--- product_id: 88385759 title: "Milkman: A Novel" price: "SAR 62" currency: SAR in_stock: true reviews_count: 13 url: https://www.desertcart.com.sa/products/88385759-milkman-a-novel store_origin: SA region: Saudi Arabia --- # Milkman: A Novel **Price:** SAR 62 **Availability:** ✅ In Stock ## Quick Answers - **What is this?** Milkman: A Novel - **How much does it cost?** SAR 62 with free shipping - **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship - **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.com.sa](https://www.desertcart.com.sa/products/88385759-milkman-a-novel) ## Best For - Customers looking for quality international products ## Why This Product - Free international shipping included - Worldwide delivery with tracking - 15-day hassle-free returns ## Description Winner of the Man Booker Prize “Everything about this novel rings true. . . . Original, funny, disarmingly oblique and unique.”― The Guardian In an unnamed city, middle sister stands out for the wrong reasons. She reads while walking, for one. And she has been taking French night classes downtown. So when a local paramilitary known as the milkman begins pursuing her, she suddenly becomes “interesting,” the last thing she ever wanted to be. Despite middle sister’s attempts to avoid him―and to keep her mother from finding out about her maybe-boyfriend―rumors spread and the threat of violence lingers. Milkman is a story of the way inaction can have enormous repercussions, in a time when the wrong flag, wrong religion, or even a sunset can be subversive. Told with ferocious energy and sly, wicked humor, Milkman establishes Anna Burns as one of the most consequential voices of our day. Review: The Milkman Burns - Perhaps it’s not right to invent a title for a review that concatenates the title and author of the book under consideration but in this case it seems so appropriate. This novel so well written, so lyrically Irish, such dark humour hurt me, burnt me. I’ve not read anything else that so successfully conveys what it must have been like to live through The Troubles of Northern Ireland and the impact this had on the minds of the people who felt they had no choice but to endure and survive those times as best they could. We are told the active voice of the principal character, nameless Middle Sister, a girl of 18 , of events unfolding around and over her, covering a period of just a few months. Through rambling sentences spiced with recall and speculation a current and historical profile of unnamed neighbourhoods (I guess Belfast) emerge populated by lithe, criminally inclined, politically bloated, blighted as well as delightful inhabitants. Burn’s skilfully conveys the agony of living in a repressive society beset with tribal loyalties and fear. I had to force myself to keep reading Burn’s intimately affective, ‘fictional’ account and accept the shadowy presence of clumsy British occupying soldiers and violent IRA patriots. Middle Sister is stalked by a powerful figure in the resistance: Milkman. He is married, in his thirties, a looming criminal. The threat of his presence alone in the absence of touch is nevertheless too close, visceral, overwhelming. She is incredibly brave. She feels she must protect her bisexual Sometime Boyfriend, watch out for more than poisoned words,defend herself from the unsympathetic narrative of her best Old Friend, ignore the constant harassment of her mother, First Older Sister and others.She must deal with the attention of a rejected suitor Somebody McSomebody, a young, pathetic pistol packing neighbour who attacks her in the loo. Perhaps most terrifying of all, our narrator, Middle Sister is caught in a culture of hostile gossip whose actors compulsively invent false stories about her, disarm and imprison her in a silo of alienated silence. We wait with growing impatience under salvos of words for something to break her entrapment. Burn’s conveys the tension between Middle Sister and those closest to her and the events that surround her in a simultaneously frightening, funny and entirely convincing way. We forget the inherent contradiction between who the truly articulate Middle Sister is who is writing the text and the girl who cannot ask for help from those in a position most likely to provide it is the same person. The Middle Sister who wrote this novel may not be the author but the author knows her so well I feel it is her alter ego talking to her younger self. Burn’s describes the prison of what seems to be her own internment. There is no need for her to explain why her eminently capable narrator is incapable of helping herself. The profound message intended or not is the way this wonderful story captures a time and place, a state of mind, what is was to be living inNorthern Ireland during The Troubles. In such a milieu, such a volatile and dangerous space it is best to fain ignorance, avoid extending to much trust in others, sensible to remain silent. There is nothing as boring as didactic intent in Burn’s wonderful novel but the lessons are there. What of current day tribalism and where it could take us? Why so many closed narcissistic minds? Why the unwillingness to listen to and respect other people’s point of view? How come we never learn? Yes, it’s complicated. Let me make it even more so. Oscar Wilde writing of a much earlier phase of The Troubles wrote something like this “if only the English would learn to talk and the Irish to listen we would have a very civilised society” Review: A brutal, difficult read – but worth the effort - “‘It’s not about being happy,’ he said, which was, and still is, the saddest remark I’ve ever heard.” (p63) This book, set in 1970’s Northern Ireland during “The Troubles”, is rough going -- both the style and content make it a brutally difficult read. The protagonist is a thoughtful, traumatized young woman who tells her story in long, meandering, complex stream-of-consciousness prose. It’s an account of people trying to live their lives in the face of unspeakable threats and horrors. How do they cope? How deep are their psychic wounds? A vile, omnipresent, omniscient, mysterious stalker anchors the story: his words and actions are especially creepy because they are understated. Yes, there are moments of hope (and dry, sarcastic humor), but the general tone conveys the feeling of life weighing everybody down. The people in the community – all traumatized in their own ways – are unable (often unwilling) to distinguish the real from the imagined and the deliberately distorted. As the book proceeds, you’ll sometimes find yourself unable to make the distinction yourself. This, of course, is exactly what the author has in mind. Pay close attention to the author’s ostentatious reluctance to use proper names. They are extraordinarily rare in the book – the nameless narrator uses functional descriptions like maybe-boyfriend, chef, tablet girl, and third brother-in-law. Even ordinary dialog avoids proper names. There are exceptions, however, and I’m certain those exceptions are important. I’ll withhold my own rather incomplete and uncertain thoughts on what I think the author intends by that. If this book resonates for you, I recommend “Prophet Song” by Paul Lynch (Booker Prize, five-star, also set in the “The Troubles”), and “Hard by a Great Forest" by Leo Vardiashvili (set in the Soviet-era republic of Georgia). ## Technical Specifications | Specification | Value | |---------------|-------| | Best Sellers Rank | #40,671 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #570 in Coming of Age Fiction (Books) #1,935 in Literary Fiction (Books) | | Customer Reviews | 3.9 out of 5 stars 11,526 Reviews | ## Images ![Milkman: A Novel - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91P67FPmyvL.jpg) ## Customer Reviews ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ The Milkman Burns *by J***N on October 31, 2018* Perhaps it’s not right to invent a title for a review that concatenates the title and author of the book under consideration but in this case it seems so appropriate. This novel so well written, so lyrically Irish, such dark humour hurt me, burnt me. I’ve not read anything else that so successfully conveys what it must have been like to live through The Troubles of Northern Ireland and the impact this had on the minds of the people who felt they had no choice but to endure and survive those times as best they could. We are told the active voice of the principal character, nameless Middle Sister, a girl of 18 , of events unfolding around and over her, covering a period of just a few months. Through rambling sentences spiced with recall and speculation a current and historical profile of unnamed neighbourhoods (I guess Belfast) emerge populated by lithe, criminally inclined, politically bloated, blighted as well as delightful inhabitants. Burn’s skilfully conveys the agony of living in a repressive society beset with tribal loyalties and fear. I had to force myself to keep reading Burn’s intimately affective, ‘fictional’ account and accept the shadowy presence of clumsy British occupying soldiers and violent IRA patriots. Middle Sister is stalked by a powerful figure in the resistance: Milkman. He is married, in his thirties, a looming criminal. The threat of his presence alone in the absence of touch is nevertheless too close, visceral, overwhelming. She is incredibly brave. She feels she must protect her bisexual Sometime Boyfriend, watch out for more than poisoned words,defend herself from the unsympathetic narrative of her best Old Friend, ignore the constant harassment of her mother, First Older Sister and others.She must deal with the attention of a rejected suitor Somebody McSomebody, a young, pathetic pistol packing neighbour who attacks her in the loo. Perhaps most terrifying of all, our narrator, Middle Sister is caught in a culture of hostile gossip whose actors compulsively invent false stories about her, disarm and imprison her in a silo of alienated silence. We wait with growing impatience under salvos of words for something to break her entrapment. Burn’s conveys the tension between Middle Sister and those closest to her and the events that surround her in a simultaneously frightening, funny and entirely convincing way. We forget the inherent contradiction between who the truly articulate Middle Sister is who is writing the text and the girl who cannot ask for help from those in a position most likely to provide it is the same person. The Middle Sister who wrote this novel may not be the author but the author knows her so well I feel it is her alter ego talking to her younger self. Burn’s describes the prison of what seems to be her own internment. There is no need for her to explain why her eminently capable narrator is incapable of helping herself. The profound message intended or not is the way this wonderful story captures a time and place, a state of mind, what is was to be living inNorthern Ireland during The Troubles. In such a milieu, such a volatile and dangerous space it is best to fain ignorance, avoid extending to much trust in others, sensible to remain silent. There is nothing as boring as didactic intent in Burn’s wonderful novel but the lessons are there. What of current day tribalism and where it could take us? Why so many closed narcissistic minds? Why the unwillingness to listen to and respect other people’s point of view? How come we never learn? Yes, it’s complicated. Let me make it even more so. Oscar Wilde writing of a much earlier phase of The Troubles wrote something like this “if only the English would learn to talk and the Irish to listen we would have a very civilised society” ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ A brutal, difficult read – but worth the effort *by D***J on November 16, 2024* “‘It’s not about being happy,’ he said, which was, and still is, the saddest remark I’ve ever heard.” (p63) This book, set in 1970’s Northern Ireland during “The Troubles”, is rough going -- both the style and content make it a brutally difficult read. The protagonist is a thoughtful, traumatized young woman who tells her story in long, meandering, complex stream-of-consciousness prose. It’s an account of people trying to live their lives in the face of unspeakable threats and horrors. How do they cope? How deep are their psychic wounds? A vile, omnipresent, omniscient, mysterious stalker anchors the story: his words and actions are especially creepy because they are understated. Yes, there are moments of hope (and dry, sarcastic humor), but the general tone conveys the feeling of life weighing everybody down. The people in the community – all traumatized in their own ways – are unable (often unwilling) to distinguish the real from the imagined and the deliberately distorted. As the book proceeds, you’ll sometimes find yourself unable to make the distinction yourself. This, of course, is exactly what the author has in mind. Pay close attention to the author’s ostentatious reluctance to use proper names. They are extraordinarily rare in the book – the nameless narrator uses functional descriptions like maybe-boyfriend, chef, tablet girl, and third brother-in-law. Even ordinary dialog avoids proper names. There are exceptions, however, and I’m certain those exceptions are important. I’ll withhold my own rather incomplete and uncertain thoughts on what I think the author intends by that. If this book resonates for you, I recommend “Prophet Song” by Paul Lynch (Booker Prize, five-star, also set in the “The Troubles”), and “Hard by a Great Forest" by Leo Vardiashvili (set in the Soviet-era republic of Georgia). ### ⭐⭐⭐ Cool but Boring *by C***E on December 19, 2023* I like this book when things happen in it. Else I don’t really like it. Although it’s a book with plenty of good things in it — the claustrophobia, the suspense, the combination of claustrophobia and suspense —, the style is so redundant that it’s exhausting even if stream-of-consciousness books have redundant styles. It goes on and on and on, all interpretation, no action, barely a smidge of action, and even without the action the book isn’t very profound. Books can be enjoyed if they’re full of action but not profound or profound and not full of action, but Milkman is neither. Though the book is a good portrait of Belfast during the Troubles, the book is tedious and unending. ## Frequently Bought Together - Milkman: A Novel - The Country Girls: Three Novels and an Epilogue: (The Country Girl; The Lonely Girl; Girls in Their Married Bliss; Epilogue) (FSG Classics) - A Ghost in the Throat --- ## Why Shop on Desertcart? - 🛒 **Trusted by 1.3+ Million Shoppers** — Serving international shoppers since 2016 - 🌍 **Shop Globally** — Access 737+ million products across 21 categories - 💰 **No Hidden Fees** — All customs, duties, and taxes included in the price - 🔄 **15-Day Free Returns** — Hassle-free returns (30 days for PRO members) - 🔒 **Secure Payments** — Trusted payment options with buyer protection - ⭐ **TrustPilot Rated 4.5/5** — Based on 8,000+ happy customer reviews **Shop now:** [https://www.desertcart.com.sa/products/88385759-milkman-a-novel](https://www.desertcart.com.sa/products/88385759-milkman-a-novel) --- *Product available on Desertcart Saudi Arabia* *Store origin: SA* *Last updated: 2026-07-14*