
Paradise
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Narrated by:
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Toni Morrison
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By:
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Toni Morrison
About this listen
"Rumors had been whispered for more than a year. Outrages that had been accumulating all along took shape as evidence. A mother was knocked down the stairs by her cold-eyed daughter. Four damaged infants were born in one family. Daughters refused to get out of bed. Brides disappeared on their honeymoons. Two brothers shot each other on New Year's Day. Trips to Demby for VD shots common. And what went on at the Oven these days was not to be believed.... The proof they had been collecting since the terrible discovery in the spring could not be denied: the one thing that connected all these catastrophes was in the Convent. And in the Convent were those women."
In Paradise - her first novel since she was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature - Toni Morrison gives us a bravura performance. As the book begins deep in Oklahoma early one morning in 1976, nine men from Ruby (pop. 360), in defense of "the one all-black town worth the pain", assault the nearby Convent and the women in it. From the town's ancestral origins in 1890 to the fateful day of the assault, Paradise tells the story of a people ever mindful of the relationship between their spectacular history and a void "Out There...where random and organized evil erupted when and where it chose."
Richly imagined and elegantly composed, Paradise weaves a powerful mystery.
©1999 Toni Morrison (P)2009 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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It is the story of 11-year-old Pecola Breedlove--a black girl in an America whose love for its blond, blue-eyed children can devastate all others--who prays for her eyes to turn blue: so that she will be beautiful, so that people will look at her, so that her world will be different. This is the story of the nightmare at the heart of her yearning and the tragedy of its fulfillment.
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Sethe was born a slave and escaped to Ohio, but eighteen years later she is still not free. Sethe has too many memories of Sweet Home, the beautiful farm where so many hideous things happened. And Sethe’s new home is haunted by the ghost of her baby, who died nameless and whose tombstone is engraved with a single word: Beloved.
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Author-read Books
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The Source of Self-Regard
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Arguably the most celebrated and revered writer of our time now gives us a new nonfiction collection - a rich gathering of her essays, speeches, and meditations on society, culture, and art, spanning four decades.
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Refreshing thoughts
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Morrison shows how much the themes of freedom and individualism, manhood and innocence, depended on the existence of a black population that was manifestly unfree--and that came to serve white authors as embodiments of their own fears and desires. According to the Chicago Tribune, Morrison "reimagines and remaps the possibility of America." Her brilliant discussions of the "Africanist" presence in the fiction of Poe, Melville, Cather, and Hemingway leads to a dramatic reappraisal of the essential characteristics of our literary tradition.
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My goodness..get ready to be challenged
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In this 1983 short story - the only short story Morrison ever wrote - we meet Twyla and Roberta, who have known each other since they were eight years old and spent four months together as roommates in St. Bonaventure shelter. Inseparable then, they lose touch as they grow older, only later to find each other again at a diner, a grocery store, and again at a protest. Seemingly at opposite ends of every problem, and at each other's throats each time they meet, the two women still cannot deny the deep bond their shared experience has forged between them.
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Read the introduction last
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Critic reviews
“Morrison has brought it all together: the poetry, the emotion, the broad symbolic plan.” (The New York Times Book Review)
“A fascinating story, wonderfully detailed.... The town is the stage for a profound and provocative debate.” (Los Angeles Times)
“Everything is resonant here: the most casual gestures are informed by the facts and myths of genders and race, by our notions of civilization and lawlessness, body and spirit, Christianity and witchcraft. Morrison’s lyrical prose displays great confidence in her readers’ intelligence, demands their unflagging attention, and rewards them generously—with a memorable work of epic range and monumental ambition.” (People)
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- Narrated by: Toni Morrison
- Length: 15 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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In Paradise - her first novel since she was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature - Toni Morrison gives us a bravura performance. As the book begins deep in Oklahoma early one morning in 1976, nine men from Ruby (pop. 360), in defense of "the one all-black town worth the pain", assault the nearby Convent and the women in it. From the town's ancestral origins in 1890 to the fateful day of the assault, Paradise tells the story of a people ever mindful of the relationship between their spectacular history and a void.
-
-
MORRISON AT HER MOST COMPLEX
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Overall
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-
not a novel, but a collection of short stories
- By Melinda on 06-14-12
By: Toni Morrison
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God Help the Child
- A Novel
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- Narrated by: Toni Morrison
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- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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At the center: a young woman who calls herself Bride, whose stunning blue-black skin is only one element of her beauty, her boldness and confidence, her success in life, but which caused her light-skinned mother to deny her even the simplest forms of love. There is Booker, the man Bride loves, and loses to anger.
-
-
God Help Us All
- By Tzynya Pinchback on 04-24-15
By: Toni Morrison
-
Jazz
- By: Toni Morrison
- Narrated by: Toni Morrison
- Length: 3 hrs
- Abridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In the winter of 1926, when everybody everywhere sees nothing but good things ahead, Joe Trace, middle-aged door-to-door salesman of Cleopatra beauty products, shoots his teenage lover to death. At the funeral, Joe’s wife, Violet, attacks the girl’s corpse. This novel “transforms a familiar refrain of jilted love into a bold, sustaining time of self-knowledge and discovery. Its rhythms are infectious” (People).
-
-
The audio is not the same as the book
- By Rocio on 03-29-16
By: Toni Morrison
What listeners say about Paradise
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- Sarah Sanjuan
- 12-04-15
Paradise
I really really enjoyed this novel, and listening to the author read it was great.
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- Jeneva
- 03-02-20
This is the abridged version
I enjoyed it overall, but would have liked to be aware that this was the abridged version. Overall I enjoyed it!
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- Keelia
- 01-07-21
Amazing
Anything Toni Morrison does is amazing! I felt what the characters felt, I saw what the characters seen. I felt I was a part of each ones story.
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- Danielle
- 05-10-15
Pay attention!
I had to listen twice because the ending was confusing. Overall a good book though. Leisure reading, might have been better to physically read.
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- JC
- 05-02-16
Interestingly Bizarre
I read Paradise with my book club. Many had a difficult times making sense of it. I had to listen twice myself. There are a lot characters and it is difficult to keep up with who is who. Over all it was an interestingly bizarre story that introduces you to the strangest group of people. Morrison did make me curious about all these troubled people but it disappointed me by ending so with many unanswered questions.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Nathalie Pierre
- 02-28-15
Grandma Morrison reading at Bedtime
Morrison reading her own words gives deeper depth to the story. The attitudes of each character come forth from her deliberate cadence. It's so worth the 25 bucks.
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1 person found this helpful
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Performance
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Story
- Gem City Books
- 03-05-14
Great Story (Abridged)
Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?
Not well spent because the story was abridged. I like to read the books alongside of the text. The author kept skipping over segments of the book.
What was one of the most memorable moments of Paradise?
The opening of the book will capture the listener/reader. "They shoot the white girl first."
Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Toni Morrison?
The author is the best reader for the project.
Could you see Paradise being made into a movie or a TV series? Who should the stars be?
I would love to see it in film.
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- Shikeitha Addye
- 02-24-23
Alive and dead
I thought that everyone was alive and turns out they were passed away. Anyway I am addicted to Tony’s voice it’s so motherly. I’ll listen to these anytime but especially when I miss my mama.
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- Carol Binta Nadeem
- 08-13-18
Raiding Life
After being ravaged by the titillating voice and graphic vocabulary of the author, I found myself lost in a sea of personal diaries and historical sequences that took a second reading just to capture pieces of the plot. No complaints though since the second visit to “Ruby” was even better than the first. Which I concluded by reading a Wikipedia study of the summary of the plot only to long for the experience once again of walking along the tragic yet melancholy lives of its inhabitants and almost citizens. The metaphors in Ms Morrison’s work are sculptures of the soul and the jazz rhythms of her narrative with their syncopated messages that tell you their meaning backwards while revealing it to you is like the push and pull of intercourse. This work is mystical, magical and blasphemously symbolic. Ms Morrison is a literary gymnast and her art work is not intended for the faint of heart! Captivating read that raids the heart and soul of the unsuspecting voyeur. Thanks
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- wylanda wynn
- 08-28-20
enjoyed very much. Interesting stories by Toni M.
very interesting stories by Toni Morrison. leaves you intrigued while listening to her. also keeper
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