Bastard Out of Carolina by Dorothy Allison
Published 1992 · 327 pages · 88,000 words · about 7 hours at an average pace · Literary Fiction
How hard is Bastard Out of Carolina to read?
Bastard Out of Carolina scores 42 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it moderately challenging. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 35 out of 100
- Southern American vernacular.
- Sentence structure: 38 out of 100
- Clear sentences with oral rhythms.
- Abstraction: 40 out of 100
- Class, abuse, and survival through experience.
- Information density: 45 out of 100
- Dense with Southern poverty detail.
- Narrative indirection: 45 out of 100
- Bone's perspective limits understanding.
- Symbolic density: 50 out of 100
- The stamp, the body, family carry weight.
- Ironic distance: 35 out of 100
- Allison writes with evident compassion.
- Resolution withholding: 50 out of 100
- Survival but not healing.
- Structural complexity: 35 out of 100
- First-person coming-of-age.
How Bastard Out of Carolina is regarded
Bastard Out of Carolina holds a literary regard score of 57 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.