As Close to Us as Breathing
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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Janet Metzger
About this listen
A multigenerational family saga about the long-lasting reverberations of one tragic summer by "a wonderful talent [who] should be read widely" (Edward P. Jones).
In 1948, a small stretch of the Woodmont, Connecticut, shoreline, affectionately named Bagel Beach, has long been a summer destination for Jewish families. Here sisters Ada, Vivie, and Bec assemble at their beloved family cottage, with children in tow and weekend-only husbands who arrive each Friday in time for the Sabbath meal.
During the weekdays, freedom reigns. Ada, the family beauty, relaxes and grows more playful, unimpeded by her rule-driven, religious husband. Vivie, once terribly wronged by her sister, is now the family diplomat and an increasingly inventive chef. Unmarried Bec finds herself forced to choose between the family-centric life she's always known and a passion-filled life with the married man with whom she's had a secret years-long affair.
But when a terrible accident occurs on the sisters' watch, a summer of hope and self-discovery transforms into a lifetime of atonement and loss for members of this close-knit clan. Seen through the eyes of Molly, who was 12 years old when she witnessed the accident, this is the story of a tragedy and its aftermath, of expanding lives painfully collapsed. Can Molly, decades after the event, draw from her aunt Bec's hard-won wisdom and free herself from the burden that destroyed so many others?
Elizabeth Poliner is a masterful storyteller, a brilliant observer of human nature, and in As Close to Us as Breathing she has created an unforgettable meditation on grief, guilt, and the boundaries of identity and love.
©2016 Elizabeth Poliner (P)2016 Hachette AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Not Good, Clean Fun
- By Cheryl on 12-20-12
By: Rochelle Alers
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Driftwood Summer
- By: Patti Callahan Henry
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 9 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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In the small seaside town of Palmetto Beach, the Sheffield sisters – responsibly Riley, vivacious Maisy, and fun-loving Adalee – reunite to celebrate their mother’s birthday and try to save the family bookstore, which has long been a beloved gathering place in their tight-knit community. But June also marks the return of Mack Logan, who 13 years ago was Riley’s best friend and Maisy’s teenage crush.
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Enjoyable
- By L.W. on 10-09-11
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The Island House
- A Novel
- By: Nancy Thayer
- Narrated by: Emily Sutton-Smith
- Length: 10 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Every summer since college, twenty-nine-year-old Jenny has traded the familiarity of the Midwest for the allure of Nantucket. Now an established university professor in Kansas City, she finds herself caught between two lifestyles and two very different men. She chooses Nantucket and the glamorous life she associates with it, unaware that the summer will take an unexpected turn, and she will have to let her heart decide what it truly wants.
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I love Nancy Thayer's style of writing
- By L.W. on 07-31-16
By: Nancy Thayer
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Grand Central
- Original Stories of Postwar Love and Reunion
- By: Melanie Benjamin, Amanda Hodgkinson, Pam Jenoff, and others
- Narrated by: Carla Mercer-Meyer
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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On any particular day, thousands upon thousands of people pass through New York City's Grand Central Terminal, through the whispering gallery, beneath the ceiling of stars, and past the information booth and its beckoning four-faced clock, to whatever destination is calling them. It is a place where people come to say hello and good-bye. And each person has a story to tell.
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Grand Central: Memories
- By ZacharyKindle Customer on 05-03-17
By: Melanie Benjamin, and others
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Love Walked In
- By: Marisa de los Santos
- Narrated by: Jennifer Ikeda
- Length: 11 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Award-winning poet Marisa de los Santos crafts an irresistibly touching debut novel. Love Walked In is a contemporary tale, steeped in nostalgic, cinematic charm, of love in all its forms. Unapologetically idealistic about love, Cornelia Brown appears to catch the break of a lifetime when the dashing Martin Grace, her own personal Cary Grant, comes strolling into her life. But it is Martin's connection to 11-year-old Clare Hobbes that touches Cornelia's heart in ways she never imagined.
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Dreadful audio quality
- By Marenghi on 09-16-11
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Spinning Forward
- By: Terri DuLong
- Narrated by: Kate Udall
- Length: 9 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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Syd never considered the possibility of turning her passion for spinning and knitting into something more than a hobby, but when the unique composition of her wool draws attention, a door is opened - the first among many. Yet even as she ventures out of her comfort zone, Syd finds herself stepping into the embrace of a community rich with love, laughter, friendship...and secrets. And as long-hidden truths are revealed, Syd faces a choice: spin a safety net - or spin decidedly forward and never look back...
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Cliche with little character development
- By Laurie A. Johnson on 01-20-15
By: Terri DuLong
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A Killer Plot
- Books by the Bay Mystery Series #1
- By: Ellery Adams
- Narrated by: Karen White
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
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Olivia Limoges is the subject of constant gossip. Ever since her mysterious return to the small coastal town of Oyster Bay, North Carolina, Olivia has kept to herself, her dog, and her unfinished novel. With a little cajoling from charming writer Camden Ford, she agrees to join the Bayside Book Writers to break her writer's block and even make a few friends. But when townspeople start turning up dead with haiku poems left by the bodies, anyone with a flair for language is suddenly suspect.
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My new favorite Cozy Mystery Series!
- By Christina on 09-21-15
By: Ellery Adams
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The Improper Life of Bezellia Grove
- A Novel
- By: Susan Gregg Gilmore
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert
- Length: 7 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Bezellia Grove was born into the most prominent of Nashville families, but that didn’t stop her from having an alcoholic mother and a distant, adulterous father. Her nanny, Maizelle, and Nathaniel, the handyman, are the people who have taken care of her since she can remember. She considers them family, but her parents just consider them servants because they are Black. When Bezellia has a clandestine romance with Nathaniel's son, Whites and Blacks unite in fury at the young couple.
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light southern fiction
- By suzanne on 02-08-13
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Bettyville
- By: George Hodgman
- Narrated by: Jeff Woodman
- Length: 10 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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When George Hodgman leaves Manhattan for his hometown of Paris, Missouri, he finds himself - an unlikely caretaker and near-lethal cook - in a head-on collision with his aging mother, Betty, a woman of wit and will. Will George lure her into assisted living? When hell freezes over. He can't bring himself to force her from the home both treasure - the place where his father's voice lingers, the scene of shared jokes, skirmishes, and, behind the dusty antiques, a rarely acknowledged conflict...
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Title Should Be Georgeville-It's All About George
- By Sara on 10-08-15
By: George Hodgman
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After the Parade
- By: Lori Ostlund
- Narrated by: Sean Runnette
- Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Sensitive, big-hearted, and achingly self-conscious, 40-year-old Aaron Englund long ago escaped the confines of his Midwestern hometown, but he still feels like an outcast. After 20 years under the Pygmalion-like direction of his older partner, Walter, Aaron at last decides it is time to stop letting life happen to him and to take control of his own fate.
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Narrator
- By Barbara on 11-10-24
By: Lori Ostlund
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Inheriting Edith
- A Novel
- By: Zoe Fishman
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 8 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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For years Maggie Sheets has been an invisible hand in the glittering homes of wealthy New York City clients, scrubbing, dusting, mopping, and doing all she can to keep her head above water as a single mother. Everything changes when a former employer dies, leaving Maggie a staggering inheritance - a house in Sag Harbor. The catch? It comes with an inhabitant: the deceased's 82-year old mother, Edith.
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Narrator is distracting.
- By Onelove on 05-13-20
By: Zoe Fishman
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The Star Side of Bird Hill
- By: Naomi Jackson
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 7 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Two sisters, ages 10 and 16, are exiled from Brooklyn to Bird Hill in Barbados, after their mother can no longer care for them. The young Phaedra and her older sister, Dionne, live, for the summer of 1989, with their grandmother, Hyacinth, a midwife and practitioner of the local spiritual practice of obeah. Dionne spends the summer in search of love, testing her grandmother's limits, and wanting to go home. Phaedra explores Bird Hill, where her family has lived for generations.
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My absolute favorite book of all time
- By Eme on 07-16-15
By: Naomi Jackson
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Texas Rich
- By: Fern Michaels
- Narrated by: Erin Yuen
- Length: 25 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Young Billie Ames naively fell for the exciting pilot Moss Coleman at the Philadelphia Navy Yard during World War II. Within a few months, she was pregnant, married, and traveling across the country to Austin...to the 250,000-acre spread known as Sunbridge and into the tantalizing world of the Texas rich. In a vast land dominated by the industrious Colemans, Billie fights to maintain control of her life and her marriage.
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Awful Southern Accent
- By Tina Peters on 03-24-16
By: Fern Michaels
What listeners say about As Close to Us as Breathing
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Amazon Customer
- 07-31-16
Thought Provoking
Vivid imagery, beautifully descriptive, raw emotions, it is all there. Wondeful, true to life story.
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2 people found this helpful
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- RueRue
- 05-02-16
A Family Tragedy
Good narration. This is a character driven story of how a family tragedy has far-extending ramifications. Very much a story of character and family.
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5 people found this helpful
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- WAYNE
- 05-27-16
Too much sorrow
While an interesting look at post war Jewish life, there was just nothing to take away from the book but sadness. It may have well been an American holocaust story. Not one character really experiences happiness in their lives.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Sara
- 03-18-17
Multigenerational Family Saga
I just finished listening to Linda Lavin reading a Selected Shorts short story and she was excellent. When I started this book I was let down by the huge difference in Metzger's reading when I compared it to the other narration done by Lavin. Through the first half of the listen I couldn't stop wishing that they had chosen a different narrator. In the end I thought that Metzger did an acceptable job--not great--just ok. I think the book would have been so much brighter and dynamic with a more animated reader.
I enjoyed this story of a large multigenerational family who worked together at the family department store and summered together at their cottage on Bagel Beach. The writing showed slices of life through different character perspectives using the voice of one daughter--Molly. Poliner really captured each character and their inner experience subtly. I just loved the detail of life in the 1930s, 40s and 50s.
To me this was a poignant and artfully written look at life from a different time now long gone. Definitely sad in parts but the complexity and fleeting nature of life were beautifully captured.
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20 people found this helpful
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- Jane/Neal
- 12-31-16
A Bit Tedious
Editing this book down to maybe 2/3's its size would have made it more absorbing listening.
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- Elizabeth
- 02-12-23
Slow and Sad
You know right from the beginning that this book explores the aftermath of Davy's death at age 12. It reverberates throughout the family, impacting each of them as they share the blame and guilt. It's a brave way to start a book, but it also made for a slow read. The timeline switches back and forth and the individual family members are plagued by other tragedies -- lost loves, broken love, estrangement, the trials of marrying or loving someone outside your faith. All good topics but I wish there had been a bit of joy in the lives of these fictional characters. I gave up before the end.
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- Susan Kay
- 05-28-16
Stick with it
I almost quit reading the book with all of the detail about the Jewish ritual details, especially with Mort, but I'm so glad I didn't. A wonderful story about family, commitment, choices and love....
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5 people found this helpful
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- JEWELS
- 10-11-21
Good Story
good story, just all over the place past and present within the story. I struggled to finish.
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- NMwritergal
- 05-02-16
It was just ok for a couple hrs, then it was great
This was an unique listening experience. I was interested from the start, but it wasn't until I got to the first bit about the ice cream man that I realized that while I was interested and wanted to keep listening, I didn't really CARE about any of the characters. So I asked myself why.
It was the structure. The story is told through a 12-yr-old's eyes (Molly) so she'll be telling the story and then she'd say, "My mother this, my father that," and later started calling her parents by their first names, which somewhat yanked me out of the story. I'd begin thinking of it as a straight 3rd person POV and then realize (again and again) that it was the daughter telling the story. When the ice cream man showed up, it was just a 3rd person POV. So I had to get over the slightly odd way the story was told. Fortunately, that sort of faded out as the story went on, alternating between past, present, and the future.
After it turned into a more traditional 3rd person POV, all of the stories were so good, so interesting, although we get much less of Molly's story than some of the other characters. A little odd since she is the narrator. While I was invested in all the characters and all the stories, Bec's story was the most intriguing.
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9 people found this helpful
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- K
- 03-10-17
Slow and rambling
The story focused on mundane things like stitching dresses in detail while doing vague broad strokes over the larger events. Heavy detail about the look of a dress and mentioning offhand a realization that you've fallen in love with someone you shouldn't have for example. This book truly tested my rule of never to not finish a book.
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