The novel is about loneliness; but, of course we are all alone, even surrounded by people and Rhys knew that. However there is here also a sense of the injustice society does to women and Sasha’s experiences illustrate this. Its powerful stuff and I got a sense of the anger that one finds in later feminist writers like Marilyn French. Most of all though there is a “whiff of existentialism” about this novel. It reminded me of “Nausea” by Sartre and there is a strong sense of alienation running through it.

Well, that's O.K. chere madame, and very nicely done too. You've said nothing but you've said it all. I bought this novel not knowing what to expect from it, I saw it in a used bookshop and remembered I liked "Wide Sargasso Sea" by Jean Rhys a lot, so why not try. Was it fate? Told with a spare prose style, this reads as a work of psychological fiction, but redeems Jean Rhys' own consciousness throughout. In her life she found the simplest practicalities beyond her, and once said 'I have only ever written about myself'. It's difficult not to see Sasha as a mere self-portrait, but would be unfair to see Good Morning Midnight just as a disguised memoir, because it isn't. It's a small novel in its own brief and perfect right, depicting the emotional and sensitive nature of trying to find stability again. It could have been more depressing but the overall tone is just about right, giving a good balance of hopefulness and despair. I am talking away, quite calmly and sedately, when there it is again — tears in my eyes, tears rolling down my face. (Saved, rescued, but not quite so good as new...)” Reading it feels pretty claustrophobic. There’s no escape, because you cannot escape your own head where all hell breaks loose. You can only hide for some time in a hotel room.CRYING ....lots of crying - in public and or alone. The type of crying where one tries hard to suppress ... but those tears come anyway. I got to know Sasha in four acts. By the third act I began to listen seriously to what she was telling me. It was at this point that the fighting stopped. By the final act, I found myself reaching out desperately for her. Your hand, Sasha, give me your hand!! But when you have taken this much shrapnel in life, you tend to me mistrustful of even the hand that wishes to save you. Save you from life, from yourself.

I want one thing and one thing only- to be left alone. No more pawings, no more prying – leave me alone.. I put my book down to think about how life was for me when in my 20’s. They ‘were’ some of my hardest years .....I ran away for a couple of years ( Paris and London too)....’running’ is the word....There were days ... I ate large amounts of sugar - instead of real food - the way Sasha drank. An actress, Selma vaz Dias, a Rhys fan, had adapted GMM as a radio play, and needed Jean’s permission, but everyone was telling her Jean Rhys was dead. (Jean, drunk for years, totally out of touch with literary London, almost – but not quite – forgotten.) Jean saw the ad and replied. And then, on 16 November, ANOTHER drunken row with the neighbours. Do I truly understand Sesha. Her thoughts leading me astray as if in pursuit of a butterfly. Our languages different. Loneliness, teaches one of a new language. A language where words are not said and never received. And to express is to feel lonelier still.Please, please, monsieur et madame, mister, missis and miss, I am trying so hard to be like you. I know I don't succeed, but look how hard I try. Wisdom would probably consist in finding some middle path between these two poles of egotism, but if I had to choose, I guess I’d take Rhys’s route. I mean, I have no desire to end up a depressive alcoholic in a rented room—though that’s a definite possibility at this point—but that does seem a marginally better fate than becoming a priapic fifty-year-old pontificating about Nietzsche to his cronies. What to say about the protagonist? She has a name, seldom mentioned, since the narrative is in the first person - but I won't bother looking it up - let's just call her "Jean" - will that do? It is not just the loneliness, it’s the inability to pull oneself out of it, of making nothing out of her youth, of pouring out her existence into the vapidness of the Parisian cafes, seedy hotel rooms. Of being the failed participant of her own life. Her life which is splattered on those forgetful streets, and bars where everyone is cruel, everyone disapproves. She is the witness of her dissolution. And how hard she tries to sink in her invisibility, the muteness of her self. But think how hard I try and how seldom I dare. Think and have a bit of pity. That is if you ever think you apes which I doubt. Try to understand yourself. Look inward. Ask yourself many questions. Why do I get so angry at any criticism of my mother, yet I guiltlessly condemn her in public? Why am vying for the attention of this man I loathe? Why can't I kiss that girl who I admire so intensely? Why do my thoughts revolve around other people all the time? Why do I feel choked in my chest when I'm sad? Why am I eating this disgusting combination of nachos and jam?

Every word I say has chains round its ankles; every thought I think is weighted with heavy weights. Since I was born, hasn't every word I've said, every thought I've thought, everything I've done, been tied up, weighted, chained? And mind you, I know that with all this I don't succeed. Or I succeed in flashes only too damned well. ...But think how hard I try and how seldom I dare. Think - and have a bit of pity. That is, if you ever think, you apes, which I doubt.I’m not sure it’s for everyone (don’t recommend it if you’re very sensitive) or every mood, but it found me at the right moment. My absolute favourite line is What is ironic about the Paris trip, which is meant to help her, is that it is probably the worst place in the world for her to be. Because hiding is not possible there. A return, as I found myself, is not an escape. She is oppressed by her memories, is forced to relive these memories as she stumbles around Paris, from one familiar place to the next. Here, she did this, my God; and there, well, there is where such and such happened. Yet Sasha’s anxiety is more complex than embarrassment or shame at having shown herself up or been shown up in certain restaurants or cafes; it goes beyond having her nose rubbed in her past experiences. Sasha’s anxiety extends to pretty much every sphere of her existence. If she goes somewhere she is convinced that people are looking at her, and talking about her, and judging her. She thinks herself old, and not attractive. Conversation, all interaction, is excruciating, for her and for the reader. I have come across very few characters that are as relentlessly terrified and lonely and unhappy as this one. She’s not a hot mess. She’s just a mess, period. The only reason she is still alive, she says, is because she doesn’t have the guts to end it all.