending, and yes, everything pulls together more coherently than you could ever imagine. I won't say anything more about the ending. If your fear is that you won't be able to get through Emotionally Weird, then just take heed that it will all make sense in the end and you should just keep plugging along. Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)   11 of 12 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars Hilarious, offbeat, thought-provoking, December 25, 2002 By  Gwen A Orel (Millburn, New Jersey United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)    This review is from: Emotionally Weird: A Novel (Paperback) To say this is a book in which on a deserted Scottish island Effie and her mother tell stories about their lives is to give a completely wrong impression of this book... it's more like Italo Calvino in the way it plays with a bunch of different narratives. Most of the book is 20-year old Effie's story.. it's 1972, and she's an unmotivated student at the University of Dundee. Her chapters, "Chez Bob" (Bob is her Star Trek-obsessed boyfriend she's too lethargic to leave) are hilarious... the descriptions of her friends and the nonsensical situations and conversations will be familiar to anyone who's ever been to college, anywhere. The excerpts from tutorials (we'd call them seminars" she half-heartedly participates on are exact and funny. They also provide an excuse to show excerpts from the mystery novel she's writing, the fantasy a friend is writing and a mysterious novel that seems to have supernatural powers taht one of the professors is working on. Every time we get to an excerpt, the font changes, which is a clear and delightful device For all that the book plays with reality, it still remains clear and not mystified and annoying. Every now and then we return to the remote Scottish island (the font is more stark there, too) and we get little glimpses of Nora's story as Effie tries to get the story of her birth... Nora is a Virgin and as the book goes on we realize Nora is not her mother... also in Effie's story she is being followed by a mysterious woman... all of these threads are tied together brilliantly by the end in a conclusion that is logical and satisfying. We also get a brief epilogue set in 1999, largely excerpts from the now-published writings of Effie and her friends, which is short and funny. I laughed out loud at the description of one of the college parties. Atkinson has a brilliant ear for dialogue and her character descriptions are sharp and clear. I feel as if I've *been* to Dundee in 1972! (The student demonstrations and their escalations, and a feminist meeting attended by a doddering, gallant male professor, are particularly wonderful). Don't be put off by some of the lukewarm reviews here-- this is one of the more original books I've read in a while! Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)   9 of 10 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars Emotionally manipulative, May 31, 2000 By  Daniel (Reading, UK) - See all my reviews When this book came out in the UK in May I was so excited, I even bought it in hardback. Kate Atkinson is that rare writer - one who knows as much about writing as how to write, and she shows this to advantage in an extremely clever book. She veers on the self-indulgent with her myriad storylines interweaving in and out of this book, but her charm and great good humour shine throughout; and I greatly regretted that we did not see more of her lead character's gloriously campy and wickedly parody-like detective novel. The word games and language play which characterise Atkinson are not so subtle as they were in "Human Croquet" (which still remains her best novel) but they still provide a source of much enjoyment and delight; amusing us as much as they entertain the brain and make the reader think. She is one of our greatest modern writers, and even if Emotionally Weird is not as good as her last two books (Human Croquet, and Behind The Scenes at the Museum, which latter is much praised by people and described as "The perfect novel") , and is, undeniably, flawed in some ways - The symbolism and development of Atkinson's storyline, with the private eye and the yellow dog, is not as clear cut as one would wish for. However - and this is the truly magical thing - with an Atkinson novel, you can re-read it and everything suddenly becomes different. Words dropped here and there become surprisingly important, dialogue leaps into focus, things you ignored suddenly force themselves into your consciousness a second time around. The book grips the brain as much as it thrills and mystifies, entertains and satisfies. Not only is it extremely funny, extremely baffling, and extremely intelligent, but it is extreme in its own right. The plot lays itself open to ridicule, but so strong is Atkinson's power and skill that we never think "Goodness, what a daft plot!". The portraits of the characters are marvellously precise, true to life and bitingly witty. Thankyou, Kate, for understanding that characters are very important in a novel. A mediocre plot can be pulled off with strong characters, a faintly weird plot is a success. Kate, you may not have quite parallelled the superlative wealth of your second book, but you're still a damn good authoress. And the exciting thing is - there is obviously room for improvement! This is not a bad thing when someone writes as well as she does. What I am saying to you is that Kate Atkinson will go on to write even better - though it hardly seems possible - than she does now. Her style will develop, and when she is at her most matured, she will be one of the literary greats of her day. I heartily recommend the purchase of this book, but would suggest strongly that you buy her other books as well, and start with Human Croquet - which is more accessible and immediately understandable. Having read that, you can then embark upon this book - and you will be all the better for it. I promise you. Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this) Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review › See all 30 customer reviews...		Most Recent Customer Reviews 1.0 out of 5 stars emotionally weird Kate Atkinson is among my favorite authors, thus my disappointment in this work is profound. The book is pure self-indulgent drivel; so much so, that I wonder if she wrote it just... Read more Published 1 month ago by life is fun 1.0 out of 5 stars A slog Based on my love for another Kate Atkinson novel, Case Histories, I thought Emotionally Weird would be a good read. Read more Published 9 months ago by Jenisan 5.0 out of 5 stars Great fun! Well, I made it through the first 20 pages and found myself completely rewarded by this charming and very, very funny book. Read more Published 11 months ago by Chan McDermott 5.0 out of 5 stars Charming and Funny I completely enjoyed Emotionally Weird. I think I giggled from start to finish. The major part of the book is a very funny sendup of university life, as applicable now as in the... Read more Published on June 3, 2007 by a. 3.0 out of 5 stars A modern Faulkner? This book is rather unconventional. While many others have each chapter be a different story with all the stories usually converging in the end, Ms. Read more Published on April 8, 2007 by josey 3.0 out of 5 stars Weird and funny I had a hard time getting into this book - too many characters introduced all at once and so briefly that I couldn't keep them straight. Read more Published on February 26, 2005 by Cathe Olson 3.0 out of 5 stars Clever but weird This is a REALLY strange book...undoubtedly very clever but strange. A mother and daughter are temporarily trapped by bad weather on a remote island off the Scottish coast and, to... Read more Published on December 15, 2004 by Beverley Strong 1.0 out of 5 stars Emotionally Wierd - Kate Atkinson This book was a total load of rubbish. I have started to read it twice but after eventually arriving at page 103, I have had to put the book down as the story does not seem to be... Read more Published on August 6, 2003 4.0 out of 5 stars Extremely Offbeat, Funny and, yes, Weird I had never read anything by Kate Atkinson before this and was quite pleasantly surprised. What I hastily concluded from the jacket description was that this was going to be a... Read more Published on September 20, 2002 by Lleu Christopher 3.0 out of 5 stars 'Weird,' indeed I loved "Behind the Scenes at the Museum," and I think that Kate Atkinson has yet to better herself. Read more Published on July 18, 2002 by M. Minnick Search Customer Reviews Only search this product's reviews › See all 30 customer reviews...

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