Spotlight On: Intermezzo by Sally Rooney
Interestingly, the first voice that came to the page for me in this project was Margaret’s — the character who becomes entangled in Ivan’s life in the course of the book. It certainly wasn’t that I sat down thinking, I have to write a book where the male voice is central. I just felt my way through the story that seemed to emerge when I encountered these characters, which is what I always try to do. Of course I had moments of self-reflection and self-consciousness, because I was thinking, What do I know about this form of interiority and specifically — which is different from Connell in “Normal People” — relationships between men?
–Sally Rooney, InterviewThe New York Times
What booksellers are saying about Intermezzo
- Intermezzo is the book I’ve been waiting for Sally Rooney to write, the one I always believed she had in her, by far her best to date. The auspicious talent she’s displayed in her previous novels (all of which I’ve loved to varying degrees), most notably her almost unrivaled ability to identify and animate the emotional valences that exist between people in relationships, has been honed and deepened in Intermezzo, resulting in an abundantly rich emotional journey for readers. The personal-is-political ethos that would all too often result in didacticism and character speechifying has been fully metabolized by Intermezzo’s characters, resulting in full, complex, utterly compelling people. Rooney’s latest is an utterly masterful home-cooked meal, so rich, so satisfying, so nourishing, but never fussy, not bespoke, clearly made by a human’s hands and heart. Intermezzo will engross you, transport you, leave you full. It’s wonderful.
― Matt Nixon, A Cappella Books in Atlanta, Georgia | BUY
- Again, Sally Rooney has written a tender, devastating, and hopeful triumph of a novel. Intermezzo introduces us to Peter and Ivan, brothers who are grieving their father. In the uprooted days that follow, we see them and the people they love as they come to terms with the new shape of the world they live in, and witness the evolution of their complex connections to each other. This is a book that you can speed-read, careening as you experience the depths of love, loss, grief, and purpose that fill these pages. If I were you, though, I’d read slowly, savoring each gem of a page.
― Maya Shenoy, Epilogue Books Chocolate Brews in Chapel Hill, North Carolina | BUY
- Easily the best Sally Rooney book. While her writing is stellar, as always, there is something about Peter and Ivan’s story that immediately draws you in. You just have to root for these messy and complicated people as they figure out life and love.
― Kelley Barnes, Page 158 Books in Wake Forest, North Carolina | BUY
- This is the millenial’s Mrs. Dalloway – and the best Sally Rooney yet. Intermezzo follows the aftermath of grief on two very different brothers – a chess champion and a high-strung but tenderhearted barrister – and their attempts at meaningful romantic relationships. It’s Rooney, so the characters also act as entry points into larger social commentary, but the lessons she’s imparting are always graceful, never heavy-handed. Small, interpersonal moments cartwheeling out into moving, philosophical passages that made it so I almost couldn’t read this book in public, because it kept making me cry. A total triumph.
― Rachel Knox, Tombolo Books in St. Petersburg, Florida | BUY
- A triumph of a novel that will intensify the fandom of existing Rooney devotees (me!) and doubtless create many new ones. I was entranced by the beautiful sentences, prose whose style was outmatched only by its substance, and the gorgeous complexity of each character as they fought for love, belonging, and understanding. This is a multi-dimensional love story, but above all a love story between brothers. Somehow Rooney is able to lean on archetypes while also subverting and reinventing them, and Peter and Ivan (and Sylvia, and Margaret, and Naomi) will remain in my heart for a long time, stirring me as flesh and blood people do. With one of the tenderest and most perfect endings I can think of in recent contemporary literature–brought me to tears. A standing ovation from me!
― Kristen Iskandrian, Thank You Books in Birmingham, Alabama | BUY
About Sally Rooney
Sally Rooney is an Irish novelist. She is the author of Conversations with Friends; Normal People; and Beautiful World, Where Are You. She also contributed to the writing and production of the Hulu/BBC television adaptation of Normal People.
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