Morningside Heights
A Novel
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $15.75
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Kathe Mazur
-
Shane Baker
-
By:
-
Joshua Henkin
About this listen
A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Book • When Ohio-born Pru Steiner arrives in New York in 1976, she follows in a long tradition of young people determined to take the city by storm. But when she falls in love with and marries Spence Robin, her hotshot young Shakespeare professor, her life takes a turn she couldn’t have anticipated.
Thirty years later, something is wrong with Spence. The Great Man can’t concentrate; he falls asleep reading The New York Review of Books. With their daughter, Sarah, away at medical school, Pru must struggle on her own to care for him. One day, feeling especially isolated, Pru meets a man, and the possibility of new romance blooms. Meanwhile, Spence’s estranged son from his first marriage has come back into their lives. Arlo, a wealthy entrepreneur who invests in biotech, may be his father’s last, best hope.
Morningside Heights is a sweeping and compassionate novel about a marriage surviving hardship. It’s about the love between women and men, and children and parents; about the things we give up in the face of adversity; and about how to survive when life turns out differently from what we thought we signed up for.
©2020 Joshua Henkin (P)2020 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Latecomer
- A Novel
- By: Jean Hanff Korelitz
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 16 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Latecomer follows the story of the wealthy, New York City-based Oppenheimer family, from the first meeting of parents Salo and Johanna, under tragic circumstances, to their triplets born during the early days of IVF. As children, the three siblings—Harrison, Lewyn, and Sally—feel no strong familial bond and cannot wait to go their separate ways, even as their father becomes more distanced and their mother more desperate. When the triplets leave for college, Johanna, faced with being truly alone, makes the decision to have a fourth child.
-
-
Conservatives and religious are the villains
- By Ashley on 09-01-22
-
The Covenant of Water
- By: Abraham Verghese
- Narrated by: Abraham Verghese
- Length: 31 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Spanning the years 1900 to 1977, The Covenant of Water is set in Kerala, on South India’s Malabar Coast, and follows three generations of a family that suffers a peculiar affliction: in every generation, at least one person dies by drowning—and in Kerala, water is everywhere. At the turn of the century, a twelve-year-old girl from Kerala’s long-existing Christian community, grieving the death of her father, is sent by boat to her wedding, where she will meet her forty-year-old husband for the first time.
-
-
Story Telling At Its Best
- By Regina on 05-06-23
By: Abraham Verghese
-
A Calling for Charlie Barnes
- By: Joshua Ferris
- Narrated by: Nick Offerman
- Length: 11 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Someone is telling the story of the life of Charlie Barnes, and it doesn't appear to be going well. Too often divorced, discontent with life's compromises, and in a house he hates, this lifelong schemer and eternal romantic would like out of his present circumstances and into the American dream. But when the twin calamities of the Great Recession and a cancer scare come along to compound his troubles, his dreams dwindle further, and an infinite past full of forking paths quickly tapers to a black dot.
-
-
the best book I've read this year
- By Brent & Marie on 10-07-21
By: Joshua Ferris
-
The Reading List
- A Novel
- By: Sara Nisha Adams
- Narrated by: Tara Divina, Sagar Arya, Paul Panting
- Length: 12 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Widower Mukesh lives a quiet life in the London Borough of Ealing after losing his beloved wife. He shops every Wednesday, goes to Temple, and worries about his granddaughter, Priya, who hides in her room reading. Aleisha is a bright but anxious teenager working at the local library when she discovers a crumpled-up piece of paper. It's a list of novels that she's never heard of before. When Mukesh arrives at the library, desperate to forge a connection with his bookworm granddaughter, Aleisha passes along the reading list…hoping that it will be a lifeline for him too.
-
-
Fabulous narrators!
- By Barbara S on 10-29-21
By: Sara Nisha Adams
-
Nobody's Fool
- By: Richard Russo
- Narrated by: Ron McLarty
- Length: 24 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Divorced from his own wife and carrying on halfheartedly with another man's, saddled with a bum knee and friends who make enemies redundant, Sully now has one new problem to cope with: a long-estranged son who is in imminent danger of following in his father's footsteps. With its uproarious humor and a heart that embraces humanity's follies as well as its triumphs, Nobody's Fool, from Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Richard Russo, is storytelling at its most generous. Nobody’s Fool was made into a movie starring Paul Newman, Bruce Willis, Jessica Tandy, and Melody Griffith.
-
-
Wonderful Book Fabulous Narrator
- By Marsha on 04-27-05
By: Richard Russo
-
Hello Beautiful
- A Novel
- By: Ann Napolitano
- Narrated by: Maura Tierney
- Length: 15 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
William Waters grew up in a house silenced by tragedy, where his parents could hardly bear to look at him, much less love him—so when he meets the spirited and ambitious Julia Padavano in his freshman year of college, it’s as if the world has lit up around him. With Julia comes her family, as she and her three sisters are inseparable: Sylvie, the family’s dreamer, is happiest with her nose in a book; Cecelia is a free-spirited artist; and Emeline patiently takes care of them all.
-
-
Book was great, performance terrible
- By Amazon Customer on 03-17-23
By: Ann Napolitano
-
The Latecomer
- A Novel
- By: Jean Hanff Korelitz
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 16 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Latecomer follows the story of the wealthy, New York City-based Oppenheimer family, from the first meeting of parents Salo and Johanna, under tragic circumstances, to their triplets born during the early days of IVF. As children, the three siblings—Harrison, Lewyn, and Sally—feel no strong familial bond and cannot wait to go their separate ways, even as their father becomes more distanced and their mother more desperate. When the triplets leave for college, Johanna, faced with being truly alone, makes the decision to have a fourth child.
-
-
Conservatives and religious are the villains
- By Ashley on 09-01-22
-
The Covenant of Water
- By: Abraham Verghese
- Narrated by: Abraham Verghese
- Length: 31 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Spanning the years 1900 to 1977, The Covenant of Water is set in Kerala, on South India’s Malabar Coast, and follows three generations of a family that suffers a peculiar affliction: in every generation, at least one person dies by drowning—and in Kerala, water is everywhere. At the turn of the century, a twelve-year-old girl from Kerala’s long-existing Christian community, grieving the death of her father, is sent by boat to her wedding, where she will meet her forty-year-old husband for the first time.
-
-
Story Telling At Its Best
- By Regina on 05-06-23
By: Abraham Verghese
-
A Calling for Charlie Barnes
- By: Joshua Ferris
- Narrated by: Nick Offerman
- Length: 11 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Someone is telling the story of the life of Charlie Barnes, and it doesn't appear to be going well. Too often divorced, discontent with life's compromises, and in a house he hates, this lifelong schemer and eternal romantic would like out of his present circumstances and into the American dream. But when the twin calamities of the Great Recession and a cancer scare come along to compound his troubles, his dreams dwindle further, and an infinite past full of forking paths quickly tapers to a black dot.
-
-
the best book I've read this year
- By Brent & Marie on 10-07-21
By: Joshua Ferris
-
The Reading List
- A Novel
- By: Sara Nisha Adams
- Narrated by: Tara Divina, Sagar Arya, Paul Panting
- Length: 12 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Widower Mukesh lives a quiet life in the London Borough of Ealing after losing his beloved wife. He shops every Wednesday, goes to Temple, and worries about his granddaughter, Priya, who hides in her room reading. Aleisha is a bright but anxious teenager working at the local library when she discovers a crumpled-up piece of paper. It's a list of novels that she's never heard of before. When Mukesh arrives at the library, desperate to forge a connection with his bookworm granddaughter, Aleisha passes along the reading list…hoping that it will be a lifeline for him too.
-
-
Fabulous narrators!
- By Barbara S on 10-29-21
By: Sara Nisha Adams
-
Nobody's Fool
- By: Richard Russo
- Narrated by: Ron McLarty
- Length: 24 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Divorced from his own wife and carrying on halfheartedly with another man's, saddled with a bum knee and friends who make enemies redundant, Sully now has one new problem to cope with: a long-estranged son who is in imminent danger of following in his father's footsteps. With its uproarious humor and a heart that embraces humanity's follies as well as its triumphs, Nobody's Fool, from Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Richard Russo, is storytelling at its most generous. Nobody’s Fool was made into a movie starring Paul Newman, Bruce Willis, Jessica Tandy, and Melody Griffith.
-
-
Wonderful Book Fabulous Narrator
- By Marsha on 04-27-05
By: Richard Russo
-
Hello Beautiful
- A Novel
- By: Ann Napolitano
- Narrated by: Maura Tierney
- Length: 15 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
William Waters grew up in a house silenced by tragedy, where his parents could hardly bear to look at him, much less love him—so when he meets the spirited and ambitious Julia Padavano in his freshman year of college, it’s as if the world has lit up around him. With Julia comes her family, as she and her three sisters are inseparable: Sylvie, the family’s dreamer, is happiest with her nose in a book; Cecelia is a free-spirited artist; and Emeline patiently takes care of them all.
-
-
Book was great, performance terrible
- By Amazon Customer on 03-17-23
By: Ann Napolitano
-
Horse
- A Novel
- By: Geraldine Brooks
- Narrated by: James Fouhey, Lisa Flanagan, Graham Halstead, and others
- Length: 14 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Kentucky, 1850. An enslaved groom named Jarret and a bay foal forge a bond of understanding that will carry the horse to record-setting victories across the South. When the nation erupts in civil war, an itinerant young artist who has made his name on paintings of the racehorse takes up arms for the Union. On a perilous night, he reunites with the stallion and his groom, very far from the glamor of any racetrack.
-
-
Love Geraldine Brooks
- By Regina on 06-25-22
By: Geraldine Brooks
-
Lucy by the Sea
- A Novel
- By: Elizabeth Strout
- Narrated by: Kimberly Farr
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As a panicked world goes into lockdown, Lucy Barton is uprooted from her life in Manhattan and bundled away to a small town in Maine by her ex-husband and on-again, off-again friend, William. For the next several months, it’s just Lucy, William, and their complex past together in a little house nestled against the moody, swirling sea. Rich with empathy and emotion, Lucy by the Sea vividly captures the fear and struggles that come with isolation, as well as the hope, peace, and possibilities that those long, quiet days can inspire.
-
-
Narrator
- By J. O'Connor on 09-22-22
By: Elizabeth Strout
-
Trespasses
- A Novel
- By: Louise Kennedy
- Narrated by: Brid Brennan
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Amid daily reports of violence, Cushla lives a quiet life with her mother in a small town near Belfast. By day she teaches at a parochial school; at night she fills in at her family’s pub. There she meets Michael Agnew, a barrister who’s made a name for himself defending IRA members. Against her better judgment—Michael is not only Protestant but older and married—Cushla lets herself get drawn in by him and his sophisticated world, and an affair ignites.
-
-
Exquisite
- By Suzanna on 11-10-22
By: Louise Kennedy
-
Count the Ways
- A Novel
- By: Joyce Maynard
- Narrated by: Joyce Maynard
- Length: 15 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In her most ambitious novel to date, New York Times best-selling author Joyce Maynard returns to the themes that are the hallmarks of her most acclaimed work in a mesmerizing story of a family - from the hopeful early days of young marriage to parenthood, divorce, and the costly aftermath that ripples through all their lives
-
-
AA Deeply Felt Story that Sometimes Goes Too Far Afield…
- By Molly on 07-18-21
By: Joyce Maynard
-
Happiness Falls (Good Morning America Book Club)
- A Novel
- By: Angie Kim
- Narrated by: Shannon Tyo, Sean Patrick Hopkins, Thomas Pruyn, and others
- Length: 13 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Mia, the irreverent, hyperanalytical twenty-year-old daughter, has an explanation for everything—which is why she isn’t initially concerned when her father and younger brother Eugene don’t return from a walk in a nearby park. They must have lost their phone. Or stopped for an errand somewhere. But by the time Mia’s brother runs through the front door bloody and alone, it becomes clear that the father in this tight-knit family is missing and the only witness is Eugene, who has the rare genetic condition Angelman syndrome and cannot speak.
-
-
A mixed review, but recommend
- By Andrea B. on 09-07-23
By: Angie Kim
-
Signal Fires
- A Novel
- By: Dani Shapiro
- Narrated by: Dani Shapiro
- Length: 7 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Division Street is full of secrets. An impulsive lie begets a secret—one which will forever haunt the Wilf family. And the Shenkmans, who move into the neighborhood many years later, bring secrets of their own.. Spanning fifty kaleidoscopic years, on a street—and in a galaxy—where stars collapse and stories collide, these two families become bound in ways they never could have imagined. Urgent and compassionate, Signal Fires is a magical story for our times, a literary tour de force by a masterful storyteller at the height of her powers.
-
-
Depressing, poorly read
- By Arden Mahaffey on 11-02-22
By: Dani Shapiro
-
Our Country Friends
- A Novel
- By: Gary Shteyngart
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 12 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the rolling hills of upstate New York, a group of friends and friends-of-friends gathers in a country house to wait out the pandemic. Over the next six months, new friendships and romances will take hold, while old betrayals will emerge, forcing each character to reevaluate whom they love and what matters most. The unlikely cast of characters includes a Russian-born novelist, his Russian-born psychiatrist wife, their precocious child obsessed with K-pop, a struggling Indian American writer, a wildly successful Korean American app developer, a global dandy with three passports.
-
-
Beautifully written, painful, but very, very moving
- By Jim on 11-08-21
By: Gary Shteyngart
-
This Time Tomorrow
- A Novel
- By: Emma Straub
- Narrated by: Marin Ireland, Emma Straub
- Length: 8 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On the eve of her 40th birthday, Alice’s life isn’t terrible. She likes her job, even if it isn’t exactly the one she expected. She’s happy with her apartment, her romantic status, her independence, and she adores her lifelong best friend. But her father is ailing, and it feels to her as if something is missing. When she wakes up the next morning she finds herself back in 1996, reliving her 16th birthday.
-
-
Loved!
- By AE on 05-25-22
By: Emma Straub
-
Lessons
- By: Ian McEwan
- Narrated by: Simon McBurney
- Length: 17 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When the world is still counting the cost of the Second World War and the Iron Curtain has closed, eleven-year-old Roland Baines's life is turned upside down. 2,000 miles from his mother's protective love, stranded at an unusual boarding school, his vulnerability attracts piano teacher Miss Miriam Cornell, leaving scars as well as a memory of love that will never fade.
-
-
Narrator Simon McBurney gets my 100% rating
- By Peggy M on 09-26-22
By: Ian McEwan
-
The Dutch House
- A Novel
- By: Ann Patchett
- Narrated by: Tom Hanks
- Length: 9 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the end of the Second World War, Cyril Conroy combines luck and a single canny investment to begin an enormous real estate empire, propelling his family from poverty to enormous wealth. His first order of business is to buy the Dutch House, a lavish estate in the suburbs outside of Philadelphia. Meant as a surprise for his wife, the house sets in motion the undoing of everyone he loves. The story is told by Cyril’s son Danny, as he and his older sister, the brilliantly acerbic and self-assured Maeve, are exiled from the house where they grew up by their stepmother.
-
-
Not my favorite Patchett
- By Regina on 12-07-19
By: Ann Patchett
-
Kantika
- By: Elizabeth Graver
- Narrated by: Gail Shalan
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Exploring identity, place, and exile, Kantika also reveals how the female body—in work, art, and love—serves as a site of both suffering and joy. A haunting, inspiring meditation on the tenacity of women, this lush, lyrical novel from Elizabeth Graver celebrates the insistence on seizing beauty and grabbing hold of one’s one and only life.
-
-
Outstanding performance of a beautiful book
- By Elliott Wolfe, M.D. on 07-25-23
By: Elizabeth Graver
-
The Best of Me
- By: David Sedaris
- Narrated by: David Sedaris
- Length: 13 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For more than 25 years, David Sedaris has been carving out a unique literary space, virtually creating his own genre. A Sedaris story may seem confessional, but is also highly attuned to the world outside. It opens our eyes to what is at absurd and moving about our daily existence. And it is almost impossible to listen without laughing.
-
-
Almost No New Material
- By Lizardectomy on 11-05-20
By: David Sedaris
Critic reviews
New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Book
Best Fiction of the Year - Chicago Tribune
One of Newsweek's Most Highly Anticipated New Books
38 Novels You Need to Read this Summer - Lit Hub
One of Good Morning America's 27 Books for June
The Millions Most Anticipated
Best Book of the Year - Bookmarks Magazine
Top Jewish Pop Cultural Stories - Jewish Telegraphic Agency
One of Alma’s Favorite Books for Summer
“Henkin has explored the exigencies of marriage and families (especially recombined families) through unflinching yet kind depictions of the ways we live now.... His thoughtful new novel, Morningside Heights, proves no exception.... Notably and satisfyingly, much of Morningside takes place against a New York City that is clearly beloved to its author. Henkin tours a wealth of landmarks and neighborhoods with authority and affection.... Quietly told, the story nonetheless pulses with insistence: Attention must be paid. This subtle urgency opens our own awareness, lens-like, upon the implied human task, larger than any single calamity - that of attending to relentless change, loss, finitude.” (Joan Frank, The Washington Post)
“[Morningside Heights] is generous, wise, and wry enough to avoid sentimentality.... Astonishingly, Henkin transforms what could be a mighty grim work of fiction into a melancholy and tender one enriched by the viewpoints of a constellation of characters.” (Elizabeth Taylor, The National Book Review)
“[Henkin's] story of a brilliant Shakespearean and his wife - once his student - radiates a tenderness for the city that we, his intended readers, can best appreciate - perhaps now most of all, as we ask our city to return to us.... Henkin is a fine writer with a wry fondness for his characters, but like any New Yorker he knows how to keep a safe distance. The specific letting-go that all New Yorkers must master if we don’t wish to be crippled by nostalgia - especially now, if we do hope to see our city’s resurgence - is particularly nuanced when a city neighborhood is also a college town, but Henkin more than meets this challenge.” (Jean Hanff Korelitz, The New York Times Book Review)
Featured Article: 15 Essential Jewish Authors to Hear in Audio
The Jewish diaspora is vast, diverse, and full of stories. In recent years, Jewish authors have published books about everything from love, identity, and history to crime, romance, and what it means to come of age in the modern world. While this list is by no means complete, these 15 Jewish authors have written some of the most fascinating Jewish literature, and they represent a deep catalog of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry in a range of genres.
Related to this topic
-
Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self
- By: Danielle Evans
- Narrated by: Daniel Deadwyler, Jeanette Illidge, Je Nie Fleming, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Striking in their emotional immediacy, the stories in Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self are based in a world where inequality is reality but where the insecurities of adolescence and young adulthood, and the tensions within family and the community, are sometimes the biggest complicating forces in one's sense of identity and the choices one makes.
-
-
things we do to oursekves
- By Jamintel on 02-06-23
By: Danielle Evans
-
The Stuff that Never Happened
- A Novel
- By: Maddie Dawson
- Narrated by: Teri Clark Linden
- Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Annabelle McKay knows she shouldn’t have any complaints. She’s been in a stable marriage that’s lasted almost three decades and has provided her with two wonderful children and thousands of family dinners around a sturdy oak table. Other wives envy the fact that Grant is not the type of man who would ever cheat on her or leave her for a younger woman. The trouble is Annabelle isn’t sure she wants to be married to Grant anymore. The trouble is she’s still in love with someone else.
-
-
Don’t pass this one up.
- By Lauren on 03-10-20
By: Maddie Dawson
-
The Natural Mother of the Child
- A Memoir of Nonbinary Parenthood
- By: Krys Malcolm Belc
- Narrated by: Krys Malcolm Belc
- Length: 4 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Krys Malcolm Belc has thought a lot about the interplay between parenthood and gender. As a nonbinary, transmasculine parent, giving birth to his son Samson clarified his gender identity. And yet, when his partner Anna adopted Samson, the legal documents listed Belc as "the natural mother of the child." The Natural Mother of the Child journeys both toward and through common perceptions of what it means to have a body and how that body can influence the perception of a family.
-
-
Excellent
- By Kathryn Bradley on 03-04-23
-
The Undocumented Americans
- By: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
- Narrated by: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
- Length: 4 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Writer Karla Cornejo Villavicencio was on DACA when she decided to write about being undocumented for the first time using her own name. It was right after the election of 2016, the day she realized the story she'd tried to steer clear of was the only one she wanted to tell. So she wrote her immigration lawyer's phone number on her hand in Sharpie and embarked on a trip across the country to tell the stories of her fellow undocumented immigrants—and to find the hidden key to her own.
-
-
Raw, heartbreaking - we can do better by others
- By RapaciousReader on 04-11-20
-
One True Thing
- By: Anna Quindlen
- Narrated by: Christina Moore
- Length: 9 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A young woman sits in jail, accused of the mercy killing of her dying mother. She didn't do it, but she thinks she knows who did. In the last months of her life, Ellen Gulden's mother revealed startling secrets that challenged everything Ellen believed about her family. Now, in jail, Ellen believes those secrets will tell her who had the courage to end her mother's suffering.
-
-
Quindlen's writing skills shine in One True Thing.
- By Bonny on 08-26-13
By: Anna Quindlen
-
Joy in the Morning
- A Novel
- By: Betty Smith
- Narrated by: Maggi-Meg Reed
- Length: 10 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1927, in Brooklyn, New York, Carl Brown and Annie McGairy meet and fall in love. Though only 18, Annie travels alone halfway across the country to the Midwestern university where Carl is studying law - and there they marry. But Carl and Annie’s first year together is much more difficult than they anticipated as they find themselves in a faraway place with little money and few friends. With hardship and poverty weighing heavily upon them, they come to realize that their greatest sources of strength, loyalty, and love will help them make it through.
-
-
Another Wonderful Betty Smith Audio Book
- By 20eagle16 on 01-25-21
By: Betty Smith
-
Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self
- By: Danielle Evans
- Narrated by: Daniel Deadwyler, Jeanette Illidge, Je Nie Fleming, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Striking in their emotional immediacy, the stories in Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self are based in a world where inequality is reality but where the insecurities of adolescence and young adulthood, and the tensions within family and the community, are sometimes the biggest complicating forces in one's sense of identity and the choices one makes.
-
-
things we do to oursekves
- By Jamintel on 02-06-23
By: Danielle Evans
-
The Stuff that Never Happened
- A Novel
- By: Maddie Dawson
- Narrated by: Teri Clark Linden
- Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Annabelle McKay knows she shouldn’t have any complaints. She’s been in a stable marriage that’s lasted almost three decades and has provided her with two wonderful children and thousands of family dinners around a sturdy oak table. Other wives envy the fact that Grant is not the type of man who would ever cheat on her or leave her for a younger woman. The trouble is Annabelle isn’t sure she wants to be married to Grant anymore. The trouble is she’s still in love with someone else.
-
-
Don’t pass this one up.
- By Lauren on 03-10-20
By: Maddie Dawson
-
The Natural Mother of the Child
- A Memoir of Nonbinary Parenthood
- By: Krys Malcolm Belc
- Narrated by: Krys Malcolm Belc
- Length: 4 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Krys Malcolm Belc has thought a lot about the interplay between parenthood and gender. As a nonbinary, transmasculine parent, giving birth to his son Samson clarified his gender identity. And yet, when his partner Anna adopted Samson, the legal documents listed Belc as "the natural mother of the child." The Natural Mother of the Child journeys both toward and through common perceptions of what it means to have a body and how that body can influence the perception of a family.
-
-
Excellent
- By Kathryn Bradley on 03-04-23
-
The Undocumented Americans
- By: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
- Narrated by: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
- Length: 4 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Writer Karla Cornejo Villavicencio was on DACA when she decided to write about being undocumented for the first time using her own name. It was right after the election of 2016, the day she realized the story she'd tried to steer clear of was the only one she wanted to tell. So she wrote her immigration lawyer's phone number on her hand in Sharpie and embarked on a trip across the country to tell the stories of her fellow undocumented immigrants—and to find the hidden key to her own.
-
-
Raw, heartbreaking - we can do better by others
- By RapaciousReader on 04-11-20
-
One True Thing
- By: Anna Quindlen
- Narrated by: Christina Moore
- Length: 9 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A young woman sits in jail, accused of the mercy killing of her dying mother. She didn't do it, but she thinks she knows who did. In the last months of her life, Ellen Gulden's mother revealed startling secrets that challenged everything Ellen believed about her family. Now, in jail, Ellen believes those secrets will tell her who had the courage to end her mother's suffering.
-
-
Quindlen's writing skills shine in One True Thing.
- By Bonny on 08-26-13
By: Anna Quindlen
-
Joy in the Morning
- A Novel
- By: Betty Smith
- Narrated by: Maggi-Meg Reed
- Length: 10 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1927, in Brooklyn, New York, Carl Brown and Annie McGairy meet and fall in love. Though only 18, Annie travels alone halfway across the country to the Midwestern university where Carl is studying law - and there they marry. But Carl and Annie’s first year together is much more difficult than they anticipated as they find themselves in a faraway place with little money and few friends. With hardship and poverty weighing heavily upon them, they come to realize that their greatest sources of strength, loyalty, and love will help them make it through.
-
-
Another Wonderful Betty Smith Audio Book
- By 20eagle16 on 01-25-21
By: Betty Smith
What listeners say about Morningside Heights
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Y. Epstein
- 07-17-21
Wonderful, moving, touching
For me, this was a powerful emotional experience. I connected with so many aspects of the story. I knew author Joshua Henkin’s father from my time at Penn when I was an undergrad and Professor Henkin taught at Penn Law School. I knew author Henkin’s brother who was the Music director at a day camp my children attended and the choir director at a high school they attended. But most of all I was able to reminisce about Morningside Heights where I lived as a Columbia Graduate Student and where I now live as a Retired professor. Like Spence and Pru in the novel I too had an apartment on Claremont Avenue and snacked in the Chock full of Nuts that no longer can be found on the corner of 116th and Broadway. I agree that Chock full’s coffee was awful (but they served tasty cream cheese on date nut bread sandwiches). But what made this such a special book was the touching and heartbreaking struggles that family members had to grapple with. Coping with the decline in intellectual and physical abilities of a loved one having Alzheimer’s. Dealing with guilt feelings of an overburdened caregiver. Struggling with a strained father-son relationship and that same son contending with a self-centered guilt-tripping mother. This book had everything. It is a powerful and gripping novel. Do yourself a favor and read it or listen to the audiobook.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
2 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Barbara S
- 07-06-21
5 glowing stars!!
“Morningside Heights” blew me away as one of the best stories of a contemporary marriage grappling with the devastating damages of early-onset Alzheimer’s disease.
Author Joshua Henkin expertly pens a story following the marriage of Pru and Spence Robin’s courtship and marriage which begins in the 1970’s. Prudence Steiner is pursuing her Ph.D. when she becomes involved with the youngest Professor at Columbia who teaches Shakespeare. He’s a noted genius and charming to boot. After marriage, Spencer achieves two Guggenheims, a Mellon, and a MacArthur, and pens a notable book about Shakespeare that attains the NYTimes best seller list.
At age 57, Spence starts notably to decline. Pru is 51. In her early 50’s she struggles with being a caretaker to her once highly intelligent, physically able spouse. For me, the moving part of this story is the marriage, the impact on the marriage. My heart broke for Pru.
There’s more to the story than dealing with Alzheimer’s disease. The Robin’s marriage has it’s complications, as all do. Spence had a brief marriage to a bohemian woman with whom he has a son, Arlo. Arlo holds grudges based on his mother’s biased information about his father. As so happens in many divorces, one parent poison’s the child’s views which doesn’t help the child or the non-custodian parent. Henkin’s writes the relationship with insider nuance. Pru and Spencer work diligently to bring his son, Arlo, into their family fold.
I absolutely love this story, although heart wrenching and sad. My husband does not have this disease, but while reading this, I felt like I was Pru or at least her best friend. I did identify with the destructive ex-spouse and working with the angry step-child. I was immersed in the story, struggled while they struggled, got frustrated when they were frustrated.
I listened to the audio narrated by Kathe Mazur. I looked forward to my audio time, even when it brought tears to my eyes. When I can get my hands on a hard copy, I will read it. I think I would have adored it more if I read it. This is literature at it’s best, and reading literature, for me, is more fulfilling.
5+ glowing stars!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
5 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Minneapolis listener
- 08-02-21
A very fine book
Readable and believable. A strong sense of character and and even stronger sense of place. Well worth the time.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Kindle Customer
- 02-11-22
A sensitive story, poignantly told
Joshua Henkin constructed a small screen slowly evolving medical tragedy on the frame of a love relationship surviving almost unscathed to the end. He gets the medical details, sadly, spot on, and the academia and the Upper West Side elements believable and not overplayed. Pru Steiner, the heroine, is a heroine, an Aysheis Chai’el of the old school regardless of her 21st C UMC trappings.
And compliments to the narrator, K Mazur, for her command of the intent and intonation of the passages in Hebrew.
High marks to all involved in Morningside Heights creation and this production.
Wm R Greenfield MD
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Heather Zimmerman
- 06-21-21
Okay
Fine audio. Wanted to love this story but just didn't fully connect with any of the characters at a heart level. Maybe I'm simply not a modern fiction person and should stick with the classics... I can see how it would be meaningful for a New Yorker.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Michelle Novoa
- 07-29-21
shallow emotionally stunted characters
Maybe it's the culture of the characters, I am not sure but typically when I read or listen to a book it's to escape to another person's life where I come away feeling inspired and that I am not living enough! listening to this very blasé book about the super boring people and their everyday boring lives was mind numbing. and for the life of me I cannot figure out why the son felt his father was a poor father when all he did was try to get close to him only to be shoved away. Very bizarre perspective on that one. There are far more other books about atrocious parenting then what was here and I felt it did not call for rejection of his father, that one is on that kid, who was quite odd, and not in an interesting way.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Marcia
- 08-22-21
“Meh”
Really wanted to like this book — New York, family saga, academic setting … kept hoping it would improve, but found it poorly paced, self-indulgent, shallow and boring. Made it all the way through, and don’t feel that it was a good investment of time. The narrator did a good job.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- LisaG
- 08-17-21
Morning side heights.
It kept resetting to first chapter all the time. Not enjoyable. It would go back to chapters I had already read.
Story excellent l. I have I’ll
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Samantha
- 09-27-21
Beautiful story, great narrator.
Equal parts heartwarming and heartbreaking. Amazing use of language and great details. 5/5. Read for a Jewish themed book club, would recommend to anyone.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- RueRue
- 07-08-22
Great narration
A wonderful narrator ! Audible should use her more often !
The book itself, well, there are positives: well written prose, an interesting character arc, and heartrending descriptions of the ravages of Alzheimer’s disease ( hard to read because my mother had this, and the descriptions are indeed quite accurate).
Favorite character in the story is the caregiver, Ginny.
The negatives: apart from Ginny, none of the characters really touched me emotionally, in spite of the sad fate of Spence. Several characters were under developed, and seemed unnecessary.
Overall, good book, but a tighter focus on the primary characters would have made it better.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!