Very unlike the wealthy intellectual Alice, Felix is a down-to-earth warehouse worker. As the novel opens, she is meeting a man, Felix, in a bar for their first date. Twenty-nine-year-old Alice Kelleher is a rich and famous novelist staying in a rectory in the Irish countryside after recovering from a mental health crisis. The narrative alternates between the lives of best friends Alice and Eileen and is interspersed with the letters they send each other. She uses this character to reflect contemporary criticism back upon her own critics in a subtle disapproval of obsessing over her literary celebrity. Rooney’s novels-including this one-discuss themes of interpersonal friendships, sexuality, Irish literature, politics, Marxism, and feminism, which are very similar to the themes that her fictional author, Alice, also writes about. Through all the communication and miscommunication amongst them, the friends find glimpses of a “beautiful world” around them by prioritizing a personalized, emotional, aesthetic life oriented around human love and friendship. It's worth thinking about.' IRISH INDEPENDENT 'Brilliantly done: gripping, steamy, unbearably sad.Beautiful World, Where Are You chronicles the daily lives of four friends as they contemplate abstract philosophy and deal with the drudgery of existence while living in a collapsing civilization. Funny and smart, full of sex and love and people doing their best to connect.' Brandon Taylor, NEW YORK TIMES 'Written with immense skill and illuminated by an endlessly incisive intelligence.' IRISH TIMES 'Beautiful World, Where Are You is not just worth reading. Rooney's best novel.' THE TIMES 'Rooney's best novel yet. There is a touching honesty and truthfulness in these pages, along with a quiet brilliance.' FINANCIAL TIMES 'The book moved me to tears more than once. The dialogue never falters, and the prose burns up the page.' GUARDIAN 'Rooney's strongest writing thus far. Are they standing in the last lighted room before the darkness, bearing witness to something? Will they find a way to believe in a beautiful world? 'A tour de force. They worry about sex and friendship and the world they live in. They desire each other, they delude each other, they get together, they break apart. Alice, Felix, Eileen and Simon are still young - but life is catching up with them.

In Dublin, her best friend Eileen is getting over a break-up and slips back into flirting with Simon, a man she has known since childhood.

'Beautiful World, Where Are You is Rooney's best novel.' THE TIMES *The Sunday Times and Global number one bestseller* *Winner of Novel of the Year at the An Post Irish Book Awards* Alice, a novelist, meets Felix, who works in a warehouse, and asks him if he'd like to travel to Rome with her.

Review of beautiful world where are you