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A very strange book, and one that is so unique it is virtually guaranteed to evoke strong feelings in the reader - as this is a book that will challenge as much as it enthralls.

Narrated by a voice that is ageless, unnamed, and only very loosely described as female and of Jewish descent, this is a stream-of-consciousness read that plays with time and space and location, excludes the idea of plot, and essentially gives us the often beautiful, maddeningly incomprehensible ramblings of our main ( that is to say, only) protagonist. The reader can only see the world through her eyes, and a very meager world it is, where not much happens, and all of it is at least to some level, impenetrable.

The youngest in a very large family, raised to be servile to her siblings, our narrator hints at emotional, physical, and even sexual abuse, all placidly taken in stride as she outlines her lot in life and where it takes her. Or is this placidity a ruse, her true emotional state unknowable to even the narrator herself?

Ending up in a “northern country” performing housekeeping and personal care duties for her affluent and blithely despotic brother, alienated from the townspeople, (who seem to fear her), our narrator appears to self-reflect on both her alienation, her feeble female nature and her inbred shortcomings, but remains trapped in her own meta-consciousness.

With twinges of both Shirley Jackson, and dystopian Margaret Atwood (“Alias Grace” comes to mind), as the “creepy” factor surrounding her life in the form of strange circumstances in the village farming life grows, it’s not clear if our narrator is after all, complicit, innocent or an agent, “both obedient and murderous”, of what appear to be acts of demonic origin or witchery, directed against the natural order.

I absolutely loved this read, though it’s complexity renders it perhaps not the best choice for my current Covid 19-addled brain. Regardless, this is a book that will require rereading (I look forward to it).

A great big thank you to Netgalley, the publisher and the author for a beautiful ARC. All thoughts presented are my own.

(2.5 stars rounded up)

In Study for Obedience, an unnamed narrator moves in with her estranged brother to take care of him and his home in a remote northern countryside. Seemingly coinciding with her arrival, strange events begin to occur in the local community including “collective bovine hysteria; the demise of a ewe and her nearly born lamb; a local dog's phantom pregnancy; [and] a potato blight”. While her brother goes away on a business trip, we follow our narrator as she tries to settle into her new life and engage with the community where she now resides, but in turn finds herself being ostracized by the townspeople.

I was so intrigued when I read the premise of this book and I found Bernstein’s writing to be quite beautiful in places. However, I did not like the execution of this story. At the surface, this novel has many elements which I loved and would typically find enjoyable such as an unreliable narrator and an unsettling plot. I found that a lot of things stayed at the surface level and I would have loved if they were explored more.

What I wish was explored more:
— The narrator’s upbringing and family.
— The very weird relationship between our narrator and her brother.
— The strange occurrences in the community. They are for the most part discussed very briefly.
— Why the community is ostracizing her.

I understand that leaving things the way they are may very well be the point as our narrator is receiving little information about what is going on. However, I found it difficult to engage with the story and care about the narrator because of this.

In this book there are themes of ostracism and subservience, as well as a hinted at discussion on antisemitism. Once again, I wish the connection between these themes and the narrator was explored more. The reader receives snippets of these ideas which are so interesting to read. What fell flat for me is that we get the what, but we never really get the why. For example, our narrator lives her life in service of others and believes anything she may do for herself is a sin. I would have loved to learn even more about where these beliefs stem from.

This had so much potential but it just didn’t work for me in the end.

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'Study for Obedience' is about a woman who moves to a new country where she does not speak the language to help her brother who is currently living there. She encounters the locals who are very suspicious of her presence because they see her as an outsider and they quickly start blaming strange occurrences on her.

This book is not for everyone. It is a slow, and often plodding, read. We follow the main character through her stream-of-consciousness as she moves about. The sentences tend to be long (I counted one that was over 100 words) and can feel tedious to get through.

That said, there were some unsettling moments that were well done, particularly in the second half.

Here is my third read of the @gillerprize long list and I put it with some dead sunflowers from the hurricane yesterday because it reminds me of dead sunflowers, dark, dense and eerie as heck. “Study for Obedience” by Sarah Bernstein is an unsettling volume that never will settle. We have an unnamed narrator in an unnamed remote Northern country, doing unnamed and very odd things. Why is she so obedient to her brother? How do people survive? You never get any real answers just a deep meditation on being an outsider, on not being accepted, existentialism and soul searching. The language is odd and it certainly is an unusual book. I just finished this morning and I’m also not sure if I liked it.

Bernstein’s novel is engrossing, but after a while, I found the narrator to be limited , self- limiting that is. After I made the adjustment to my reading of the narrator, the novel makes more sense snd continues to show the narrator being both self-reflective and blinded to her own agency. She does things that we (the reader) know will create problems, we see her interaction with her brother deteriorating, with a murderous edge.

Bernstein is drifting between the symbolic and realistic continuously, and it is both disconcerting to the reader, creating ambiguous points, yet solidifies themes, providing a glimmer of a political stance to redeem the narrator.

Yet, there is something lacking, clarity perhaps, to bring us to the exact stance the author would like us to have. Like the inability of the narrator to identify the northern country with the language, fluent as she is in several languages, this language of her ancestors being beyond her capability to use, we are also left unable to identify or communicate the issue she,and we as the world, grapple with that can pinpoint the triggers for human fear and isolation. A Study for Obedience does not give us a convincing guide at all. A provocative read.

Many thanks to NetGalley and to Penguin Random House Canada for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

"Study for Obedience" by Sarah Bernstein earned its place on the longlists of both the Booker and Giller Prize, but this novel is a journey into the strange and often disturbing.

A couple of times I questioned the narrator's reliability. As the story unfolds, it become a psychological labyrinth where I felt that reality blurred, leaving me wondering if the protagonist might be grappling with a psychotic disorder, some of her experiences mere illusions.

This unnamed narrator's hunger for approval and her persistent sense of unworthiness, isolation, and familial rejection weigh heavily on her. Guilt, shame, and failure permeate her emotions as she keenly observes her surroundings.

Written entirely from the narrator's perspective, devoid of dialogue, Bernstein's style presents a challenge with its long, drawn-out sentences. However, after a few chapters, these intricacies become familiar, infusing the text with a poetic, detached quality. The dream-like, atmospheric tone creates a contemplative novel that demands a patient, slow read.

Though just over 200 pages, "Study for Obedience" is far from a quick read. Instead, it deepens with each page, raising more questions than answers. This enigmatic narrative invites readers into a complex world where ambiguity reigns, leaving you haunted by its lingering mysteries.

I’m not quite sure how to rate this one. It definitely deserves a second read.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada for a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Special thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a free, electronic ARC of this novel received in exchange for an honest review.
Sarah Bernstein’s “Study for Obedience” was long-listed for both the Booker Prize and the Scotiabank Giller so, although Bernstein was a new author for me, I needed to see if she was worth the fuss. I probably won’t be in the majority here but—she wasn’t.
Bernstein has experience in poetry, and this was very obvious from the verbose language in her story. The novel was only two hundred and eight pages, and if “Obedience” was focused only on the plot, it would’ve been about fifty. I’m all for setting and character development, but Bernstein turned one simple sentence into an onslaught of complicated vernacular that left me frustrated and confused.
Okay, so my understanding of the plot is as follows; a nameless young woman, our narrator, leaves her life in the city to come to the country house her family has owned for generations to care for her recently divorced brother. (And when I say ‘care for’, I mean it in every sense- the woman BATHES him and feeds him. And no, he does not have any disability that I can ascertain). When she arrives, strange things start happening in the town, such as mass animal deaths, to which the townspeople believe our narrator is somehow responsible (for some reason). We never find out why the townspeople blame the narrator and, in fact, the story barely touches on the strange occurrences at all (even though they are supposed to be the heart of the story) because Bernstein is complicating the plot with her choppy grammar and language that leaves the reader reaching for a dictionary.
The language, aside from being excessive, and the way the narrator behaves, gives the impression that the story takes place centuries ago. However, the narrator works as a law clerk and her brother travels for work and has meetings over Zoom, so it’s obvious that it’s present day. Which makes the sister “caring” for her brother in such an intimate way not only bizarre, but exceptionally disturbing.
I’m sure Bernstein has a truly deep meaning hidden within the loquacious plot, but I missed it. Bernstein had such a good premise with this novel and I was hoping for way more.

A slightly disturbing novel telling the tale of a sister who goes to a northern land to help her brother. In a land where she does not speak the language, strange occurrences after her arrival cause her to be looked upon with disfavor by the local townspeople. Beautifully written but not an easy read. I admired the flow of the language and truthfully parts of the story will haunt me for a while, but I cannot say this was a story I enjoyed reading. The feeling of unease and discontent permeates and leaves the reader feeling a bit wary. Thank you to #NetGalley andPenguinRandomHouseCanada for the eARC.
#StudyForObedience

This book is so difficult to read. It’s hard to get past the language to even understand the plot. The narrator is completely unreliable and she is completely “obedient”, but in that horrible church-lady kind of way. Normal people will not be able to read this.

A short, haunting, and challenging read, with dense sentences unspooling gradually into a compelling account of an unnamed woman’s isolation. I’m not sure if I can say I enjoyed reading, but I certainly appreciated the carefully crafted atmosphere, the tension ratcheting up into thrilling tableaus, my eyes skipping ahead to find out what would happen next. There was no precise timeline, no names, no satisfying resolution, and the literary lyricism of the prose felt almost evasive at times. In the end, I was left with more questions than answers, and yet I was undeniably drawn into the protagonist’s swirling thoughts, into the eerie narrative whose meaning I kept feeling I could nearly grasp.

Thanks to Penguin Random House Canada and NetGalley for providing me with an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review!

At the request of her older brother a young woman relocates to a small town that is their ancestral home. Her brother’s wife and children have left him and he requires assistance to maintain his household. His sister is well versed in the role of care giver and agrees.
Once she reaches her brother’s home she is given specific instructions on what is expected of her. Her acquiescent nature allows her to comply with all that is expected of her. The brother goes on an extended business trip leaving the woman on her own.
Despite the fact the woman has been able to learn a couple of other languages she is unable to grasp her ancestral tongue. Visits to town become necessary and she struggles to communicate her needs to the villagers. The townspeople have become very suspicious of the woman. Since her arrival strange occurrences have begun involving the livestock in the region. A dog experiences a phantom pregnancy and a ewe gets caught in fencing while trying to give birth to a lamb to name a couple of the events.
Through all of this the woman tries to understand the complexities of her past and present day events.
Although STUDY FOR OBEDIENCE is a short book, it is a long read. The reader is immersed in the woman’s innermost thoughts. Structurally the sentences and paragraphs are long. The length of a single thought made it difficult to follow the continuity of what was being said. I found myself reading passages twice.
I think it is the type of book that requires a second reading to fully appreciate the message the author is trying to convey.
Thank you to Penguin Random House and NetGalley for allowing me to access an advanced digital version of STUDY FOR OBEDIENCE.

I read a Netgalley arc copy of Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein because it is longlisted for the Booker Prize and it's written by a Canadian author.

Title: Study for Obedience

Author: Sarah Bernstein

Publication Date: August 2023

Publisher: Knopf Canada

Genre: Adult General Fiction

Pages: 208

Content Warnings: toxic relationship, animal cruelty

PG-13

› The cover of Study for Obedience is bleak, yet disturbing with the bird that appears to be dead.

First sentence:
"It was the year the sow eradicated her piglets. It was a swift and menacing time. One of the local dogs was having a phantom pregnancy."

› The unnamed narrator first learned obedience as the youngest of many children (we don't know how many).

› She says her brother always took a "particular interest" in her and the family "allowed him this indulgence". What does this mean? I assume that she's now an adult when her recently divorced brother asked her to come live at his house in an obscure northern town where she does not speak the regional language.

› I feel like she is a witch because she made talismans and delivered them around town. She says she "made sure to bless the places I felt to be sacred". She also said words of devotion, practiced mindfulness, and had a connection with nature.

› As a teenager I shared her feelings of self-doubt and thinking that obedience should be my goal. I teared up when she made promises to herself that she would limit her speech and try to take up less space.

› Her brother goes out of town for work and she's left living in his house on the outskirts of a conventional town. They blame her for the strange things that start happening. However, Study for Obedience isn't about the people of the town and the narrator, it's about her toxic relationship with her brother.

› Characters: 3
› Atmosphere: 4
› Writing Style: 4
› Plot: 3
Very little action or plot. No real conflict.
› Intrigue: 3
I felt disconnected from this story.
› Logic: 8
› Enjoyment: 4
Average 4.1
My Rating ★★★

Average Story Graph Rating 3.18

Average Goodreads Rating 3.23

› Final Thoughts
• Being Canadian, I really wanted to love Study For Obedience, especially because not many Canadian books make it to the Booker Longlist. However, this was just okay for me. Marketed as "For readers of Shirley Jackson, Iain Reid, and Claire-Louise Bennett, a haunting, compressed masterwork from an extraordinary new voice in Canadian fiction", Study for Obedience is a slow-paced, ambiguous, and inconclusive book about gender norms and wanting to belong.

Other reviewers have said it reminded them of Sylvia Plath's writing. I haven't read anything from her yet, so I can't confirm or deny it. It reminded me of Ann Patchett, Paul Murray, and Helen Oyeyemi.

Check out Study for Obedience if you like a meandering plot, with anonymous characters, flowery writing, and an inconclusive ending.


Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for sending this book for review. All opinions are my own.

4 stars
<b>Ambiguous Novel Alert</b>
<i>Review of the Net Galley ARC for the Knopf Canada edition (August 22, 2023) with reference to the original Granta Books hardcover (July 6, 2023).</i>

Longlisted for the <a href="https://thebookerprizes.com/the-booker-library/books/study-for-obedience">2023 Booker Prize</a>.

The nature of <i>Study for Obedience</i> requires going a step beyond my standard <b>Ambiguous Ending Alert™</b>, although it earns that tag as well. A nameless narrator arrives at a nameless northern town in a nameless northern country to become the caregiver to her eldest brother, whose wife and children have left him. She does not speak the local language We gradually piece together that the woman is of Jewish heritage and that the townspeople have an ancestral animosity towards people of that faith as pogroms are hinted to have taken place in the past. Soon after her arrival, the brother departs and doesn't return until towards the end of the book when he appears to sicken.

This follows on from the heart of the book where, although she attempts to ingratiate herself to the town by participating in community farming chores, the woman is suspected of causing a mad cow infestation & resultant herd extermination, a still-born birth by a sheep, a phantom pregnancy of a dog, the containment of the chicken population and a potato blight.

The woman doesn't help her cause by one night travelling around the town leaving handmade dolls woven out of grass and herbs on doorsteps. Although that is a foreboding sign, no apparent actual witchcraft occurs. The townspeople see it differently however.

Although there is no real resolution and much remains a mystery, I still found this to be a very compelling read due to the author's rather hypnotic prose which was often poetic and used repetitive strokes, as if to insist on various points. So it earns a 4 rating regardless of its ambiguous nature. The ambiguous end comes with a paraphrase and allusion to the "Lecture on Nothing" in John Cage's [book:Silence: Lectures and Writings|765651] (1961).<blockquote><i>I am here and there is nothing to say.</i> - John Cage.</blockquote>
I read <i>Study for Obedience</i> through its being longlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize and especially due to Sarah Bernstein being the only Canadian author on the longlist. Readers who are prepared to accept its ambiguous nature will likely find it just as engrossing as I did.

My thanks to the publisher Knopf Canada and Net Galley for the opportunity to read this Kindle ARC in exchange for which I provide this honest review.

<b>Other Reviews</b>
<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/jul/19/study-for-obedience-by-sarah-bernstein-review-life-in-limbo">Life in Limbo</a> by Chris Power, The Guardian, July 19, 2023.
<a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books/reviews/article-sarah-bernsteins-study-for-obedience-is-something-ancient-and/">An Unnervingly Modern Tale</a> by Emily Donaldson, The Globe and Mail, August 17, 2023.
<a href="https://www.cbc.ca/books/the-study-for-obedience-by-sarah-bernstein-1.6950521">A Haunting Novel</a> by CBC Books, August 29, 2023.

<b>Trivia and Link</b>
There is a background article and a brief interview with author Sarah Bernstein about her being longlisted for the 2023 Booker Award at <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/9892942/montreal-sarah-bernstein-booker-longlisted-study-for-obedience/">Global News</a> by Sonja Puzic, The Canadian Press, August 12, 2023.

I can't decide whether I liked this book or not. The voice reminded me very much of Edgar Allan Poe, a definite plus. It had that sense of creeping dread. The sense that all wasn't as it seems. Again, things I normally liked in a story. But I could never quite figure out where the story was going. Was it about submission? Acceptance? Being allowed to survive and even thrive? I couldn't tell you.

Do you ever read a book and feel like you missed so much? Well, this is one of those for me. It is so well written but so complex that I feel like I need to reread it again to try to understand it better.

This is not to say it isn’t a good read, but it is thought provoking and requires mulling over. Most of what is happening in the story is alluded to instead of said outright.

Would I recommend this book, yes, there are people I would recommend it to. It would make a good book for a book club discussion. However, there are a lot of people I know wouldn’t enjoy it.

I am so confused by this short but enigmatic story. The unnamed narrator moves to a northern country, whose language she neither speaks nor understands, to take care of her eldest brother. As strange events occur, she feels that the townspeople blame her. The writing is beautiful, though the sentences are very long, and meandering. I feel like this book needs a second (and third?) read to understand it fully. I am sure I missed a lot on the first read. The narrator is unreliable to a certain extent, they seem to not fully understand the way the world works. Adding to this that we only get to read the narrator's circumvoluted description of the event, and their isolation, the atmosphere of the story felt claustrophobic to me. It's still a good book, I enjoyed it, I just feel I was not intelligent enough to fully understand it.

Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Granta for an ARC.

I would like to thank @NetGalley for graciously offering a free copy on publication day in exchange for a review. All opinions are mine.

I wanted to like this one. I was craving literature and this novella was listed for many renowned prizes. The reviews were low but I tried to see above that. The synopsis sounded interesting. Study for Obedience is pitched as a haunting and exciting novella. I was expecting obscure events and ethereal ambiance.

Unfortunately, I was met with a first POV of a woman having a very strange, unhealthy relationship to her brother. The brother is rarely there but when he is, she's treating him almost like a mother would bathing him, reading to him, cajoling him... Then, there the fact she doesn't speak the village's language and cannot communicate with the townspeople. They are apparently afraid of her for some reason but she doesn't know why and we never get to know it either.

The 200 pages are filled with lengthy sentences with so. many. commas. To a point where you lose the meaning of the sentence and need to go back and reread a couple time, detaching every bits to form something understandable. What I got from that book was that living in a remote village in the country, where you don't speak the language is very isolating and you will be considered terrifying by its inhabitants.

Maybe I just don't get it. 🤷🏻‍♀️

This was a delightfully creepy read. It certainly wasn't an easy read given the density of the prose and the opaqueness of the plot, but I enjoyed the fact that if you stuck with it, more details about the life and the (perhaps) mental illness of the protagonist became clear. As well, the contrast between the seemingly anachronistic setting in the rural village and modern elements like cell phones and Teams meetings was a jarring and brilliant touch.

The twisted dynamic between the protagonist and her brother provided the backbone to the novel. Was she taking revenge on him for how he treated during her childhood? Or did she truly think she was helping him recover? I liked how these questions were never resolved. While this novel might not be for everyone, I would recommend it for fans of Shirley Jackson and Stephen King.

As I was nearing the end of this relatively short novel in which not very much happens, at a certain point I realized I had gone from sitting back on my couch to leaning forward. I was literally on the edge of my seat. When I reached the end, I snapped my e-reader shut and announced to my partner, "That was something." That might shock some people who have read this book, but it really worked for me, even if after a first reading, I'm not entirely sure what "it" is. I just know that the writing was beautiful and compelling, that this book had me thinking and puzzling and re-reading constantly. At times I felt unease and dread and disgust, and at others I felt a strange sense of peace and serenity and contentment. I think this is a book that will benefit from re-reading, and its length will ensure that won't be a daunting task. If you are not deterred by writing that actively challenges its readers, I recommend Study for Obedience highly.

Study for Obedience is a languid, dreamy novel full of vivid imagery. It is rich in poetic prose that carries the reader through stream of consciousness.