Madeleine Is Sleeping

Her writing is so beautiful that I find myself constantly thinking about this book, even though I finished it days ago. It is written in a style very similar to that of poetry, and thus it's happenings are subject to a lot of personal interpretation. I find myself yearning to find other people who have read the book so I can hear their take on it. This is not a book that spells everything out for you in characters and plot. Rather it infers it. But that is part of it's beauty and mystery. Also, the writing is very sophisticated, so not everyone will appreciate it. I loved this book, and am actually looking forward to reading a second time so that I may get a fresh take on it.

The novel offers a ripe setting infused with poetic language and seamless sequences of the surreal. Bynum succesfully creates a luscious scene for each part of Madeleine's dream. This novel captures the delicious wonderment of adolescence in all its curious mischeviousness and the strangeness that accompanies it. Bynum fuses poetry and prose to create a beautiful piece. The running theme of music (the opera, le petomane's gift, the violin) the circus, unrequited love, and the gross but sensually delightful images of Mme. Colchon, the sexual mishappening with the town dullard, and the details of Madeleine's enchanted sleep are each uniquely arresting. The form is much like Evan Connell's Mrs. Bridge-- the language mellifluous and never cumbersome. It is no surprise that this book was a national fiction finalist. And as an endnote, I am currently a student of Bynum and have to unashamedly announce my enthusiasm for her love of writing, literature, and teaching. The experience has been challenging and wonderfully enriching.

This book is irresistable. The prose poem-like chapters thread through a carnival of characters and settings, leading you from one strange and beautiful world to another. The language is stunning; the story is part fairy tale, part historical fiction, part surreal tableau. As a book seller, I see hundreds of new novels every year, many of which are well-written, innovative, and lovely, but this is one of those rare gems--a story so perfect in its peculiarity, so delightful in its turns--that you feel you have been given a gift of something you didn't even know you wanted until it was there in your hands.

This book slips off its clothes at a very seductive, rhythmic pace. I was engaged in its turns of phrase and of plot. Very like a dream, and in an innocent, artful way that actually pulls you in deeper and deeper. I read it too fast, though--- it is a page turner as well. I highly recommend this book.

Sighing, rustling, the sounds of sleep; a torrent of sensations surround the reader from the start in this stunning fiction, a remarkable debut, assaulting with images of Reubanesque shapes, the sweet, slightly rancid taste of butter, "dirty children with fat melting in their fists." It is poetry, barely disguised, metaphor unbridled. It is impossible to describe such a novel, draped with concupiscent women and gaunt saints, unabashedly erotic, cautionary and fearless, a celebration of inventiveness. All is larger than life, most especially flesh-draped bodies, but also the tragi-comedic range of emotions, of extremes. Myriad images and sensory impressions thread one to another, weaving fragments of thought into whole cloth. Imagination, morality, Eros and ambiguity lie side by side, contentedly coexisting. The uniquely talented Sarah Shun-Lien Bynam has given an hour or two the transcendence of immortality. Madeline Is Sleeping is a highly personal journey, one that can only be appreciated through the experience. If my words do not make sense, it is because they are mine; like a dream, each person must recognize his own reflection. Luan Gaines/2004.