No One Is Talking About This

A Novel

By: Patricia Lockwood

Narrated by: Kristen Sieh

FINALIST FOR THE 2021 BOOKER PRIZE & A NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BOOK OF 2021
WINNER OF THE DYLAN THOMAS PRIZE

“A book that reads like a prose poem, at once sublime, profane, intimate, philosophical, witty and, eventually, deeply moving.” —New York Times Book Review, Editors’ Choice

“Wow. I can’t remember the last time I laughed so much reading a book. What an inventive and startling writer…I’m so glad I read this. I really think this book is remarkable.” —David Sedaris

From "a formidably gifted writer" (The New York Times Book Review), a book that asks: Is there life after the internet?

As this urgent, genre-defying book opens, a woman who has recently been elevated to prominence for her social media posts travels around the world to meet her adoring fans. She is overwhelmed by navigating the new language and etiquette of what she terms "the portal," where she grapples with an unshakable conviction that a vast chorus of voices is now dictating her thoughts. When existential threats--from climate change and economic precariousness to the rise of an unnamed dictator and an epidemic of loneliness--begin to loom, she posts her way deeper into the portal's void. An avalanche of images, details, and references accumulate to form a landscape that is post-sense, post-irony, post-everything. "Are we in hell?" the people of the portal ask themselves. "Are we all just going to keep doing this until we die?"

Suddenly, two texts from her mother pierce the fray: "Something has gone wrong," and "How soon can you get here?" As real life and its stakes collide with the increasingly absurd antics of the portal, the woman confronts a world that seems to contain both an abundance of proof that there is goodness, empathy, and justice in the universe, and a deluge of evidence to the contrary.

Fragmentary and omniscient, incisive and sincere, No One Is Talking About This is at once a love letter to the endless scroll and a profound, modern meditation on love, language, and human connection from a singular voice in American literature.

©2021 Patricia Lockwood (P)2021 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

Finalist for the Booker Prize
Finalist for the Women’s Prize for Fiction
Finalist for The Center for Fiction First Novel Prize
Winner of the Dylan Thomas Prize

Named a Best Book of 2021 by The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, NPR, TIME, Vulture, Esquire, Entertainment Weekly, BuzzFeed, PopSugar, Harper's Bazaar, LitHub and Publishers Weekly

“One of the most incisive observers of the spectacle of digital discourse . . . Lockwood is a sharp and often funny social critic. She writes wisely of the emotionally labile landscape of the internet . . . many of her images are evocative and often beautiful . . . More inventive than lapidary, Ms. Lockwood’s style is artful without being precious . . . What begins as an ironical story about irony becomes an intimate and moving portrait of love and grief. In this way, a novel that had been toying with the digital surface of modern life finds the tender heart pumping away beneath it all.” —Emily Bobrow, The Wall Street Journal

“Lockwood is sending a bulletin from the future . . . [She] has set out to portray not merely a mind through language, as Joyce did, but what she calls ‘the mind,’ the molting collective consciousness that has melded with her protagonist’s singular one . . . Lockwood gets it right, mimicking the medium while shrewdly parodying its ethos . . . God, is she funny! . . . Lockwood’s conceit is smart, her prose original, hugely entertaining and witty . . . a powerful, paradoxical observation about what digital platforms take from us . . . Lockwood’s own writing takes on new depth and a more focussed, richer beauty as her protagonist gets farther from the portal and deeper into the tangible present . . . Lockwood’s writing grows radiant . . . it is a story, simply, about love, selfless and delighted.” —Alexandra Schwartz, The New Yorker

“[An] attention-grabbing mind-blower which toggles between irony and sincerity, sweetness and blight . . . surprisingly beautiful . . . Lockwood is a master of sweeping, eminently quotable proclamations that fearlessly aim to encapsulate whole movements and eras . . . It's a testament to her skills as a rare writer who can navigate both sleaze and cheese, jokey tweets and surprising earnestness, that we not only buy her character's emotional epiphany but are moved by it. Of course, people will be talking about this meaty book, and about the questions Lockwood raises about what a human being is, what a brain is, and most important, what really matters.” —NPR

Written like a work of poetry

This book was written from the point of view of a young adult who is constantly scrolling on her phone. The writing is insightful, poetic, and left me laughing and crying. I will definitely be looking for more books by this author. While the story does not have a conflict leading to resolution plot I was amazed that I hung on her every word. (I am not a writer so please excuse this badly written review.)

Beautiful, moving, hilarious, astute.

This book moves from a haphazard collection of irreverent impressions of modern life into one of the most tender, precious and reverent stories we know.

The last half is amazing.

If you can somehow survive the nonsensical first 2 1/2 hours, you’re in for a beautiful and tender story. That said, that first 2 1/2 hours feels incomprehensible. Maybe a text better read than listen to

Effective and moving, but requires trust and patience

This is to a standard narrative what Cubism must have seemed like to an Impressionist audience. It’s wild and seems random at the start. Then it ends up having a lot to say. From shallow to deep. I really enjoyed it. And the audio performance really helped.

Funny, heartbreaking, profound

I loved this book so much. It captures something so true about the contemporary experience and about human life. The narrator did an amazing job bringing the text to life, so much more than simply “reading” it.

Funny, moving, glad to have read it

I read several reviews that said this book didn’t have a plot and one that said it did. The positive reviewer said something like they were glad to have read it. I am also glad and still crying.

Part one required my attention. I had to sit and listen, which makes me think that part may have been easier to follow with a hard copy book. I had to stop part 2 several times because I was crying (and not quietly).

I’m thankful to the writer and the voice actress for gifting such preciousness to us. Worth it. Worth it. Worth it.

Fascinating and profound

A poetic and dreamy exploration of love, grief, human strength and adaptability in the age of online immediate gratification and judgement. It is incredibly ironic while sharply realistic and honest. I did not know what to expect but I found it to be a haunting, joyful and eye opening surprise.

Unexpectedly Great

I don’t know what to say except I was in literal tears by the end.

Bizarre and wonderful

Never read anything quite like this book, but I found it sharp and funny and even sweet at times.

Stunning heart string puller

For most f this book, I thought it was some woke feminazi rantings of a bunch of random nonsense. I kept thinking to myself, "Why the hell did I choose this book?" But then, when the life of the baby was illustrated, I began to realize the contrast of the beauty of that life in contrast to all the other minutia that we so often think of as important. The chapters that walked the reader through the babies life kept me in tears. That infant was beauty incarnate and even though she wasn't around, she left a priceless gift to us. That we are human and being human is beauty in simplicity and amid complexity. Nonetheless, no matter what, this is the precious gift we must always hold on to for dear life, for that is the breath of our soul. It's amazing how things come at you from such strange origins, and yet, that is where the strongest medicine resides, because it gets our attention so. For this, I'm thankful. This was a wonderful read. Thank you for sharing that story.