Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine: Debut Sunday Times Bestseller and Costa First Novel Book Award winner

sybarite.

She had tried to steer me towards vertiginous heels again – why are these people so incredibly keen on crippling their female customers? I began to wonder if cobblers and chiropractors had established some fiendish cartel.

epistolary level.

When did people become embarrassed to sing in public? Was it because of the decline in churchgoing? And yet the television schedule was full of singing contests in which people, however untalented, were far from shy about participating. Perhaps

It seemed there was an announcement every five minutes from the mythical conductor, imparting sagacious gems such as large items should be placed in the overhead luggage racks, or that passengers should report any unattended items to the train crew as soon as possible. I wondered at whom these pearls of wisdom were aimed; some passing extraterrestr

Everything took so long. Before, I’d simply bathed, run a comb through my hair and pulled on my trousers. Being feminine apparently meant taking an eternity to do anything, and involved quite a bit of advanced planning. I couldn’t imagine how it would be possible to hike to the source of the Nile, or to climb up a ladder to investigate a malfunctio

She was, quite simply, a nice lady who’d raised a family and now lived quietly with her cats and grew vegetables. This was both nothing and everything.

And if a woman who’s wholly alone occasionally talks to a pot plant, is she certifiable?

sybaritic