Laura
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Barbarian Days
- A Surfing Life
- By: William Finnegan
- Narrated by: William Finnegan
- Length: 18 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Pulitzer Prize, Biography, 2016. Barbarian Days is William Finnegan's memoir of an obsession, a complex enchantment. Surfing only looks like a sport. To initiates it is something else entirely: a beautiful addiction, a demanding course of study, a morally dangerous pastime, a way of life.
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What a Jerk.
- By ML Sadler on 03-06-17
- Barbarian Days
- A Surfing Life
- By: William Finnegan
- Narrated by: William Finnegan
Compelling
Reviewed: 10-25-15
If you could sum up Barbarian Days in three words, what would they be?
Ocean, Life, Love
What was one of the most memorable moments of Barbarian Days?
Finnegan's deep understanding of and love for the physics and beauty of ocean waves are compelling, even for a non-surfer. His descriptions of the waves he's surfed made me want to know and love the waves the same way he did, even though I will probably never touch a surfboard.
Which scene was your favorite?
I especially appreciated his recounting of the years he spent as an ex-patriot surfer.
Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
Even though this was a long book, I didn't want to end. I didn't want his voice and the authentic experiences that he shared with me, the listener, to ever end.
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5 people found this helpful
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Lord of Misrule
- By: Jaimy Gordon
- Narrated by: Myra Lucretia Taylor
- Length: 10 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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At the rock-bottom end of the sport of kings sits the ruthless and often violent world of cheap horse racing, where trainers and jockeys, grooms and hotwalkers, loan sharks and touts are all struggling to take an edge, or prove their luck, or just survive. Equal parts Nathanael West, Damon Runyon and Eudora Welty, Lord of Misrule follows five characters -- scarred and lonely dreamers in the American grain -- through a year and four races at Indian Mound Downs, downriver from Wheeling, West Virginia.
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Worthy of the National Book Award
- By fmg on 03-06-11
- Lord of Misrule
- By: Jaimy Gordon
- Narrated by: Myra Lucretia Taylor
Over-wrought
Reviewed: 08-21-15
What would have made Lord of Misrule better?
Muddy descriptions and language need a good, hard edit. So much going on, nothing stands out as authentic or interesting. The language is just plain hard to follow at times. And what, exactly, is Gordon trying to do with those occasional shifts to second-person perspective? A total fail.
Has Lord of Misrule turned you off from other books in this genre?
Books on horse racing? Not necessarily. But I won't be reading any more of this author.
Would you be willing to try another one of Myra Lucretia Taylor’s performances?
Yes. The reader is not the problem. It's the condescending dialect that Gordon saddles some of her characters with that gets under the skin.
If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Lord of Misrule?
Over-wrought sex scenes and scenes with second-person narration.
Any additional comments?
I can usually find something good in just about any book. But this one irritates me.
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