The Emperor's Children Audiobook By Claire Messud cover art

The Emperor's Children

A Novel

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The Emperor's Children

By: Claire Messud
Narrated by: Suzanne Toren
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Two-time PEN/Faulkner Award nominee Claire Messud is hailed as "a writer of enormous skill and stylistic grace" by Publishers Weekly. This wonderfully crafted comedy of manners was called a "stinging portrait of life among Manhattan's junior glitterati" in a starred review by Kirkus Reviews.

Friends at Brown University, Marina, Danielle, and Julius are still looking to make their marks as they approach their 30s. Marina lives with her celebrated parents on the Upper West Side while trying to complete her book. TV producer Danielle's success is due to the puff pieces she churns out. Freelance critic Julius can barely make ends meet. Into this mix comes Bootie, Marina's college dropout cousin, who is just the catalyst the three friends need to start making significant changes in their lives.

©2006 Claire Messud (P)2006 Recorded Books Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Women's Fiction

Critic reviews

"Tangy dialogue, provocative asides, glittering imagery, and nimble postulations build toward an electrifying and edifying conclusion." (Booklist)
"Her writing is so fluid, and her plot so cleverly constructed, that events seem inevitable, yet the narrative is ultimately surprising and masterful as a contemporary comedy of manners." (Publishers Weekly)
All stars
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Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

I feel the narration really overwhelmed my impression of the book. Audiobooks, I suppose, are prone to this phenomenon for good or for bad. In this case, trust me, it took away from the book. There is some pretty prose in this novel though the story itself may disappoint. Lots of navel gazing and some whining, and sympathetic characters were scarce. The writer has a gift for expression. I may try another of her novels sans the over affected, boorish narration.

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Suzanne Toren?

someone less affected and overbearing.

Was The Emperor's Children worth the listening time?

no

overwrought narration

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This was one of those "why did I choose this?" selections for me. The majority of reviews state it like it is: a bunch of young adults whining about their sorry self-fulfilled lives. If that is your thing, go for it. But I need something a little more solid.

Read Reviews Before Buying

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Not sure if it was just the performance that made this hard to be excited to listen to or if the story was just kind of mediocre without any characters who were remotely likeable

Meh

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I loved the book but wasn't crazy about the narrator. I really wanted a simpler, less obvious reading of what is a morally and intellectually complex story. I felt as though the reader didn't quite trust the writing to speak for itself so added unnecessary embellishment.

I felt that several of her characterizations were really heavy-handed. Instead of trusting the listener to determine a character's strengths and weaknesses she seemed determined to telegraph them for us.

Ultimately this overwrought interpretation rests squarely on the director's shoulders. It is the director's job to help the actor temper her reading. Because he didn't do this, the reader got in the way of the beautiful narrative flow of this magnificent novel.

Great Book/Lame Director

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This story has no point and in the end I was disappointed with the time I spent listening to the book. The characters wander aimlessly for too long, then just when you expect there to be some big event/blowup or closure (the affair is discovered, he really did marry her to get at her father, etc.) the book just ends. I don't know if the writer is also of this generation, but it felt like she struggled to write a book with any meaning, just as Marina couldn't pull her book together. It left me wondering if the author was describing her own unfulfilling life. The original setup of characters and situations had so much potential, but the end left me flat. For the last hour of the book (at least), I wanted to slap all 4 characters, the 3 friends and the cousin, and say 'grow up and dump this illusion that you have to 'be somebody' or do something 'significant' and be noticed and get on with your life'.

Whining 20 somethings

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3.5, really.

None of the central characters in The Emperor's Children are very likable people, though they aren't portrayed without some sympathy. Murray Thwaite is an egotistical, two-faced ivy tower intellectual used to being fawned over by the media. His overindulged daughter, Marina, is "taking a year off" for a fatuous writing project, but is barely working on it. She gets involved with Ludovic Seeley, an ambitious, Machiavellian Australian who intends to launch a magazine. Murray's nephew, Bootie, cultivates a creepy, parasitic idealism reminiscent of Ignatius J. Reilly in A Confederacy of Dunces.

Messud takes her unpleasant cast and sets their lives in speeding motion, like billiard balls on a table, gleefully letting them race towards their inevitable collisions. Later in the book, the September 11 attacks occur, creating their own complications in everyone's lives -- which have little to do with the death and destruction, of course. It's a scathing glimpse at the underside of the privileged NYC elite, focusing on their self-absorption and sense of entitlement, and it's hard not to watch their struggles and falls.

To be fair, though, the characters are a bit caricatured, offering little to redeem the liberal intelligentsia, and not reflecting much that's positive about any other way of being. I often pitied these flawed people, sometimes identified with them, and half wanted to see them get their well-deserved comeuppance, but are they really the reality?

Still, I enjoyed this book and its plotting. If, like me, you're an urban dweller who sometimes find yourself at cocktail parties with people from this world, you might get something out of this scathing drama of its aspirants and pretenders.

Woes of the over-privileged

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I can't even remember the plot ... If there was one. Endless descriptions and philosophizing.
I stopped trying to keep track of the characters and their relationships. Sloppy writing

BORING!

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the book to me was mostly rising action. I was really hoping for more reaction to 9/11 than all of the lead in. but overall it was a fun light read.

big build up

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Not a bad book but this story has no point and in the end I was disappointed with the time I spent listening to the book.

Not all it is cracked up to be!

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Any additional comments?

I always listed to the end, just in case! This book I listened for 7 hours and still didn't know what the characters were all about. Just a waste of time. Should have read the reviews more closely before buying. Others feel the same.

Waste of Time!

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