Amina Cain

What a delightful read! This reminded me of Sylvia Plath's journals but with Emily Dickinson's whimsy. Cain has written an earnest narrator who documents her life without the clutter of overdeveloped scenery. It is tender without being sentimental, and I found myself snickering at our narrator's quick wit and offbeat jabs.

"Indelicacy" is a strange butterfly of a book - it dips down into the corporeal realm and then immediately flips around and flits back into something delightfully intangible yet somehow still relatable. Watching the main character move through her strange world and examine the things around and inside of her was really satisfying and eye-opening; it felt like I was immersed in a POV period drama or a dream most of the time, but not one that was nonsensical. Almost the opposite, in fact! Cain show more has such a keen talent for describing moments that tend to feel indescribable while also opening the doors to new feelings and emotions. I can see how this book wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea, but personally I fell in love with this one. "Indelicacy" is refreshing, unusual, and beautifully written. show less

Occasionally a man would walk by and ask what I was doing. "A menu for a dinner party," I would say. Or, "I am writing down my dreams." When too many men had walked by with this same question, or some version of it, I said, "Your face looks like the butt of a wolf and it's interfering with my concentration." I was a rich woman now; I could say these things.

Sharp & tight. This book completely hit the spot for me. I absolutely loved it.

Distractedly compelling meaning I easily put the book down but consistently picked it up again. I like Clarice Lispector with whom she’s compared, but this author didn’t captivate me in the same way. There was a flatness to the narrative, ruminative, yes, but without passion. What does the narrator want? She tells us it is to write, but does she give that up in her decision at the end? Can her conclusions be read more as passive than feminist? Her female friendships were heartening, as show more were her thoughts on art. I pondered the title which the author explains in an article in the Millions: “There’s a line in the novel when Vitória says of herself: “how indelicate,” and my husband said, why not Indelicacy? It made such sense. In addition to the fact that being indelicate is partly how Vitória finds her freedom, it’s a word that isn’t used as much as it once was, which seems apropos to the novel. And a word used to insult suffragettes!” Another mystery is where and when the story takes place. Maybe in an era of suffragettes. show less