Eileen: A Novel

Eileen is a 24-year-old residing with her paranoid, delusional, alcoholic father—a retired cop-- in a decaying, unkempt New England house. She hates her dreary days, her sleepless nights, and her menial job at a boys' correctional facility. It’s Christmas week, 1964, dank, glum, and bitter cold. Her father taunts and abuses her, and makes sexual gestures that were difficult and disturbing to read. He’s a danger to himself and others, but his cop frenemies are afraid of him, too. Eileen has to lock away his shoes to keep him homebound. Disgusted by him, by herself, by her troubles, she locks herself away in her room most of the time.Eileen's gallows humor and self-destructive ways will seize you from the start; her tense and twisted mind is irresistible. She paints her lips with garish lipstick in order to hide their true hue, which she says are the color of her nipples. She’s disgusted by any body parts that convey sexuality, but has a celibate crush on one of the detention workers, Randy. On weekends, she drives by his house and parks there for hours, never even sneaking a peek. At home she tries to hide from her father and drinks herself to sleep. She chews her food and then spits it out. She’s whip thin and undernourished, routinely denying what her body needs.Sexual appetites—any appetites, repulse Eileen. She considers bodily functions disgusting, so she tries to control them, deny them. Her diet, laxative use and clothing choices are all in favor of resisting maturity and becoming invisible. The trauma she’s endured all her life is devastating. It's no shock that she grew into a self-hating girl-woman.Still a virgin, Eileen assumes that sex will have to be forced and violent. “Of course I hoped to be raped by only the most soulful, gentle, handsome of men, somebody who was secretly in love with me.” She considers her sister, Joanie, a whore for running off with a boyfriend at age seventeen. There’s no one in Eileen’s life to serve as a role model. Eileen’s nasty, self-centered mother died years ago from cancer--Eileen reluctantly took care of her at the end.I grew up near Boston (this is near Boston) and remember the short days of winter, cracked and soggy simultaneously. That squelch when your boots hit the slush, and the snowy ice melting and refreezing, this cycle going on for weeks. Moshfegh captured it so meticulously, plus the weak light of day that glared at you despite its low wattage, the dark of New England winter nights—the absolute blackness of the season. The dour gloom of this story would be total if not for the reader's foreknowledge that Eileen does get away. She is narrating this story fifty years into the future, dropping small but rich details of her life over the years.Eileen’s hunger for liberty is captivating. Her exile at home corresponds to her menial job at a juvie prison. Her life is defined by confinement, isolation, and her morbid sense of self. She has a car and a decent bank account, yet she doesn't comprehend her own agency. She's stuck. Not until she meets a new counselor at the facility, an enigmatic woman named Rebecca, does she see an escape route. She is transfixed, intoxicated, enamored. She wants Rebecca as her BFF, she’s buzzed by Rebecca’s charisma, her infectious presence. Randy is discarded; Eileen has no room now for anyone but her new friend. She self-appoints Rebecca to lead her out of darkness.That is the story—Eileen’s sense of self, her captivity, her desire for release. I felt every minute of Eileen’s belief in her own incarceration. She’s convinced her isolation is physical. When she meets Rebecca, it's an epic moment for Eileen. Her inflection point.Moshfegh taunts us with Eileen’s raw convictions, her shredded self-esteem. We wait painfully for her tortured gnawing to shift. Trauma and abuse are immobilizing, demoralizing, but we are creatures of hope and desire. Eileen (the novel) is wretched, pervy, and thrilling; Eileen, the character, is determined, inexorable. The story is drab, foul, creepy, and permissibly wearying, yet seductive and compelling. Moshfegh may be an acquired taste, it took me a minute to adjust to the style.Hot button triggers are deployed on every page. Eileen is not for everyone—trigger warning!

"Eileen" by Ottessa Moshfegh is a darkly captivating novel that immerses readers in the unsettling world of its titular character, Eileen Dunlop. Set during the bleak Christmas season in a small coastal New England town, Eileen, a 24-year-old secretary at a juvenile correctional facility, is caught in a web of resentment and self-loathing while serving as the caretaker for her alcoholic father. The story is introduced with a haunting promise as Eileen reflects on her life and the unusual circumstances that drive her to ultimately disappear from it.Moshfegh’s sharp and incisive prose paints Eileen as a deeply flawed yet fascinating protagonist. Her life is filled with bizarre escapades, including shoplifting and stalking a handsome prison guard, which she navigates while fantasizing about escaping to a brighter world. The arrival of Rebecca Saint John, a beautiful and charismatic new counselor at Moorehead, serves as a catalyst for change, sparking an unexpected and intoxicating friendship that leads to a shocking and dangerous turn of events. Moshfegh's novel blends elements of suspense and dark humor, exploring themes of identity, desire, and complicity while crafting a narrative that is both chilling and mesmerizing. With its unique voice and riveting storytelling, "Eileen" establishes Moshfegh as one of contemporary literature's most original talents.

I found this book hard to review. I'm quite sure 3 stars is an unfairly low rating. I'll do my best to explain.Let me start with what I liked about the book. Number 1-Eileen's character and voice. She's dark and brutal and, in her own way, honest. There are too few female protagonists out there that talk about their bathroom habits or masturbatory fantasies or violent desires in such a straight forward, unabashed way as Eileen does. She feels so authentic, even if much of what she says can't be taken at face value. All in all, I loved this character. Number 2-The town of X-ville. Moshfegh creates a dark little corner of America reminiscent of one Shirley Jackson might have imagined. With, at least imaginatively, the boys prison at its center, X-ville radiates a sad, tragic kind of provincialism that makes the reader feel for Eileen and her sense of claustrophobia. And Moshfegh makes it clear that for all its smallness and casual cruelties, Eileen still has a kind of love for the place, much like, despite the wretchedness of her father, she can't help but love him too, even as she thinks about killing him. Her desire to leave but inability to do so create the primary conflict of the first half of the book.Ok, my main problem with the story is its length. Not that it's a long book, but the entire first half of the book merely serves Eileen's voice. Yes, It introduces her character, situation and home, but that could all be cut down to less than fifty pages (perhaps far less). To me, it felt that the author, in her pure joy of writing Eileen's voice, luxuriated in and indulged that pleasure far too long while striving to find her plot. She almost gets away with it (or, in many people's opinion, does get away with it) because the voice is so compelling. My other issue, which I think stems from the first, is that I felt, as I just mentioned, that I could feel the author searching for her plot. As if Moshfegh knew she wanted to get Eileen out of X-ville, but didn't figure out how to accomplish this until half way through the novel. Then she introduces Rebecca and this very odd plot twist (which I liked) that comes out of the blue. In my very humble opinion, I think that the author, once she discovered Rebecca and her usefulness, could have gone back and streamlined the first half of the story, cutting about 100 pages. This sense of groping also came through in Moshfegh's instance on pointing the reader's attention to certain objects throughout the novel. For instance, she refers to icicles over and over again, imagining them as murderous and threatening. I said to my wife about 1/3 of the way through that something better happen with these icicles, or I'd be pissed. Well, something does, but it's minor and feels like an afterthought. She does the same thing with the car and its exhaust issues, though this gets more consequentially used.So, all that's to say I thoroughly enjoyed Moshfegh's writing. She crafts a compelling character that fascinates and disturbs at the same time. However, it takes over half the book for the plot to actually kick in, which, for me, meant too little tension in the first part of the book. All though she has Eileen constantly assuring the reader that consequential happenings wait just around the corner, I became impatient, feeling that the character's repeated "little did I know this would be my last Christmas in x-ville" acted as stand ins for actual suspense. When the plot does kick in, its pace picks up and I did find the conclusion, for the most part, satisfying. I would recommend giving the book a read, if for no other reason than the quality of the writing and the uniqueness of the character's voice. I'm for more character's like this in fiction. (less)

El libro llego según lo programado y en buenas condiciones

After reading and adoring McGlue, I had the highest hopes for Moshfegh, but Eileen is the sort of trash that confirms the author was shooting for mass-market success. This is a book devoid of style, character, vision, direction, and talent. Most of the book is a repetition of itself, which is infuriating. There is no writing quality whatsoever to speak of. The hype is entirely false, as there is nothing remotely subversive or shocking about the book and its ending. I’ll just say that this is a book that could only be recommended by a bland NPC.

I loved Eileen for all her faults. Well observed, no holds barred account of a lost and troubled woman, not always likeable but the author lets you see beyond that. But, the constant interruption from Eileen’s story with long, boring descriptions of the drunken father really wore thin at times. I really wasn’t interested in him but he became the star of the show.Well written and descriptive, I’d love to know what happened to Eileen next.

El libro retrata un mundo tan lúgubre, que creo que no he leído nunca una historia tan tétrica, tan cerrada. Debe ser muy bueno porque me lo leí en pocos días. Eso si, te tiene que pillar con animo.

Setting – Small Massachusetts town known as XvilleCharacters – Eileen – a dour young woman with much hate for the world and little concern for her personal appearance. She works at a juvenile centre where she obsesses over Randy, one of the guards.Father of Eileen – a drinker who sits in front of the electric stove all day who Eileen describes as “only ever satisfied by [her] complete debasement.”The women of the office were both “awful middle-aged women with stiff hairdos who barely looked up from their romance novels unless the warden was around.”Rebecca – Eileen’s would-be saviour – “powerful and everything [Eileen] wanted to be.Plot – This is a story of redemption and the power to start again but first, we must explore the misery of Eileen’s existence as she revels in the sinister lives of herself and others and their contemptuous inner thoughts.Terrifically written story about the inner lives of "losers" and their capacity for rebellion.