“Fans of Rooney’s previous work will relish the ache and uncertainty of her characters’ coming of age, her way with emotional difficulty and her brilliance in showing the barriers we put between ourselves and the love of others. The last third of Beautiful World, Where Are You, when the four characters meet and connect, is a tour de force. The dialogue never falters, and the prose burns up the page. It takes some time to get these people in the same room, however, and that movement towards intimacy is purposely delayed by Rooney’s descriptive prose, which heats up slowly.” —Anne Enright, The Guardian

“Extremely well-written longing. Three novels in, and it’s still what Rooney does best: ensnare us over and over in the jet-fueled heat between good-looking (and supernaturally articulate) Irish youths . . . Each sentence builds like a brushstroke: on its own, any particular line can seem pedestrian. Assembled together, we get whole scenes of otherwise banal parties and bus rides, glances cast and bodies rearranged, all rendered to a storybook-like effect.” —Delia Cai, Vanity Fair

"[Rooney’s] writing about sex is taut and direct. It’s a narrative style I associate with the films of Andrew Haigh and Joanna Hogg, two great visual poets of social anxiety and reticence. Rooney’s dialogue is frequently perfect . . . Beautiful World, Where Are You is Rooney’s best novel yet. Funny and smart, full of sex and love and people doing their best to connect.” —Brandon Taylor, The New York Times Book Review