Millennial Sensation

AT 28, IRISH author Sally Rooney has been hailed at the voice of her generation. But you may initially struggle to see that from the flat titles and first few pages of her two novels. Conversation With Friends, her debut novel from 2017, begins with the following nondescript line: ''Bobbi and I first met Melissa at a poetry night in town, where we were performing together.'' Her second novel Normal People, published last year, begins even more simply: ''Marianne answers the door when Cornell rings the bell.''

But once you've passed the first few pages, you find yourself moving easily to the second, third and fourth chapters. Before you know it, you've come to know her characters extremely well and you wonder what they'll do next.

By the time you've polished off both novels, you're hungry for her next work - only to be crushed reading an interview published in the Irish Independent where Rooney says almost dismissively: ''I have no idea if I'll write another book... Maybe I am one of those people who writes two novels in their 20s then never writes anything else again.''