Emma Jane Unsworth’s virtuoso new novel is far too canny to convey anything so gauche as a 'message', but if it did, it would be this: step away from your screen ... Adults is a tale rich in keenly observed relationships – between mothers and daughters, best friends and boyfriends, idols and rivals – yet its central, inseparable pairing is that of thirtysomething heroine Jenny and her phone. Theirs is a supremely dysfunctional affair ... Daffy one-liners, trenchant satire, misadventure of the laugh/cry variety – the narrative pops with all of the above as it parses everything from selfhood to attraction ... Though she’s a dauntingly able all-rounder ... it’s as a comedic writer that Unsworth sparkles, and her quickfire wit synthesises perfectly with her theme in Adults, mimicking the relentless pace of the internet. Yet like the very best of her kind, she creates a world complex enough that in the echoes of our laughter are also relatability, wistfulness, even hope. All are present in this novel’s satisfying close.
...a novel that acutely captures the anxious ruminations of a life lived online ... Unsworth’s prose is jaunty, witty, sexy and funny ... The novel verges on the manic in places – there are a lot of exclamation marks and shouty upper-case typography. The patchwork structure, with very short chapters, including email drafts and therapy session monologues, means that it lacks the tight coherence of Unsworth’s previous novel, Animals. ... The writing can be gorgeously shiver-inducing ... The last third...is almost unbearably moving, in part through its directness ... Adults has much packed into it: romance, grief and betrayal, with several twists and turns and shifting loyalties. The path between the jaunty humour and gut-wrenching sadness that Unsworth steered so precisely in Animals feels more unsteadily managed here; the form seems unresolved. But her writing surprises, delights and moves. I will remember, for a long time, this novel’s lacerating wit and its melancholy sorrow.
The reader, too, may find Jenny’s online insecurities barely credible given her age. But her voice is so immediately engaging—and her perspective so zanily acute—that we overlook any incongruities ... But this oddly charming narrative is far more than a feast of one-liners. Ms. Unsworth’s satirical eye is more keenly focused here than in her previous two novels ... self-inflating targets such as mindfulness, artiness and new-manliness are sparingly deployed and exquisitely punctured while the overall mood is subtly textured and the central plot almost quaintly plain ... The novel’s deeper charm resides in its fleeting evocations of the past and of England’s flintier regions, sketches that in their deftness recall Alan Bennett’s portraits of his northern English birthplace ... in this sprightly novel introspection has met its match.
Emma Jane Unsworth’s new novel, Grown Ups, grants you precisely that voyeuristic look into the hideous unseen machinations behind the posts. And it is deeply unsettling ... Although it’s a comedic novel — and a truly funny one — it’s less of an escape than it is a set of Clockwork Orange metal eye clamps, forcing you to examine, in paragraphs and paragraphs of hand-wringing over exclamation points and emoji choices and the exact right timing of a fav, your own profoundlyunhealthy relationship with social media ... Grown Ups succeeds in not just accurately portraying this modern obsession, but in tenderly revealing what might be driving it.
Jenny’s character fits within the long literary tradition of The Messy Woman which is in fact the secret history of, whisper it, most women ... And the hunger for this sort of character is not waning ... Reading this book, I thought about Fleabag; the neuroses, the joy, the messiness – all the things women don’t say ... This is also the story of Jenny’s own relationship to the idea of being a mother ... The writing about maternal longing is devastatingly perceptive – Jenny is surrounded by doubt ... Unsworth never shies away from all the blood and bondage of female biology, the animal of us ... And no one can put a laugh out loud smut right up beside poetry the way Unsworth can.
Adults is a sharp, funny novel about floundering in a social-media world where everyone else seems to be flying ... The story cuts between the past — childhood, teenage years, scenes from her relationships — and present, but how present Jenny is in her own life is up for debate ... And yes, she is often maddening and does some terrible things. Yet we are shown why — and my heart ached for her. Jenny’s behaviour is extreme, but easy to recognise; we are blessed with so many ways to be in touch, to be ignored, to snoop for new ways to torment ourselves ... Emma Jane Unsworth, who adapted her previous novel, Animals, about an intense, hedonistic female friendship for the big screen, nails the anguish of losing a future and figuring yourself out. Adults is witty, clever and a bit frightening. Unsworth had me rooting for Jenny to like herself.
From Dawn O'Porter's So Lucky to Sophie White's Filter This, several novels have already honed in on the chasm between the IRL self and the online self. Yet Unsworth's is in a class of its own, pinpointing perfectly the discomfiting tangle between the person we project out into the world, and the sheer effort required to upkeep the charade ... Unsworth tempers any tonal unease with plenty of spiky, current humour ... Some readers might find Adult's humour slightly too rich, and knowing. It's certainly relentless, yet the quickfire one-liners are a neat reflector of Jenny's frenzied interiority, and her lupine hunger for approval. With a dusting of ribald wit on every page, it comfortably falls (for me at least), on the right side of entertaining ... Adults is zeitgeisty, and its humour couched in current argot. Will Unsworth's third novel stand the test of time and become a classic to withstand the ages? The jury is out. But like the works of Ephron and Dunham before it, a detailed look at how women live in the face of massive societal expectation won't fall out of fashion.
Unsworth (Animals, 2015) deftly bounces readers through Jenny’s story, which unfolds in snappily titled chapters that often contain emails, texts, and tweets. This fun, chatty packaging adds to what is ultimately a journey of serious transformation and redemption ... Unsworth’s wise and invigorating novel captures something essential in the ways Jenny rules, and is ruled by, her digital self; readers will be hooked.
Although Jenny's constant need to filter every life experience through social media often feels exhausting, there’s no denying that her obsession will resonate with many millennials. Jenny’s voice is strong, sharp, occasionally disgusting, and alternately charming and horrifying as she narrates every one of her stumbles through life. A bracing look at a breakdown that’s sometimes difficult to read but always completely captivating.
... a blistering tragicomic send-up of a life documented on Instagram ... The broad satire with which Unsworth opens her novel quickly gains both substance and shadow ... Though directed squarely at millennials, Jenny’s stumbling journey toward authenticity will resonate with anyone who’s taken the bold, hard step of assessing their life without any filters.
