Ugh. What is it about Sally and her obsession with grammatical errors just to make it feel “artistic”. It feels like yet another iteration of her predictable, formulaic storytelling. 

While she has a reputation for capturing the complexities of modern relationships, this book lacks originality and substance, recycling the same themes and character archetypes found in her previous works. Rooney’s protagonists once again exist as overly introspective, emotionally stunted twenty-somethings who speak in clipped, elliptical conversations that often feel unnatural and forced. Name ONE book of hers that doesn’t take place in Dublin :-)))). 

 

The pacing is excruciatingly slow, dragging the reader through mundane details. I couldn’t follow the pace at all. Rooney’s sparse prose, which has been praised in the past for its minimalism, here feels like a lazy excuse for poor sentence construction and grammatical errors. 

 

It’s hard to escape the feeling that she is simply retelling the same story in slightly different settings with characters who blur together. For readers familiar with her previous works, Intermezzo offers nothing new, and for those unfamiliar, it’s unlikely to leave a memorable impression. Disappointing and uninspired.