The Weekend
A Novel
(Sprache: Englisch)
#1 International Bestseller * Shortlisted for the Stella Prize 2020 * Longlisted for the 2020 Miles Franklin Award
When three best friends in their seventies come together for one last summer weekend to mark the death of a fourth friend, they begin to...
When three best friends in their seventies come together for one last summer weekend to mark the death of a fourth friend, they begin to...
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#1 International Bestseller * Shortlisted for the Stella Prize 2020 * Longlisted for the 2020 Miles Franklin AwardWhen three best friends in their seventies come together for one last summer weekend to mark the death of a fourth friend, they begin to see their lives and loyalty to one another more clearly.
For nearly four decades, lifelong friends Jude, Wendy, Adele, and Sylvie have seen each other through romances, child-rearing, changing careers, divorces, medical recoveries, and general aging. But now Sylvie has died, and the three remaining women are tasked with cleaning out her beach house before it's sold. Over the course of a hot, muggy weekend, Jude, Wendy, and Adele gather for one last time in this memory-filled spot on the beach, and get to work restoring the house, and - in Sylvie's absence - their trust in one another.
It's not a sentimental event. The weather is sticky, the work is grimy, and Sylvie's absence brings constant tension. It's immediately clear that Sylvie had been the one who made the friendship work between such utterly different women: "perfect Jude" with her perfectly designed life and long-standing relationship with a married man; feminist, intellectual, widowed Wendy, now obsessed with keeping her elderly dog alive; and glamorous, preening Adele, a former star of the stage, now practically broke and homeless. Thrust together in this weathered old house on the ocean, where the ghosts of their younger selves compete with their current realities, the women ponder a collective lifetime of loves and grievances, disappointments and successes, and ultimately, how a life can change in a single unexpected instant - or over the course of a weekend.
Lese-Probe zu „The Weekend “
Chapter One It was not the first time it had happened, this waking early in the pale light with a quiet but urgent desire to go to church.
Cognitive decline, doubtless. Frontal-lobe damage, religion, fear of death-they were all the same thing. Jude had no illusions.
This longing-was it a longing? It was mysterious, an insistence inside her, a sort of ache that came and went, familiar and yet still powerful and surprising when it arrived. Like the arthritis that flared at the base of her thumb. The point was, this feeling had nothing to do with Christmas or with anything in her waking life. It came somehow from the world of sleep, from her dreaming self.
At first when it came, it would trouble her, but now Jude gave herself over to it. She lay in her white bed on the morning before Christmas Eve and imagined the cool, dark space of a cathedral, where she might be alone, welcomed by some unseen, velvety force. She imagined herself kneeling, resting her head on the ancient wood of the pew in front of her, and closing her eyes. It was peaceful, in that quiet space of her imagination.
Frontal-lobe shrinkage, doubtless. At this age it was inevitable.
She pictured the soft gray sphere of her brain and remembered lambs' brains on a plate. She used to enjoy eating brains; it was one of the dishes she ordered often with Daniel. But the last time she did-three tender, tiny things lined up along a rectangular plate-she was revolted. Each one was so small you could fit it in a dessert spoon, and in this fashionable Turkish restaurant they were unadorned, undisguised by crumbs or garnish, just three bald, poached splotches on a bed of green. She ate them, of course she did, it was part of her code: You did not refuse what was offered. Chosen, indeed, here. But at first bite, the thing yielded in her mouth, too rich, like just-soft butter, tepid and pale gray, the color and taste of moths or death. In that moment she was shocked into a vision of the
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three lambs, each one its own conscious self, with its own senses, its intimate pleasures and pains. After a mouthful she could not go on, and Daniel ate the rest. She had wanted to say, I don't want to die.
Of course she did not say that. Instead she asked Daniel about the novel he was reading. William Maxwell, or William Trevor, she often confused the two. He was a good reader, Daniel. A true reader. Daniel laughed at men who did not read fiction, which was nearly all the men he knew. They were afraid of something in themselves, he said. Afraid of being shown up, of not understanding-or more likely the opposite: They would be led to understanding themselves, and it scared the shit out of them. Daniel snorted. They said they didn't have time for it, which was the biggest joke of all.
Jude pulled the sheet up to her chin. The day felt sticky already; the sheet was cool over her clammy body.
What would happen if she did not wake, one of these mornings? If she died one night in her bed? Nobody would know. Days would pass. Eventually Daniel would call and get no answer. Then what? They had never discussed this: what to do if she died in her bed.
Last Christmas, Sylvie was here, and this one she wasn't-and now they were going to clear out the house at Bittoes. Take anything you want, Gail had said to them from Dublin in an e-mail. Have a holiday. How you could think cleaning your dead friend's house a holiday . . . but it was Christmas, and Gail felt guilty for flitting off back to Ireland and leaving it to them. So. Take anything you want.
There was nothing Jude wanted. She couldn't speak for the others.
Sylvie had been in the ground for eleven months.
The memorial had been in the restaurant (unrecognizable now from the old days-everything but the name had gone), and there were beautiful food and good champagne, good speeches. Wendy spoke brilliantly, honestly, poetically. Gail lurched with a silent,
Of course she did not say that. Instead she asked Daniel about the novel he was reading. William Maxwell, or William Trevor, she often confused the two. He was a good reader, Daniel. A true reader. Daniel laughed at men who did not read fiction, which was nearly all the men he knew. They were afraid of something in themselves, he said. Afraid of being shown up, of not understanding-or more likely the opposite: They would be led to understanding themselves, and it scared the shit out of them. Daniel snorted. They said they didn't have time for it, which was the biggest joke of all.
Jude pulled the sheet up to her chin. The day felt sticky already; the sheet was cool over her clammy body.
What would happen if she did not wake, one of these mornings? If she died one night in her bed? Nobody would know. Days would pass. Eventually Daniel would call and get no answer. Then what? They had never discussed this: what to do if she died in her bed.
Last Christmas, Sylvie was here, and this one she wasn't-and now they were going to clear out the house at Bittoes. Take anything you want, Gail had said to them from Dublin in an e-mail. Have a holiday. How you could think cleaning your dead friend's house a holiday . . . but it was Christmas, and Gail felt guilty for flitting off back to Ireland and leaving it to them. So. Take anything you want.
There was nothing Jude wanted. She couldn't speak for the others.
Sylvie had been in the ground for eleven months.
The memorial had been in the restaurant (unrecognizable now from the old days-everything but the name had gone), and there were beautiful food and good champagne, good speeches. Wendy spoke brilliantly, honestly, poetically. Gail lurched with a silent,
... weniger
Autoren-Porträt von Charlotte Wood
Charlotte Wood
Bibliographische Angaben
- Autor: Charlotte Wood
- 2021, 272 Seiten, Maße: 20,1 x 13 cm, Kartoniert (TB), Englisch
- Verlag: Riverhead Books
- ISBN-10: 0593086449
- ISBN-13: 9780593086445
- Erscheinungsdatum: 02.09.2021
Sprache:
Englisch
Pressezitat
Praise for The Weekend: A lovely, insightful exploration of aging, regrets and rebirth. People
Wood has several surprises up her sleeve; her characters have loved often, lived large and taken plenty of risks, which makes for quick, Liane Moriarty-esque reading. She also has an eye for the little moments that link us, sometimes past the point of reason, to people whose histories we share. The New York Times
If you ve ever thought to yourself, I wish there were a beach read kind of like the movie Book Club, but more emotionally complex look no further. Entertainment Weekly
The Weekend is a bittersweet celebration of growing old together and an exploration of how complicated female friendships are. HelloGiggles
[A] dark, smart comedy of manners . . . For a reader in or facing the demographic of Wood s three friends, The Weekend is both fascinating and chilling. Not just the question of superannuated friendships, but also past-prime careers, aging bodies, senior finances and calcifying personality traits are all fairly coldly examined here. . . . Star Tribune
Old age is a state of mutiny rather than stasis in this glorious, forthright tale of female friendship. . . . What gives the book its glorious, refreshing, forthright spine is that each woman is still adamantly (often disastrously) alive, and still less afraid of death than irrelevance. The Guardian (London)
Capture summer (even if you can't leave your house) with a tender read dripping in easy nostalgia. Marie Claire
The Weekend captivated me from the excellent opening chapter. . . . The three main characters Jude, Adele and Wendy are superbly drawn. . . . his wise, funny novel will help you understand yourself and it may scare the s*** out of anyone brave enough to confront the truths within its masterful pages. The Independent (London)
Wood finds a beautiful balance between her three women, swivelling between their
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perspectives on the present and their shared past. The gaps between how a character sees themselves and how their friends see them are astutely drawn, both painfully comic and frequently heartbreaking. . . . Wood is to be praised for taking female friendship seriously and for being caustically honest there s not a sentimental line in this beautifully insightful book. The Observer (London)
Three seventy-something women spend Christmas together and find new tensions in their long friendship. With the lightest of touches, this big-hearted, insightful read tackles friendship, ambition, aging and death. Good Housekeeping
A darkly funny, truthful novel . . . There is endless pleasure to be found in the candor and compassion Wood brings to bear on femininity and female friendship. Metro (UK)
A lovely, lively, intelligent, funny book . . . So good on aging and on the fraught, warm friendships between women. Tessa Hadley, author of The Past
I found reading The Weekend both hypnotic and profoundly unsettling. The prose is sharply vivid and precise, the characters and location exceptionally real, and I challenge anyone to write a better description of an elderly dog and its owner. Masterful. Rosamund Lupton, author of Sister and Three Hours
The Weekend positively hums with life even as these three women are approaching the end of theirs. The book is exquisitely wrenching and poignant when dealing with female friendship and old age, yet it still manages to be funny and very real. Claire Fuller, author of Our Endless Numbered Days
Friendship, ambition, love, sexual politics, and death: it s all here in one sharp, funny, heartbreaking, and gorgeously written package. I loved it. Paula Hawkins, #1 The New York Times bestselling author of The Girl on the Train
An insightful, poignant, and fiercely honest novel about female friendship and female aging. Sigrid Nunez, National Book Award winning author of The Friend
The Weekend is more Big Chill. . . . with a dash of Big Little Lies . . . A novel about decluttering and real estate, about the geometry of friendship, about sexual politics, and about how we change. The Guardian (London)
The Weekend is an unflinchingly observed celebration of the profundity and mundanity of friendship, treated with elegance, wit, and tenderness. Kiran Millwood Hargrave, author of The Mercies
Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. The Australian (Sydney)
Wood s technique in this novel is masterly. The Sydney Morning Herald
One of the best novels of the year. The Saturday Paper (Australia)
Three seventy-something women spend Christmas together and find new tensions in their long friendship. With the lightest of touches, this big-hearted, insightful read tackles friendship, ambition, aging and death. Good Housekeeping
A darkly funny, truthful novel . . . There is endless pleasure to be found in the candor and compassion Wood brings to bear on femininity and female friendship. Metro (UK)
A lovely, lively, intelligent, funny book . . . So good on aging and on the fraught, warm friendships between women. Tessa Hadley, author of The Past
I found reading The Weekend both hypnotic and profoundly unsettling. The prose is sharply vivid and precise, the characters and location exceptionally real, and I challenge anyone to write a better description of an elderly dog and its owner. Masterful. Rosamund Lupton, author of Sister and Three Hours
The Weekend positively hums with life even as these three women are approaching the end of theirs. The book is exquisitely wrenching and poignant when dealing with female friendship and old age, yet it still manages to be funny and very real. Claire Fuller, author of Our Endless Numbered Days
Friendship, ambition, love, sexual politics, and death: it s all here in one sharp, funny, heartbreaking, and gorgeously written package. I loved it. Paula Hawkins, #1 The New York Times bestselling author of The Girl on the Train
An insightful, poignant, and fiercely honest novel about female friendship and female aging. Sigrid Nunez, National Book Award winning author of The Friend
The Weekend is more Big Chill. . . . with a dash of Big Little Lies . . . A novel about decluttering and real estate, about the geometry of friendship, about sexual politics, and about how we change. The Guardian (London)
The Weekend is an unflinchingly observed celebration of the profundity and mundanity of friendship, treated with elegance, wit, and tenderness. Kiran Millwood Hargrave, author of The Mercies
Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. The Australian (Sydney)
Wood s technique in this novel is masterly. The Sydney Morning Herald
One of the best novels of the year. The Saturday Paper (Australia)
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