Book Review: Big Girl, Small Town, by Michelle Gallen
“Sometimes Majella thought that she should condense her whole list of things she wasn’t keen on into a single item:
Other People.
It was people who talked shit. It was people who made up rules that said you were cool or not because of what you wore. It was people who judged one-half of the human race for not wearing make-up, and the other half for wearing it. It was people who switched on lights, made noise, sweated and fought, wept and shouted. Majella knew when she came down to it, she wasn’t keen on Other People.”
I liked Majella from page one and think everyone can relate to feeling some of these things. Isolated and stuck. Small, but at once too large, and like you take up too much space and often wondering whether or not you deserve it.
Big Girl, Small Town, by Michelle Gallen, is a coming of age story unlike most I’ve read before.
Majella is in her 20’s and is managing life as best as she can. Things are still tumultuous in Ireland and the division between Protestants and Catholics is still tinglingly sensitive and often tumultuous.
Her life has a predictable pattern to it, and who can’t relate to that right now I wonder? In spending time with her we see how she manages to get through it, to keep going, what things she finds interesting, what sustains and encourages, comforts, occupies her thoughts, and challenges her.
What makes this debut special, to me, are the ways in which Gallen highlights the most universal sensations about growing up that apply so singularly to Majella, and still, to all the rest of us too. Majella describes her body often, and in ways that had me nodding and chuckling to myself thinking, yes, I’ve felt that way too but had forgotten.
Gallen writes charmingly dark observations through the eyes of Majella that have just the right balance of humor and edge to have my heart strings plucked and taught.
She manages to take an interesting character exercise - a list of things Majealla likes and dislikes - and with it create an annotated examination of Majella’s life in incredible and fascinating detail.
This is a wonderful debut novel and I’m eager to see what Gallen does next. Majella will be in my thoughts for a long time to come.
***Thanks to Algonquin for the free review copy - all opinions are my own :)