Most readers, myself included, probably know Pearl is a Booker Prize nominee, and the quality of the writing did not disappoint. It is a short and intimate book, narrated by a woman, Marianne, who reflects on her relationship with a mother who leaves her early in childhood and whose gap in her life has inspired constant questioning and searching.

I often find fiction expands to fill the space alloted for it, but this book has a focused story to tell and doesn't waste space. While the blurbs for this book seem to make a lot of the medieval poem named Pearl, I felt this was actually only one small part of the story. Much more present in the novel, to me, was the sense of place - the childhood home and village that Marianne lives in at the time of her mother's disappearance.

There is plenty to reflect on in this novel - digestible in a long afternoon but equally able to be slowly savored over a longer period.

Pearl by Siân Hughes is a beautifully written and deeply emotional story that stays with you long after you finish. The novel explores themes of loss, love, and the complexities of family in such a raw and honest way. Hughes’ writing is lyrical yet grounded, capturing the quiet moments of grief and healing with precision. The character of Pearl is so well-drawn and relatable, making her journey both heart-wrenching and hopeful. This is a book that delves into the depths of human experience, with a narrative that feels both personal and universal. It’s a stunning debut that I highly recommend.

When she’s eight years old, Marianne hears her mother walk out the front door, barefoot and empty-handed, and never sees her again. In this extraordinary moment following an ordinary moment, Marianne’s life is split in two: before and after. With no evidence to suggest her mother’s fate, Marianne holds out hope beyond hope that one day the mystery will be resolved—perhaps her mother will even return. Until then, she must grapple with ineffable grief.

From the first page, Hughes crafts an immersive pastoral setting, bringing the lush English countryside to life in full color. This whimsical setting contrasts beautifully, if tragically, with the absence at the novel’s core. Though it may sound oxymoronic, the heart of the novel is indeed an empty space, the space left behind by Marianne’s mother, and this is part of its brilliance: every facet of Marianne’s life—her schooling, career, clothing, haircut, hobbies, her daughter’s name—circles this absence like dirty bathwater circling the drain. Her grief is oppressive, to herself, her family, and the reader too—but how could it not be?

Hughes’s rendering of trauma’s isolating and growth-stunting effects is nothing short of brilliant, and certainly Booker-worthy. However, this “circling the drain” structure impeded the novel’s forward motion, particularly because Marianne is reflecting on the events several decades later rather than experiencing them for the first time. I’m sure this choice was the best one with which to show readers how Marianne has spent her life mentally and emotionally trapped in her most traumatic moment, but the constant reflective tone and lack of present-day immediacy often made the narrative feel inappropriately tranquil.

Finally, given the book’s titular reference to the medieval poem “Pearl,” I was surprised to find that the poem played only a minor role. Perhaps I didn’t pick up on every reference to it, but I think longer and more explicit explorations of the poem could have mitigated some of the novel’s steady tranquility and helped to fill absence at its center.

These critiques aside, Pearl is a stunning meditation on the profundity of loss and how one lives after being left behind. It is a novel I won’t soon forget—and a poem I’ll soon reread.

With a focus on grief and mental health, Pearl is a lyrical and complex novel. The story is not unique, but the writing is so heart filled and penetrating; Pear is profoundly moving.

Pearl was an incisive character study into one of the worst things that can happen to a person and the emotional fallout therein, and as such, Pearl can also be a largely polarizing book in making a character struggling to survive the worst the complete center of all plot and story. Marianne is never not struggling, and that can be difficult to read. And through the first person perspective, you must also watch her (to the best of her capability) make worse and worse decisions knowingly. And that's, frankly, grief.

This was an incredibly honest portrayal of one woman's grief, and that can be incredibly hard to engage in. Because grief moves you through life, and hits only on select moments in memory, which translates to a realistic portrayal, but not an entirely put-together story or plot. Grief is really hard to make the center of a narrative, fictional piece, and when the authenticity of the portrayal becomes the goal, the sacrifice of story, of any tenable plot, might be too high a price.

For those who love character-driven literary fiction, this will do wonders. For those who read the description and are looking for Pearl, you'll find it in mentions of the literal book in Marianne's hand, and less-artfully woven through the story as the description might suggest.

Siân Hughes’s debut novel Pearl is a gorgeous exploration of the nature of grief and memory and how both can intertwine to create our perspectives and shape our relationships.

Read the rest of this review online in the September issue of The Brooklyn Rail. link below.

This was a deeply introspective read about Marianne whose loss haunts her throughout her life, shaping her childhood and relationships. The book touches on loss and trauma and how they can impact one's mental state and relationships. It was heart-wrenching to read about Marianne grappling with her memories and trying to understand the whys and hows of her traumatic experiences. You feel the confusion, despair, and emptiness as Marianne also tries to understand herself and facing the truth of herself, that in many ways, she is her mother. Sian Hughes did a great job in balancing the heavy moments with moments in which the characters reached understanding and clarity. And in Marianne's case, ultimately finding relief and release through her mother.

In a Nutshell: A literary fiction novel about a woman who finally learns how to deal with her unresolved grief. Slow and poignant but also rambling (in both its meanings.) Might be a good read for the right reader, but not my cup of tea. (Should have known better, considering it is a Booker-longlisted work.)

Plot Preview:
When Marianne was eight, her mom went missing, leaving behind a distraught husband, a forlorn daughter, and a newborn son. As the years go by, Marianne struggles to make sense of her grief, and tries to understand what might have gone through her mother’s mind in her final moments. When she discovers a medieval poem named ‘Pearl’ and sees its theme being similar to that of her life, she tries to see her life and her pain through the poem’s lens of loss and healing.
The story comes to us in Marianne’s first-person perspective.

I have a fondness for Irish writers. I have a dislike for Booker books (whether winner or longlisted.) I have a soft spot for literary fiction. I shun books that wallow in misery. I love character-oriented books. I avoid novels that are heavily prose-dominated. So this novel could have gone either way. Unfortunately for me (and the book), it went the way it shouldn’t have.

The plot begins with Marianne’s visit to her village for ‘The Wakes’, an annual trip she makes in the hope of seeing her mother again. She then starts reminiscing about her past, going back thirty years to when her mother disappeared and leading us through the interim period: her childhood hurt, her teen struggles, her adult uncertainty.

The book starts off strongly, with a poignant depiction of Marianne’s grief, her confusion about what might have happened, and her struggle to let go of the trauma and to live in the present. Until the narrative was focussed on Marianne’s childhood, I was invested in the story. But once the teen years start, the plot goes the typical way, trudging down the standard pitstops of teen rebellion such as drugs and alcohol and self-harm. I hoped for Marianne to come to her senses soon, but her adulthood seemed to be a series of one bad decision after another. Basically, it was like telling us that once you have trauma in your childhood, there’s no way of living a normal life personally or professionally.

The book depicts 1970s England and its atmosphere in a true-to-life manner. There are some interesting quotes at the start of every chapter, each taken from an Irish fictional work or folklore.

The themes of grief and coming-of-age are seen throughout the book. But these come to us in an endlessly rambling manner. It was listening to one long self-pitying story. I hoped that the ending would make things better, and it did, to a great extent. The parting chapter was beautiful and bittersweet, with some thought-provoking poetic lines.

Because of the first-person narration, we don’t get to know the other characters as intimately as we know Marianne. I’d especially have loved to know more about her father Edward and her daughter Susanna. It was interesting to see how Marianne always referred to her father as “Edward” but her mom was “my mother.”

The titular ‘Pearl’ has a strong presence through the book. ‘Pearl’, poet unknown, is a 14th-century poem that is considered one of the most important surviving Middle English works and has elements of allegory and dreams. It is present only in a single manuscript at the British Library in London. I read up a summary of the poem in order to better understand its role in this book, and this prep helped somewhat.

I found it interesting to learn that this novel has been forty years in the making. The author used to cycle past a broken-down house in the same village as ‘Pearl’ is set. She then invented characters for the house and began working on this novel. But perhaps the extended writing period created this meandering prose with minimal plot. (Then again, this was longlisted for the Booker, so whom am I kidding! It must hold at least some literary merit for prose lovers!)

I completed this debut work only because I had to complete it. This wasn’t written for us plot-aficionados. The introspective parts where Marianne wonders about the what-ifs and what-might-have-beens are the best. The parts about teen rebellion and going off track in adulthood are boring.

Basically, this is for those lit fic lovers who rejoice in Booker-type books, who value prose over plot, who believe that merit-worthy stories are necessarily dark and gritty stories that delve into human misery. The whole book is essentially segments of musings and introspection, so make sure you are in the right (prose-loving) mood if you intend to pick this up.

2 stars.

My thanks to Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor for providing the DRC of “Pearl” via NetGalley. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book. Sorry this didn’t work out better.

Pearl is a beautifully written debut novel by the Welsh poet Sian Hughes. We find our narrator, Marianne, recounting her life's story. At age 8, Marianne's mother disappears and Marianne is forced to confront her grief and trauma and how it plays out throughout her life and within her own motherhood.

Pearl is a slight story but it packs a punch. There's a depth here that many authors couldn't grasp at with several hundred pages. Hughes manages to paint the story so tenderly. This one will stay with readers for a long, long time.

Pearl is wonderfully written and an enveloping journey into Marianne's coping with loss, grief, reconciliation of what happened to her missing mother, and post-partum depression. Definitely a novel not to be missed.

A really beautifully written story about losing a parent and living with that grief and loss for the rest of your life. This was a moving story, and I loved the way the author stitched the pieces together to create something really emotional.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a DRC in exchange for my honest review!

I tried three times to get through this book. I even restarted from the beginning but could not stick with it. There was something I found off-putting in the main character that made it difficult to want to read and care about her story.

A short novel that gives an intensive look at grief and its effects on those left behind. A young mother disappears shortly after giving birth and her 8-year-old daughter finds the remainder of her life is a struggle to understand it. Just as important is the novel’s study of memory, how we struggle to hold on to important bits of the past but the more time that passes, the more confused those memories become.

Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf Publishing for the ARC to read and review.

Marianne lost her mother when she was just a child and as a mother now herself, she sifts through her hazy memories to try and piece together the woman who left her family so long ago. Based on a medieval poem of the same name, PEARL is a beautifully rendered portrait of childhood, motherhood, and the lasting effects of trauma. A heart wrenching and quietly life-affirming meditation on loss, grief, and the love that lives on through our memories.

DNF @45%

I had hopes at the beginning of this book, but it quickly became clear that the beginning, middle and end are all the same according to other reviews. The story seems stagnant, it consists of an abundance of memories from a girl whose mother disappeared when she was young. The narrative lacks momentum, and i found little to no incentive to continue the story. I feel like I’m just reading sad flashbacks over and over again but no new content in the present moment that keeps the story moving.

There’s some lovely, poetic, vivid writing here and a genuine sense of loss, nevertheless I found the book indulgent and grating. Too monotone. Too much of a perspective that didn’t enchant, rather irritated in its fixity..
I know, the book was Booker longlisted, but I hold to my opinion. Nevertheless, she’s an interesting writer and I hope her next book will reach further.

Marianne is eight when her mother disappears and leaves behind a husband, a daughter, and an infant son. The story is told through Marianne's memories of her close relationship with her mother and how the pain of losing that relationship at such a young age affected and continues to affect her life now as a mother herself.

The story itself felt confusing to me as a reader at times, which also made it feel very slow paced. I could not connect with Marianne and could not understand her choices and behavior. But I did enjoy the ending and the realization she has that felt like she could finally take a breath after all those years.

Pearl, by Siân Hughes, is a gift of a book that explores motherhood, daughterhood, and the lengths women will go to understand themselves within and beyond these roles. It was in some ways a difficult book to read because of the pain it explores, but Hughes addresses these issues in a thoughtful, meditative way. It's no surprise that this novel was long-listed for the Booker Prize.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an eARC; all opinions are my own.

In Ireland, Marianne is only eight years old when her mother disappears. She spends the upcoming years keeping the memories of her mother close and grappling with her absence.

She discovers a book of poems titled Pearl that helps to guide her through the loss of her mother while navigating motherhood herself.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read and review Pearl.

“When someone takes their life, they don’t only steal the future out from under our feet, they also desecrate their past. It makes it hard to hold on to the good things about them. And no one deserves to be judged on the worst five minutes of their life, even if those five minutes turn out to their last.” When 8 yr old Marianne’s mum walks out the door and never returns her loss is palpable. Homeschooled by her mother Marianne shares with us the loving relationship they had creating things, singing songs, gardening and reading as she tries to understand why her mother would do this. No body, no letter, no answers leave Marianne troubled throughout her life. Edward her father is at a loss and now is a single parent to Marianne and her baby brother Joseph. Marianne brings us back to her mother helping us to understand her with memories whether accurate or embellished and with sweet simple things like smells and spirits.

“I wanted to talk to her so many times,” spoke to me as I think every one of us would like one more opportunity to speak with our mums. This book touched my soul for its deeply personal way of dealing with motherly loss, suicidal loss and the effects on children.

Many thanks to #NetGalley and #Knopf for this ARC of #Pearl.



I wanted to talk to her so many times