What I Read: Olive Kitteridge

Confession 1: The post should technically be titled "What I Listened to," but that just doesn't have the same ring to it. I do feel like I should confess, though, that I listened to all nine discs of this one while driving around the great state of WI (and a little bit of northern IL).


Olive Kitteridge
by Elizabeth Strout

Confession 2: I've gone back and forth for several months about whether I actually wanted to read this book. Several reader-friends reported that they really didn't enjoy it because they didn't like the main character and were confused by the many simultaneous story lines. I decided to move forward when I needed something to listen to on several back-to-back road trips (which takes me back to confession one).

Confessions out of the way. . . Olive Kitteridge is a series of short stories (each occupying a chapter of the novel) that tell the story of the novel's namesake. We see scenes of Olive's adult life in each chapter. Some chapters provide only a snapshot of Olive - she was the seventh grade math teacher of a troubled adult, she was the friend of a widow, she was a favorite customer of the waitress of Dunkin' Doughnuts. In these chapters, I found myself enjoy a story that could stand alone while also waiting anxiously to find out how Olive fit into the story. Some chapters gave only a sentence or two about Olive; other chapters gave stories Olive was more closely intertwined with.

Other chapters were entirely about Olive - she provides care for her husband after his stroke, she loathes her son's first wife and learned to love her son's second wife, she watched as her own father lost his life to mental illness.

Really, the reader doesn't just see Olive's life. The reader experiences Olive through the town she lives in (Crosby, Maine) and the people she interacted with. Olive does many things that are unlikeable, but she also has tender moments with her husband, son, and self. I couldn't help but like her just because she was so real. I especially enjoyed seeing how Olive was shaped by the people and landscape around her.

I would be interested in reading more of Elizabeth Strout's work including:
Amy and Isabelle
Abide with Me