Eimear McBride talks about her debut novel A Girl Is a Half-Formed Thing with Reading Group Choices.
Given the lyric prose in the first novel by Eimear McBride, we enjoyed discussion the style as much as the story itself. The book brought up many important and timely issues to discuss: gender, power, trauma, individuality and perception, and caused us to consider how the meaning of of these words/themes change when they are specifically tied to a woman’s story. We were lucky enough to have Eimear answer a few questions for us!
RGC Group: When you began writing the book or had the idea for the book,
Our group of 11 has been together for over 12 years. We range in age from 55-80. We formed after several of the ladies became friends when attending a church-sponsored series on leading a purpose-filled life. They came up with the idea of staying in touch through a book club. I was courted (I fought the idea) by a couple of neighbors when the group was formed. I attended a meeting when it was held in one of my neighbors’ homes. My plan was to go to the meeting, and then then tell them I wasn’t interested.
This is a photo of some of the members of our book group, The Bees. We are from Superior, MT, and we meet weekly in our small local library.