Monica Byrne. (2014). The Girl in the Road: A Novel. Crown.

Monica Byrne. 2014. The Girl in the Road: A Novel. Crown.

Monica Byrne, The Girl in the Road: A Novel. Crown, 2014.

Monica Byrne. The Girl in the Road: A Novel. Crown, 2014.

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33. • value: fiction books
34. • value: fantasy
35. • value: science fiction books
36. • value: strong female lead
37. • value: sci fi books
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1. • role: Author
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     MONICA BYRNE studied at Wellesley College and MIT. She's a writer and playwright based in Durham, North Carolina.
      
     @monicabyrne · monicabyrne.org

   • name: Monica Byrne

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2014-05-20T00:00:00-04:00

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title

The Girl in the Road

fullDescription

A debut that Neil Gaiman calls “Glorious. . . . So sharp, so focused and so human.” The Girl in the Road describes a future that is culturally lush and emotionally wrenching.

Monica Byrne bursts on to the literary scene with an extraordinary vision of the future.  In a world where global power has shifted east and revolution is brewing, two women embark on vastly different journeys—each harrowing and urgent and wholly unexpected.
When Meena finds snakebites on her chest, her worst fears are realized: someone is after her and she must flee India.  As she plots her exit, she learns of the Trail, an energy-harvesting bridge spanning the Arabian Sea that has become a refuge for itinerant vagabonds and loners on the run.  This is her salvation.  Slipping out in the cover of night, with a knapsack full of supplies including a pozit GPS, a scroll reader, and a sealable waterproof pod, she sets off for Ethiopia, the place of her birth.
Meanwhile, Mariama, a young girl in Africa, is forced to flee her home.  She joins up with a caravan of misfits heading across the Sahara. She is taken in by Yemaya, a beautiful and enigmatic woman who becomes her protector and confidante. They are trying to reach Addis Abba, Ethiopia, a metropolis swirling with radical politics and rich culture.  But Mariama will find a city far different than she ever expected—romantic, turbulent, and dangerous.
As one heads east and the other west, Meena and Mariama’s fates are linked in ways that are mysterious and shocking to the core.
Written with stunning clarity, deep emotion, and a futuristic flair, The Girl in the Road is an artistic feat of the first order: vividly imagined, artfully told, and profoundly moving.

reviews

1. • premium: False
   • source: NPR.org
   • content: "Dizzying. . . . Primal and indelible. . . . Delivered with all the vivid, haunting poignancy of a vision quest."
2. • premium: False
   • source: Duke Chronicle
   • content: "[A] sci-fi smash hit. . . . Byrne crafts a gorgeous future world. . . . Elaborate and beguiling."
3. • premium: False
   • source: San Francisco Chronicle
   • content: "The Girl in the Road brims with ambition...Inventive... Fearless ...[A] wild, hallucinatory ride."
4. • premium: False
   • source: Kirkus
   • content: "The most inventive tale to come along in years. . . . The writing is often brilliant, as Byrne paints wholly believable pictures of worlds and cultures most Westerners will never know. . . . Engrossing and enjoyable."
5. • premium: False
   • source: Guardian (UK)
   • content: "Byrne is a science writer and graduate of MIT, but her insight into our near future is as much informed by her extensive travels as her grasp of science. . . . A book you will certainly be hearing a lot about in 2014."
6. • premium: False
   • source: Helene Wecker, author of The Golem and the Jinni
   • content: "Monica Byrne's vision of India and Africa as an ever-changing maelstrom of language and culture, technology and sexuality is utterly captivating. As Meena and Mariama chase each other's echoes, Byrne strips away their preconceptions (and ours as well) through that most dangerous of human impulses: our need to understand the past, and to decide our own future. An electrifying debut."
7. • premium: False
   • source: John Scalzi, author of Redshirts
   • content: "Monica Byrne has written the road trip novel you didn't know you were waiting for. A genuine and extraordinary journey. Take it."
8. • premium: False
   • source: Kim Stanley Robinson, author of 2312 and Red Mars
   • content: "The Girl in the Road is a brilliant novel, vivid, intense, and fearless with a kind of savage joy. These journeys--Meena's across the Arabian Sea and Mariama's across Africa--are utterly unforgettable."
9. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     February 24, 2014
     The Trail, or Trans-Arabian Linear Generator, reaches from Bombay to Africa, resembles a “pontoon bridge,” and in the year 2068 generates a vast amount of energy from both the sea and the sun. In this debut novel, it also becomes a means for Meena, a tough young woman living in India, to travel to Ethiopia, where she was born and where her parents were killed soon thereafter. Byrne builds an elaborate future with complex geopolitical realities and a fascinating scientific illustration of the Trail and its power. She also has a clear handle on everything from Hindu rituals to Addis Ababa side streets. Unfortunately, the concepts aren’t enough to bring Meena to life, or perhaps it’s the ideas that suffocate the characters. With overbearing first-person exposition, violent melodrama, and exaggerated sexual escapades, the book never quite coalesces into the sum of its many parts. Additionally, the narrative relies on alternating chapters featuring another story thread—an escaped slave girl, Mariama, heading east toward India as Meena travels west. The two plot strands eventually intertwine, but instead of illuminating one another, they contribute to an overall sense of discombobulation. Agent: Sam Stoloff, Frances Goldin Literary Agency.

10. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      March 1, 2014
      

      This spectacular and intriguing book of parallel journeys takes place in the near future and the present day; two narratives that are seemingly unrelated arrow together in a shattering climax. The future quest is that of Meena, escaping from a troubled history by embarking on an impossible odyssey across a floating wave-energy bridge connecting India and Africa. The contemporary Miriama is a child slave fleeing from Mauritania across continental Africa to Ethiopia. Both are running from violent pasts; both are in denial about the truth behind their lives. VERDICT Novelist and playwright Byrne's debut is enthralling on many levels. Meena's story provides a detailed vision of the technological and ecopolitical future of Africa and Asia, while Miriam's account depicts the tenuous experience of a powerless child in Africa. The incorporation of evolving views of gender with reference to the Hijra transgender experience in India and the Wodabe Gerewol mate selection ritual (made famous in Werner Herzog's film Herdsmen of the Sun) propel this novel into the stratosphere of artistic brilliance.--Henry Bankhead, Los Gatos Lib., CA

      Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

11. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      May 1, 2014
      Byrne's stunning debut tells the story of two women from different time periods who set out on quests across forbidding landscapes. In India in the latter half of the twenty-first century, Meena survives what she believes is an assassination attempt after discovering a snake in her bed. Fleeing this threat to her life, she decides to track down the woman responsible for the death of her parents more than a quarter-of-a-century ago in Ethiopia. Meena knows her journey won't be an easy one. She intends to travel along the Trail, a bridge used to harness energy that runs across the Arabian Sea. Years before Meena sets out on her journey, ten-year-old Mariama smuggles herself aboard a truck bound for Ethiopia. The drivers take pity on her and allow her to accompany them, but it is Yemaya, a mysterious, beautiful passenger they pick up along the way, who captures Mariama's attention and heart. More than a few surprises await Meena and Mariama and the reader as story lines converge in a surprising, gratifying climax.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)

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A debut that Neil Gaiman calls “Glorious. . . . So sharp, so focused and so human.” The Girl in the Road describes a future that is culturally lush and emotionally wrenching.

Monica Byrne bursts on to the literary scene with an extraordinary vision of the future.  In a world where global power has shifted east and revolution is brewing, two women embark on vastly different journeys—each harrowing and urgent and wholly unexpected.
When Meena finds snakebites on her chest, her worst fears are realized: someone is after her and she must flee India.  As she plots her exit, she learns of the Trail, an energy-harvesting bridge spanning the Arabian Sea that has become a refuge for itinerant vagabonds and loners on the run.  This is her salvation.  Slipping out in the cover of night, with a knapsack full of supplies including a pozit GPS, a scroll reader, and a sealable waterproof pod, she sets off for Ethiopia, the place of...

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