I like Smith's reworking of the Iphis myth better than Chaudhuri's attempts with the Odysseus story. Smith gives us movement, energy, chutzpah, and shows that the retelling of a myth in the modern context does not necessarily have to emphasize the mundane and the mundane only. Not everyone has to be plotless like Joyce. And, on plot or on syntactical innovation or on something else, Smith knows that it is important to get a tick in the 'radical' column, like Joyce knew very well. It's something

2.5 stars She was the most beautiful boy I had ever seen in my life I confess, I ran kicking and screaming from Smith’s Autumn after reading no more than the first 5 or so pages – this was my second attempt at her, to try to understand what everyone else finds so substantial and rewarding. After all, I love Ovid; I love classical receptions; I’m interested in books about gender – and textual – fluidity – I should love this, right? Wrong. I think I’m going to have to admit that Smith is just, a...

Let it be known: I enjoyed an Ali Smith book. That's something I never thought I'd hear myself say, as I tried to read The Accidental a few years ago, and just couldn't get on board with the prose style. I've never been a fan of stream-of-consciousness so that was to be expected, but with Girl Meets Boy I ended up devouring it in two sittings.I won't go into the synopsis too much: it follows two sisters, Andrea and Imogen. Andrea finds herself falling in love with a girl, Robin, whereas Imogen s...

"The river laughed. I swear it did. It laughed and it changed as I watched. As it changed, it stayed the same. The river was all about time, it was about how little time actually mattered. I looked at my watch. Fuck. I was an hour and a half late. Ha ha! The river laughed at me again." Girl Meets Boy is part of the Myths series published by Canongate where authors re-tell exisitng myths and stories. Other authors in this series include Margaret Atwood, Karen Armstrong, AS Byatt, David Grossman,

Even though this book is really tiny (it's 161 pages), it still has a strong story and a clear message. It deals with the two genders and how they both mix up and are basically the same. It doesn't matter whether you're a boy and a girl or whether you fall in love with a boy or a girl, and Ali Smith does a beautiful job at describing this transparancy between the two sexes. Once again, Ali Smith has surprised me with her poignant writing style. She definitely has a rare talent for telling a stor...

This was a beautiful lgbtqia+ retelling of the Ovid in the modern era and I adored it.The love story was beautiful, the prose, the character development..all together it kept a huge smile on my face the entire time.The open nature of gender and it’s fluidity and how the narrative relating to sexuality and identity was directed to the reader was so intimate it drew you in and made the story much more powerful.

Another day, another terrific novel from Ali Smith. I have resolved to gobble up her canon in the most heroic time possible, like an overweight man backing a lorryload of curries and waffles into his ecstatic gob. In Glasgow we have a meal called the Everything & More, which is enough food for an entire Ethiopian village in a bucket. Battered.This delightful story frames the myth of Iphis (woman disguises her daughter as a man, daughter turns into a man later on) within a tale of sexual identity...

If this was written by Jodi Picoult or Danielle Steel is would be branded as an "unconventional love story". Thankfully it's written by Ali Smith who has enough brains in her head to write a love story which happens to be unconventional.

Well this was my first Ali Smith book and I liked it a lot.This novel is one of the Canon gate myth series, modern re tellings of ancient myths.This one is the story of Ovids Iphis from Metamorphoses, the story of a girl who falls in love with a girl but on their wedding day turns into a boy so she can please her lover. (that's the short version!)Ali Smith centres the story around 2 sisters Imogen (Midge) and Anthea.It is told in both their voices and I loved them both.I really liked Ali Smith's...

This is my third book by Ali Smith. Based on everything I have read, I was looking forward to one of those novellas that seems so short, yet so perfect; one that would impress me with its storytelling finesse. I have a special interest in modern retellings, and this seems to be the only adaptation out there on the Myth of Iphis.A whimsical adaptation in which Smith's writing makes for a poetic read illustrating the transformative power of love, I was only a little disappointed. While I liked it,...

I started reading this randomly today and probably wouldn’t have chosen it if I had read up on it and saw that it was a “myth retelling,” or that an entire chapter was written in dozens of parenthesis. I’m glad I did, though.

2.5/5"Let me tell you about when I was a girl, our grandfather says."I was so excited to read this book because I had it in my TBR for so long but I feel like I must have missed something with this book. Don't get me wrong - this is a beautifully written book. There were quotes in this book that I've highlighted; there are pages that I've folded at the corners so I can find them again when I want to read a wonderful line. But that's all they are, and that's perhaps why they stood out so starkly;...

Find all of my reviews at: http://52bookminimum.blogspot.com/ “Girl meets boy, I said. In so many more ways than one.” While I’m admittedly someone who is not afraid to share my opinion, I am also not a person who actively seeks out things to rage about. Especially on a social media site. Yes, there are injustices in the world and yes sometimes a book makes me think about political/religious/whatever controversial topics, but my goal on this site is to discuss those things as little as possibl...

I was excited at the beginning of this book - particularly since I'm going to Inverness next week! - but found it to be a bit of an odd mixture of on-the-nose plot (it's a classic feel good story in many ways, with a horrid sexist villain who is overcome and everything) and experimental, stream-of-consciousness writing. When it is good, it is very good: "Because of us, things came together. Everything was possible. I had not known, before us, that every vein in my body was capable of carrying li...

this is not my favorite ali smith, but its charming, and it is better than the other books in this series look. does that make sense? i loved elements of this novella, but some of it seemed a bit pat. her writing is still gorgeous though.

I came to this book through the group reading on Ovid’s Metamorphoses, RC , referred to us this ‘Ovidian’ take by Ali Smith. I had already read one of Smith’s novels How to Be Both, which partly dwells on the Ferrarese painter Francesco del Cossa. In a way the title of that one could also fit for this other novel. Clearly Smith is interested in dualities -- whether characters, sex etc. Seven years separate the two novels; Girl Meets Boy is the earlier one and was published in 2004.This was an e...

"Let me tell you about when I was a girl, our grandfather says."I was hooked by the first line of "Girls Meets Boy" by Ali Smith and had to buy it immediately (from the awesome bookstore, Raven Used Books, in Northampton, MA). GMB is a little book, a modern retelling of the myth of Iphis. Not to worry, the myth is explained both traditionally in poetic old school language and in everyday slang, as well as through the story of two Scottish sisters in modern day Iverness: the brooding smartass lay...