Ducks, Newburyport – Lucy Ellmann
Expectation: A unique journey into the mind of a Midwest housewife and baker.
Reality: A 1,000+ page run on sentence with no plot, or seemingly, purpose outside of threading random topics together.
My Take:
The fact is, “Ducks, Newburyport” is the type of literary experiment that will either captivate or alienate readers. There is absolutely no middle ground.
The fact is, the book has no conventional plot. Instead, it unfolds through hundreds of pages of the unnamed narrator's stream of consciousness. While baking pies and tending to her family, her mind wanders through a labyrinth of thoughts, memories, anxieties and observations.
The fact is, this fragmented narrative style is both bizarre and strangely engrossing. It highlights the constant chatter of our inner world and the unexpected connections our brains make. While the constant barrage of thoughts can feel overwhelming at times, it also creates a strange sense of intimacy.
The fact is, the book's sheer length (over 1,000 pages) is its biggest hurdle — if you don’t mind every sentence starting with the “the fact” or the run-on sentences, that is.
The fact is, I DNF’d it at 33 percent, because while I was interested in how Ellman was slowly giving us glimpses of the narrator’s life between the bric-a-brac of her thoughts, I had zero interest in continuing to invest time in the story.
The fact is that outside of the structure there’s not much interesting or unique. The narrator grapples with the typical domestic themes: from the mundane (housekeeping and child rearing) to the profound (lingering trauma from the loss of her parents and divorce) and every relationship and career misstep in-between.
The fact is there was little new ground presented, at least in trying to understand the human experience. The most interesting part of the novel, and why it was likely short-listed for the 2019 Booker Prize, is the intense focus Ellman needed to curate her list of topics and create connective threads.
The fact is not many writers could find a way to have baking recipes and household tips intermingle with climate change, cancer treatment and pop culture references, like the musical "Oliver!" and the film "Julie and Julia.” Then pivot to 9/11, animal sentience, presidential politics, true crime, the Amish and Laura Ingalls Wilder.
The fact is this is only an incredibly small sample of the topics presented, but I don’t think many people would say they need 1,000+ pages of this. It’s not entertaining nor particularly enjoyable.
The fact is that what I liked best about the novel were the interludes that featured a female mountain lion. This accounted for about 10 percent of the book, and is essentially a novella about her reuniting with her cubs after they are captured by zookeepers.
The fact is, these short chapters can be seen as a metaphorical reflection of the narrator's own anxieties about loss and motherhood. I ended up listening to all of them, so it gave me the broad strokes of what to expect in our narrator’s life, but it also didn’t motivate me to give the full book another go.
The fact is the audiobook narration by Stephanie Ellyne effectively portrays the narrator's ennui, but I have to imagine she felt like she was going crazy during the recording process. I hope they paid her well.
The fact is despite abandoning "Ducks" before the end, I found pockets of humor and the sheer variety of topics intriguing. Completing it might grant a sense of exclusivity to readers, but the undercurrent of pretentiousness wore on my patience.
Rating (story): 2.5/5 stars
Rating (narration): 4/5 stars
Format: Audiobook (personal library)
Dates read: June 13 – June 23, 2024
Multi-tasking: Good to go. If you choose to read this, and I’d think long and hard about it before committing, the book is great background noise to most activities, but the lists will either lull or agitate.
