A Line Made by Walking
By: Sara Baume / Narrated By: Heather O'Neill
Length: 9 hrs and 40 mins
Sorry, Ms. Baume, but The Bell Jar has already been written…
… and it was written oh so much better.
I dunno, I was really looking forward to A Line Made by Walking since Baume’s debut book, Spill Simmer Falter Wither, was so drop dead stunning: Gorgeously written, I didn’t have a problem with it being Literary Fiction (Since I’m often shallow enough to want some sort of plot in my books, and all). Where that book tackled ugliness, isolation so well, imbued it with a sense of beauty and hope? Well, sure! THIS book, tackling depression and holding on by seeking art was sure to be an absolute winner!
Uhm, noooo….
Yes, it looks at mental illness, puts a face to it, but it in no way makes it as heartrending or beguiling as, say, Plath’s The Bell Jar (Tho’ now I have a definite hankering to re-listen to the Maggie Gyllenhaal version of that classic!). Indeed, I kept making comparisons between the two audiobooks so much that I just gave in and allowed myself to think that perhaps Baume thought she was giving us, her adoring fans, an updated and more artistic version of it.
Hmm, I’ll drop my unkindness re: Ms. Baume’s intentions and get to the book, shall I?
Twenty-five, then twenty-six year old (That much closer to being 30—can no longer be considered as a young phenom) Frankie’s mental health starts cratering after her grandmother’s death, after a hopeless stint in art school (Hell, I coulda told her about THAT being a lost cause!), after living on the fringes of society with no real friendships, just a couple of acquaintances to make the time she’s spent in the big ol’ Irish city. Now she’s moved into her grandmother’s old cottage, and basically? She waits to die… only she doesn’t wanna kill herself.
She’s a desperately fractious creature, more apt to screech at loved ones to F* Off! and shout racist comments at others in a position to help her with her mental stability. She REFUSES to accept meds, tho’ she can’t stop crying, tho’ she can’t see anything but hopelessness and death. She gets drunks and vituperative, shouts at the TV all sorts of insults and pronouncements. She photographs dead animals as her form of art therapy, waits by the side of the road for creatures to die.
Indeed, it was pretty much her insensitivity, which I get it: The depressed don’t feel quite as those in normal states of mental health do, that made me lose any shred of compassion I could’ve had for Baume’s heroine in this dark tale chockfull of the depressed ramblings of a depressed and oh so woefully self-absorbed individual. That and she tells her mother to F* off way too much. This is one looooong inner musing that ended far too evasively to like.
I mean, I’m sounding clueless when actually, I know a thing or two about all things clinical, having lost a few years here and there throughout my life. But if one is to make it into Literary Fiction, as Baume is attempting here, sure she had a few thought-provoking concepts but for the most part: Use more graceful language, turn depression into a form of art, show us just how black black can be. Don’t just have a dull-witted character who thinks too much plod for 9 hours and 40 minutes. I mean, how tedious! How exasperating!
And I don’t like being exasperated. Add to that genius narration by Heather O’Neill who shouts when Frankie shouts, who scathingly shrieks when Frankie shrieks most scathingly, who seethes when Frankie seethes, and I was done in, I tell you. She was this years, St. Patrick’s Day 2020’s, John Banville, using nice words without plot, and driving me to think that maybe a drink or two might be absolutely necessary to get through yet another hour of the danged book.
I tried, I tell you, I tried. But in addition to all that, it just felt rushed, as tho’ Baume had a two-book deal with the publisher and thought of something ugly (Her forte) and thought that just writing it, without elegant phrasing, without an engaging character, without a conclusive ending, would be good enough.
It’s not…
And boy, does that have me all exasperated, or what?!
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