A Regular Guy Audiobook By Mona Simpson cover art

A Regular Guy

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A Regular Guy

By: Mona Simpson
Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
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In this luminous and tartly comic new novel, Mona Simpson, modern master of the surreal family drama, trains her eye on a generation - and a man - torn between idealism and self-absorption.

Tom Owens is a brilliant barefoot entrepreneur who has become rich and famous by inventing a new kind of business - a man who is fond of showering his largesse on friends and perfect strangers even as he resists any deeper claims on his affection. Into Owens's charmed life comes a 10-year-old girl whose claims he cannot ignore: Jane is his daughter, born out of wedlock, raised in communes, and now dispatched into his care by a mother who is no longer capable of providing it. As this raggedy, preternaturally observant girl seeks a place within Owens's circle, A Regular Guy depicts the miraculous chemistry that transforms longing into belonging, an uneasy menage into a family, and an arrogant boy-man into a father.

"Simpson understands families. She understands money. She understands America. This is a poignant, funny book about loss and disillusionment." (Chicago Tribune)

©2011 Mona Simpson (P)2012 Brilliance Audio, Inc. Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction
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I have read a lot about Steve Jobs and his family and have read Lisa’s book. Mona’s book seems to be to be theft of Lisa and Steve’s stories that she was told as a confidant and aunt and certainly not for her to gather as string for a novel. I think it was irreverent of her to have done this to Lisa.

Theft by any other name

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What would have made A Regular Guy better?

The author having a vocabulary of more then 1000 words and finding some alternatives to "He said," and "she said".

Has A Regular Guy turned you off from other books in this genre?

no, just from this author.

How could the performance have been better?

If the narrator had developed any of the characters in such a way that one did not despise them all equally.

You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?

Possibly some insight into the author's brother, but one understands why he wished to limit contact with his sister.

Any additional comments?

Not a book worth reading.

To be missed!

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