A short life of the author
Eimear McBride (b. 1976) was born in Liverpool and grew up in Ireland. She studied at Drama Centre London. She wrote A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing in six months in 2003; it was rejected by every major publisher and took nine years to find a home with Galley Beggar Press, a tiny Norwich-based publisher.
Life and Career
A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing (2013) tells the story of a young Irish woman’s life — her relationship with her brain-damaged brother, her sexual abuse, her self-destruction — in a language that shatters conventional syntax to capture the movement of consciousness before it becomes coherent thought. The novel’s first sentence — “For you. You’ll soon. You’ll give her name” — announces a style that is both exhilarating and demanding.
The novel won the Goldsmiths Prize, the Baileys Women’s Prize, the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year, and the Desmond Elliott Prize. The Lesser Bohemians (2016) — a love story set in 1990s London — and Strange Hotel (2020) — a compressed novel about a woman alone in hotel rooms — confirm McBride’s talent.
Major Works and Themes
McBride writes about consciousness, embodiment, sexuality, and trauma in a language that attempts to capture experience before it has been processed into conventional narrative. Her style is the most radical in contemporary fiction in English.
Key Works
- A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing (2013) — Goldsmiths Prize, Baileys Women’s Prize
- The Lesser Bohemians (2016)
- Strange Hotel (2020)
Collecting McBride
A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing (2013, Galley Beggar Press) — the small-press first edition — is very scarce: $100–$500+. The Faber paperback followed. McBride signs at literary events.