Oh My God, What a Complete Aisling!: Just a Small-Town Girl Living in a Notions World

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There was space there for me to do that. So we did that twice, we delayed a book. And everyone around me was so brilliant. Emer McLysaght and Sarah Breen, authors of Oh My God, What A Complete Aisling and The Importance of Being Aisling

The final Aisling book, Aisling Ever After, is an homage to all she’s been through. It details not only how far Aisling has come but, in a way, how far we’ve all come.' But Aisling, never one to worry about having too much on her plate, rolls up her sleeves: she's got this. Authors Emer McLysaght and Sarah Breen created 'Aisling' when they were living in a flat share in Stoneybatter 10 years ago, and said the character was inspired by a 'very particular type' of Irish girl.I think we have a little bit of Aisling in all of us so it's really easy to identify with her. I found myself getting quite emotional in some of the lifelike, sobering scenes but it wasn't long before I found myself laughing again. Emer McLysaght and Sarah Breen need to bottle Aisling and prescribe her in place of anti-depressants; I can't imagine anyone reading it without a smile on their face. Aisling goes out every Saturday night with her best friend Majella, who is a bit of a hames (she’s lost two phones already this year – Aisling has never lost a phone). Oh My God, What a Complete Aisling was released last year and has already found a place in common parlance and Irish culture. Even if they don't know the Aisling of the novel, they certainly know an Aisling. We all do in Ireland. If you don't know an Aisling, it is because you are an Aisling. She's from outside Dublin and goes "down home" at weekends, is going steady with a long-term boyfriend from her hometown and walks to work in trainers (to get her steps in) while carrying her court shoes in a Brown Thomas bag.

So who is Aisling? In short, she’s the Irish everywoman who over the past six years and five books has become a runaway publishing success story. Co-author Sarah Breen summed her up best for this newspaper in 2017. “Aisling’s the country girl who works up in Dublin but has precisely zero time for your city notions, thank you very much. She loves working in the Big Smoke – very sophisticated altogether – but she loves going Down Home every weekend even more ... Aisling loves a good wake; Aisling has never hidden from the television licence inspector; Aisling knows the Weight Watchers points in everything.” This fifth and final book focuses on what is really important to Aisling: home, family and friends. Is the place we grew up our true home, or is home wherever the person we love is? So weit, so gut. Für mich klang das nach einer starken Protagonistin, einem großen Abenteuer und einem Befreiungsschlag, um Träume zu verwirklichen. Nun ja, in dieser Hinsicht wurde ich leider enttäuscht. Aisling verhält sich so, dass sie dem Titel "OMG, diese Aisling!" mehr als gerecht wird. Denn wie oft habe ich über sie den Kopf geschüttelt, mir an den Kopf gefasst und gegen die Stirn geschlagen?Some of the scenes are written with great tenderness and depth, while others are played for straight comedy Newly single and relocated to the big city, life is about to change utterly for this wonderful, strong, surprising and funny girl, who just happens to be a complete Aisling. That rare, precious thing: a fictional character you care about like a friend. It's a joy to spend time with Aisling again' LISA McGEE, creator of DERRY GIRLS Meanwhile, in Ballygobbard, it’s all go. Baby showers are the new hen parties, Mammy and Dr Trevor are more serious than Aisling thought, and the prospect of two evil stepsisters has her doubting her place in the family. Pulled between head, heart and home, Aisling strives to finally create her own happy ever after.” Aisling is the meeting point between old Ireland and the newer, more cosmopolitan version in which Irish twenty- and thirtysomethings are trying to figure out their role, taking with them the best of old Ireland and embracing the opportunities and challenges that come with adulthood in a country that has experienced rapid change in recent decades. Normalising neurosis

Here she is … Aisling Ever After, the fifth and final book in the series, is out on August 31st,” Sarah enthused. Emer McLysaght (left), and Sarah Breen during the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2019 (Image: DPA/PA Images) I feel a little sting of jealousy watching everyone crowd around Denise. John and I have actually been going out eight months longer than she and Liam, and they got engaged two years ago. Meanwhile, we’re not even living together.Oh My God, I am such a complete Aisling!!! From her fallen arches to her love of carbs and knowledge of points in every morsel, I connected with Aisling in a way that I have never really connected with other characters before. Maybe it is because I am Irish and therefore could relate to so much of Aisling's life and see similarities EVERYWHERE 😂 but mainly I think it was because Aisling is a little bit of everyone we know as well as a little bit of ourselves and to be honest I wouldn't want it any other way. Nach diesem ganzen Geschimpfe über das Buch muss ich aber auch sagen, dass es schnell und gut zu lesen war. Die Autorinnen haben einen tollen Schreibstil und an Einfallsreichtum was peinliche Situationen angeht sind sie kaum zu überbieten. Ich denke die Geschichte kann schon unterhaltsam sein, wenn man über die großen Schwächen hinweg sieht. Das Ende fand ich ganz gut aber das konnte eben das gesamte Buch für mich überhaupt nicht retten. Motherhood rears its head, too, as Aisling and her friends each try to figure out how they might engage with the narrow template of job-marriage-children that women in their 30s are often faced with. Mercifully, the Aisling series gives us many nonjudgmental and alternative options. The message remains an empowering one: be yourself, find your joy, and the other stuff will find you. When a week in Tenerife with John doesn’t end with the expected engagement, Aisling calls a halt to things, and soon she has surprised herself and everyone else by agreeing to move into a three-bed in Portobello with stylish Sadhbh from HR and her friend, the mysterious Elaine. Newly single and relocated to the big city, life is about to change utterly for this wonderful, strong, surprising and funny girl, who just happens to be a complete Aisling. I'm not Irish, never even been to Ireland so my entire experience of Irish families is based on reading Marian Keyes. This reminded me of her stories, with the family and the humour particularly, but the bite of bittersweet also reminded me of her books.