Bookrate

This book made it to #98 in our Top 101 2023! Every year we ask our Booklovers to vote for their favourite book. From that, we share the Top 101 winners for everyone to enjoy. Discover the rest of the books that made it into our Top 101 list.Sally Rooney set the books world buzzing in 2017 with her debut Conversations With Friends; Normal People is a girl-meets-boy story with a difference, interrogating the difficulties of sincere communication in a complicated, post-ironic world.Connell and Marianne grow up in the same small town in the west of Ireland, but the similarities end there. In school, Connell is popular and well-liked, while Marianne is a loner. But when the two strike up a conversation - awkward but electrifying - something life-changing begins.Normal People is a story of mutual fascination, friendship and love. It takes us from that first conversation to the years beyond, in the company of two people who try to stay apart but find they can't.Winner of the 2019 Novel of the Year and Book of the Year at the British Book AwardsWinner of the 2018 Costa Novel AwardWinner of Specsavers National Book Awards International Author of the YearLonglisted for the Man Booker Prize 2018Longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2019