The Marriage Plot
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 $24.74
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
David Pittu
About this listen
A New York Times Notable Book of 2011
A Publisher's Weekly Top 10 Book of 2011
A Kirkus Reviews Top 25 Best Fiction of 2011 Title
One of Library Journal's Best Books of 2011
A Salon Best Fiction of 2011 title
One of The Telegraph's Best Fiction Books of the Year 2011
It's the early 1980s—the country is in a deep recession, and life after college is harder than ever. In the cafés on College Hill, the wised-up kids are inhaling Derrida and listening to Talking Heads. But Madeleine Hanna, dutiful English major, is writing her senior thesis on Jane Austen and George Eliot, purveyors of the marriage plot that lies at the heart of the greatest English novels.
As Madeleine tries to understand why "it became laughable to read writers like Cheever and Updike, who wrote about the suburbia Madeleine and most of her friends had grown up in, in favor of reading the Marquis de Sade, who wrote about deflowering virgins in eighteenth-century France," real life, in the form of two very different guys, intervenes. Leonard Bankhead—charismatic loner, college Darwinist, and lost Portland boy—suddenly turns up in a semiotics seminar, and soon Madeleine finds herself in a highly charged erotic and intellectual relationship with him. At the same time, her old "friend" Mitchell Grammaticus—who's been reading Christian mysticism and generally acting strange—resurfaces, obsessed with the idea that Madeleine is destined to be his mate.
Over the next year, as the members of the triangle in this amazing, spellbinding novel graduate from college and enter the real world, events force them to reevaluate everything they learned in school. Leonard and Madeleine move to a biology Laboratory on Cape Cod, but can't escape the secret responsible for Leonard's seemingly inexhaustible energy and plunging moods. And Mitchell, traveling around the world to get Madeleine out of his mind, finds himself face-to-face with ultimate questions about the meaning of life, the existence of God, and the true nature of love.
Are the great love stories of the nineteenth century dead? Or can there be a new story, written for today and alive to the realities of feminism, sexual freedom, prenups, and divorce? With devastating wit and an abiding understanding of and affection for his characters, Jeffrey Eugenides revives the motivating energies of the Novel, while creating a story so contemporary and fresh that it unfolds like the intimate journal of our own lives.
©2011 Jeffrey Eugenides (P)2011 Macmillan AudioListeners also enjoyed...
-
Middlesex
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Kristoffer Tabori
- Length: 21 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 1974, Calliope Stephanides, a student at a girls' school in Grosse Pointe, finds herself drawn to a chain-smoking, strawberry-blonde classmate with a gift for acting. The passion that furtively develops between them - along with Callie's failure to develop physically - leads Callie to suspect that she is not like other girls. In fact, she is not really a girl at all.
-
-
Anything but middle.
- By Michael on 05-04-03
-
Fresh Complaint
- Stories
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Jeffrey Eugenides, Ari Fliakos, Cynthia Nixon
- Length: 8 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The stories in Fresh Complaint explore equally rich—and intriguing—territory. Ranging from the bitingly reproductive antics of “Baster” to the dreamy, moving account of a young traveler’s search for enlightenment in “Air Mail” (selected by Annie Proulx for Best American Short Stories), this collection presents characters in the midst of personal and national emergencies. We meet a failed poet who, envious of other people’s wealth during the real-estate bubble, becomes an embezzler; a clavichordist whose dreams of art founder under the obligations of marriage and fatherhood.
-
-
You’ll love this book if you love hearing about bodily fluids on a regular basis.
- By Cynthia C. Stellar on 11-13-17
-
Purity
- A Novel
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: Jenna Lamia, Dylan Baker, Robert Petkoff
- Length: 25 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Young Pip Tyler doesn't know who she is. She knows that her real name is Purity, that she's saddled with $130,000 in student debt, that she's squatting with anarchists in Oakland, and that her relationship with her mother - her only family - is hazardous. But she doesn't have a clue who her father is, why her mother chose to live as a recluse with an invented name, or how she'll ever have a normal life.
-
-
Not a case of Franzenfreude
- By Mel on 09-13-15
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
Crossroads
- A Novel
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 24 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jonathan Franzen’s novels are celebrated for their unforgettably vivid characters and for their keen-eyed take on contemporary America. Now, in Crossroads, Franzen ventures back into the past and explores the history of two generations. With characteristic humor and complexity, and with even greater warmth, he conjures a world that resonates powerfully with our own.
-
-
How do narrators still do clownish stuff like this in 2021?
- By Hotrodimus on 10-30-21
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
Demon Copperhead
- A Novel
- By: Barbara Kingsolver
- Narrated by: Charlie Thurston
- Length: 21 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in the mountains of southern Appalachia, Demon Copperhead is the story of a boy born to a teenaged single mother in a single-wide trailer, with no assets beyond his dead father’s good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit, and a fierce talent for survival. Relayed in his own unsparing voice, Demon braves the modern perils of foster care, child labor, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves, and crushing losses.
-
-
Wow! It’s a Masterpiece
- By Billy on 10-25-22
-
The Goldfinch
- By: Donna Tartt
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 32 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Goldfinch is a haunted odyssey through present-day America and a drama of enthralling force and acuity. It begins with a boy. Theo Decker, a 13-year-old New Yorker, miraculously survives an accident that kills his mother. Abandoned by his father, Theo is taken in by the family of a wealthy friend. Bewildered by his strange new home on Park Avenue, disturbed by schoolmates who don't know how to talk to him, and tormented above all by his unbearable longing for his mother, he clings to one thing that reminds him of her: a small, mysteriously captivating painting that ultimately draws Theo into the underworld of art.
-
-
Boy, am I in the minority on this one.
- By Bonny on 11-04-13
By: Donna Tartt
-
Middlesex
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Kristoffer Tabori
- Length: 21 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 1974, Calliope Stephanides, a student at a girls' school in Grosse Pointe, finds herself drawn to a chain-smoking, strawberry-blonde classmate with a gift for acting. The passion that furtively develops between them - along with Callie's failure to develop physically - leads Callie to suspect that she is not like other girls. In fact, she is not really a girl at all.
-
-
Anything but middle.
- By Michael on 05-04-03
-
Fresh Complaint
- Stories
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Jeffrey Eugenides, Ari Fliakos, Cynthia Nixon
- Length: 8 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The stories in Fresh Complaint explore equally rich—and intriguing—territory. Ranging from the bitingly reproductive antics of “Baster” to the dreamy, moving account of a young traveler’s search for enlightenment in “Air Mail” (selected by Annie Proulx for Best American Short Stories), this collection presents characters in the midst of personal and national emergencies. We meet a failed poet who, envious of other people’s wealth during the real-estate bubble, becomes an embezzler; a clavichordist whose dreams of art founder under the obligations of marriage and fatherhood.
-
-
You’ll love this book if you love hearing about bodily fluids on a regular basis.
- By Cynthia C. Stellar on 11-13-17
-
Purity
- A Novel
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: Jenna Lamia, Dylan Baker, Robert Petkoff
- Length: 25 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Young Pip Tyler doesn't know who she is. She knows that her real name is Purity, that she's saddled with $130,000 in student debt, that she's squatting with anarchists in Oakland, and that her relationship with her mother - her only family - is hazardous. But she doesn't have a clue who her father is, why her mother chose to live as a recluse with an invented name, or how she'll ever have a normal life.
-
-
Not a case of Franzenfreude
- By Mel on 09-13-15
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
Crossroads
- A Novel
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 24 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jonathan Franzen’s novels are celebrated for their unforgettably vivid characters and for their keen-eyed take on contemporary America. Now, in Crossroads, Franzen ventures back into the past and explores the history of two generations. With characteristic humor and complexity, and with even greater warmth, he conjures a world that resonates powerfully with our own.
-
-
How do narrators still do clownish stuff like this in 2021?
- By Hotrodimus on 10-30-21
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
Demon Copperhead
- A Novel
- By: Barbara Kingsolver
- Narrated by: Charlie Thurston
- Length: 21 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in the mountains of southern Appalachia, Demon Copperhead is the story of a boy born to a teenaged single mother in a single-wide trailer, with no assets beyond his dead father’s good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit, and a fierce talent for survival. Relayed in his own unsparing voice, Demon braves the modern perils of foster care, child labor, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves, and crushing losses.
-
-
Wow! It’s a Masterpiece
- By Billy on 10-25-22
-
The Goldfinch
- By: Donna Tartt
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 32 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Goldfinch is a haunted odyssey through present-day America and a drama of enthralling force and acuity. It begins with a boy. Theo Decker, a 13-year-old New Yorker, miraculously survives an accident that kills his mother. Abandoned by his father, Theo is taken in by the family of a wealthy friend. Bewildered by his strange new home on Park Avenue, disturbed by schoolmates who don't know how to talk to him, and tormented above all by his unbearable longing for his mother, he clings to one thing that reminds him of her: a small, mysteriously captivating painting that ultimately draws Theo into the underworld of art.
-
-
Boy, am I in the minority on this one.
- By Bonny on 11-04-13
By: Donna Tartt
-
The Corrections
- A Novel
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 21 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Corrections is a grandly entertaining novel for the new century--a comic, tragic masterpiece about a family breaking down in an age of easy fixes. After almost 50 years as a wife and mother, Enid Lambert is ready to have some fun. Unfortunately, her husband, Alfred, is losing his sanity to Parkinson's disease, and their children have long since flown the family nest to the catastrophes of their own lives. Enid has set her heart on an elusive goal: bringing her family together for one last Christmas at home.
-
-
"Grandly Entertaining"? Really?
- By Georgia Burns on 10-08-13
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
Wonderful Town
- New York Stories from The New Yorker
- By: Woody Allen, John Cheever, E. B. White, and others
- Narrated by: Tyne Daly, Timothy Jerome, Joe Morton, and others
- Length: 9 hrs and 20 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
New York City is not only The New Yorker magazine's place of origin and its sensibility's lifeblood, it is the heart of American literary culture. Wonderful Town, an anthology of superb short fiction by many of the magazine's most accomplished contributors, celebrates the 75-year marriage between a preeminent publication and its preeminent context with this collection of 44 of its best stories from (so to speak) home.
-
-
Great stories and readers, but technically sloppy
- By Alison on 09-08-04
By: Woody Allen, and others
-
The Interestings
- A Novel
- By: Meg Wolitzer
- Narrated by: Jen Tullock
- Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The summer that Nixon resigns, six teenagers at a summer camp for the arts become inseparable. Decades later the bond remains powerful, but so much else has changed. In The Interestings, Wolitzer follows these characters from the height of youth through middle age, as their talents, fortunes, and degrees of satisfaction diverge. The kind of creativity that is rewarded at age 15 is not always enough to propel someone through life at age 30; not everyone can sustain, in adulthood, what seemed so special in adolescence.
-
-
Needs a better title, but a good read (listen)
- By Tango on 04-12-13
By: Meg Wolitzer
-
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow
- A Novel
- By: Gabrielle Zevin
- Narrated by: Jennifer Kim, Julian Cihi
- Length: 13 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sam and Sadie—two college friends, often in love, but never lovers—become creative partners in a dazzling and intricately imagined world of video game design, where success brings them fame, joy, tragedy, duplicity, and, ultimately, a kind of immortality. It is a love story, but not one you have heard before.
-
-
This book sucked the life out of me
- By RMan on 08-08-22
By: Gabrielle Zevin
-
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
-
The Nix
- A Novel
- By: Nathan Hill
- Narrated by: Ari Fliakos
- Length: 21 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It’s 2011, and Samuel Andresen-Anderson—college professor, stalled writer—has a Nix of his own: his mother, Faye. He hasn’t seen her in decades, not since she abandoned the family when he was a boy. Now she’s re-appeared, having committed an absurd crime that electrifies the nightly news, beguiles the internet, and inflames a politically divided country. The media paints Faye as a radical hippie with a sordid past, but as far as Samuel knows, his mother was an ordinary girl who married her high-school sweetheart.
-
-
Is There An Editor In The House??
- By Sara on 11-03-16
By: Nathan Hill
-
Trust (Pulitzer Prize Winner)
- By: Hernan Diaz
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini, Jonathan Davis, Mozhan Marnò, and others
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Even through the roar and effervescence of the 1920s, everyone in New York has heard of Benjamin and Helen Rask. He is a legendary Wall Street tycoon; she is the daughter of eccentric aristocrats. Together, they have risen to the very top of a world of seemingly endless wealth—all as a decade of excess and speculation draws to an end. But at what cost have they acquired their immense fortune? This is the mystery at the center of Bonds, a successful 1937 novel that all of New York seems to have read. Yet there are other versions of this tale of privilege and deceit.
-
-
Before Purchasing
- By JLDLOfficial on 08-13-22
By: Hernan Diaz
-
The Great Gatsby
- By: F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Narrated by: Jake Gyllenhaal
- Length: 4 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic American novel of the Roaring Twenties is beloved by generations of readers and stands as his crowning work. This new audio edition, authorized by the Fitzgerald estate, is narrated by Oscar-nominated actor Jake Gyllenhaal (Brokeback Mountain). Gyllenhaal's performance is a faithful delivery in the voice of Nick Carraway, the Midwesterner turned New York bond salesman, who rents a small house next door to the mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby....
-
-
Simple, Beautiful, and Exquisitely Textured
- By Darwin8u on 04-09-13
-
Rules of Civility
- A Novel
- By: Amor Towles
- Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On the last night of 1937, 25-year-old Katey Kontent is in a second-rate Greenwich Village jazz bar when Tinker Grey, a handsome banker, happens to sit down at the neighboring table. This chance encounter and its startling consequences propel Katey on a year-long journey into the upper echelons of New York society - where she will have little to rely upon other than a bracing wit and her own brand of cool nerve.
-
-
Bright Young Things in a Dark World
- By Michele Kellett on 08-13-12
By: Amor Towles
-
Fates and Furies
- A Novel
- By: Lauren Groff
- Narrated by: Will Damron, Julia Whelan
- Length: 14 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the award-winning, New York Times best-selling author of The Monsters of Templeton, Arcadia, Florida and Matrix, an exhilarating novel about marriage, creativity, art, and perception. Fates and Furies is a literary masterpiece that defies expectation. A dazzling examination of a marriage, it is also a portrait of creative partnership written by one of the best writers of her generation. Every story has two sides. Every relationship has two perspectives.
-
-
Paean to Marriage, Mythology and Theatre
- By W Perry Hall on 09-20-15
By: Lauren Groff
-
Wild
- From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail
- By: Cheryl Strayed
- Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne
- Length: 13 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At 22, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother's death, her family scattered and her own marriage was soon destroyed. Four years later, with nothing more to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life: to hike the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State - and to do it alone. She had no experience as a long-distance hiker, and the trail was little more than “an idea, vague and outlandish and full of promise.” But it was a promise of piecing back together a life that had come undone.
-
-
Glad I Took the Trip
- By FanB14 on 04-08-13
By: Cheryl Strayed
-
The Magicians
- A Novel
- By: Lev Grossman
- Narrated by: Mark Bramhall
- Length: 17 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Quentin Coldwater is brilliant but miserable. A senior in high school, he's still secretly preoccupied with a series of fantasy novels he read as a child, set in a magical land called Fillory. Imagine his surprise when he finds himself unexpectedly admitted to a very secret, very exclusive college of magic in upstate New York, where he receives a thorough and rigorous education in the craft of modern sorcery.
-
-
Not an average book
- By Kyle on 04-30-11
By: Lev Grossman
Critic reviews
“The sound of silk drawn across fine-grain sandpaper best describes David Pittu's voice in THE MARRIAGE PLOT, by Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Jeffrey Eugenides...The talented Pittu rises to the occasion of this challenging work, rewarding the listener with a sense of satisfaction reserved for great works of literature.”—AudioFile magazine, An Earphones Award Winner
“David Pittu brilliantly narrates this audio version of Eugenides' complex novel, whether he's rattling off quotes from Jacques Derrida and Roland Barthes or creating unique voices for the book's many characters. Among the standouts are his renditions of the slow and reflective Mitchell and Thurston, the star of the semiotics seminar who speaks in a falsely laconic and disinterested fashion to impress his classmates and professor… [Pittu] never runs out of voices for this large, global cast. The result is one of the best audiobooks of the year.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review
“No one's more adept at channeling teenage angst than Jeffrey Eugenides. Not even J. D. Salinger . . . It's in mapping Mitchell's search for some sort of belief that might fill the spiritual hole in his heart and Madeleine's search for a way to turn her passion for literature into a vocation that this novel is at its most affecting, reminding us with uncommon understanding what it is to be young and idealistic, in pursuit of true love and in love with books and ideas.”—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
“This is a story about being young and bright and lost, a story Americans have been telling since Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises. Our exceptionally well-read but largely untested graduates still wonder: How should I live my life? What can I really believe in? Whom should I love? Literature has provided a wide range of answers to those questions—Lose Lady Brett! Give up on Daisy! Go with Team Edward!—but in the end, novels aren't really very good guidebooks. Instead, they're a chance to exercise our moral imagination, and this one provides an exceptionally witty and poignant workout.”—Ron Charles, The Washington Post
Related to this topic
-
Bright Lights, Big City
- By: Jay McInerney
- Narrated by: Daniel Passer
- Length: 5 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The tragicomedy of a young man in New York City, a writer, never named, who works as a fact-checker for a prestigious magazine. He struggles with the reality of his mother's death, alienation, and the seductive pull of drugs and a vibrant nightlife.
-
-
Curiously, mundanely real
- By Amber on 01-07-12
By: Jay McInerney
-
Bettyville
- By: George Hodgman
- Narrated by: Jeff Woodman
- Length: 10 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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...
-
-
Title Should Be Georgeville-It's All About George
- By Sara on 10-08-15
By: George Hodgman
-
Confessions of a Latter-Day Virgin
- A Memoir
- By: Nicole Hardy
- Narrated by: Nicole Hardy
- Length: 10 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Nicole Hardy’s eye-opening "Modern Love" column appeared in the New York Times, the response from readers was overwhelming. Hardy’s essay, which exposed the conflict between being true to herself as a woman and remaining true to her Mormon faith, struck a chord with women coast-to-coast. Now in her funny, intimate, and thoughtful memoir, Nicole Hardy explores how she came, at the age of 35, to a crossroads regarding her faith and her identity.
-
-
This Book Spoke to Me
- By Allison on 04-08-14
By: Nicole Hardy
-
Saints for All Occasions
- A Novel
- By: J. Courtney Sullivan
- Narrated by: Susan Denaker
- Length: 15 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Nora and Theresa Flynn are 21 and 17 when they leave their small village in Ireland and journey to America. Nora is the responsible sister; she's shy and serious and engaged to a man she isn't sure that she loves. Theresa is gregarious; she is thrilled by their new life in Boston and besotted with the fashionable dresses and dance halls on Dudley Street. But when Theresa ends up pregnant, Nora is forced to come up with a plan - a decision with repercussions they are both far too young to understand.
-
-
The narration ruined it
- By Janis Reynolds on 06-12-17
-
Fairyland
- A Memoir of My Father
- By: Alysia Abbott
- Narrated by: Alysia Abbott
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A beautiful, vibrant memoir about growing up motherless in 1970s and 80s San Francisco with an openly gay father. After his wife dies in a car accident, bisexual writer and activist Steve Abbott moves with his two-year-old daughter to San Francisco. There they discover a city in the midst of revolution, bustling with gay men in search of liberation - few of whom are raising a child. Steve throws himself into San Francisco's vibrant cultural scene.
-
-
Great representation of the time
- By AvidReader22 on 06-07-19
By: Alysia Abbott
-
The UnAmericans
- Stories
- By: Molly Antopol
- Narrated by: Jennifer Van Dyck
- Length: 7 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Again and again, Molly Antopol’s deeply sympathetic characters struggle for footing in an uncertain world, hounded by forces beyond their control. Their voices are intimate and powerful and they resonate with searing beauty. Antopol is a superb young talent, and The UnAmericans will long be remembered for its wit, humanity, and heart.
-
-
Sensational stories! Brilliant new author.
- By MidwestGeek on 05-04-14
By: Molly Antopol
-
Bright Lights, Big City
- By: Jay McInerney
- Narrated by: Daniel Passer
- Length: 5 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The tragicomedy of a young man in New York City, a writer, never named, who works as a fact-checker for a prestigious magazine. He struggles with the reality of his mother's death, alienation, and the seductive pull of drugs and a vibrant nightlife.
-
-
Curiously, mundanely real
- By Amber on 01-07-12
By: Jay McInerney
-
Bettyville
- By: George Hodgman
- Narrated by: Jeff Woodman
- Length: 10 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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...
-
-
Title Should Be Georgeville-It's All About George
- By Sara on 10-08-15
By: George Hodgman
-
Confessions of a Latter-Day Virgin
- A Memoir
- By: Nicole Hardy
- Narrated by: Nicole Hardy
- Length: 10 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Nicole Hardy’s eye-opening "Modern Love" column appeared in the New York Times, the response from readers was overwhelming. Hardy’s essay, which exposed the conflict between being true to herself as a woman and remaining true to her Mormon faith, struck a chord with women coast-to-coast. Now in her funny, intimate, and thoughtful memoir, Nicole Hardy explores how she came, at the age of 35, to a crossroads regarding her faith and her identity.
-
-
This Book Spoke to Me
- By Allison on 04-08-14
By: Nicole Hardy
-
Saints for All Occasions
- A Novel
- By: J. Courtney Sullivan
- Narrated by: Susan Denaker
- Length: 15 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Nora and Theresa Flynn are 21 and 17 when they leave their small village in Ireland and journey to America. Nora is the responsible sister; she's shy and serious and engaged to a man she isn't sure that she loves. Theresa is gregarious; she is thrilled by their new life in Boston and besotted with the fashionable dresses and dance halls on Dudley Street. But when Theresa ends up pregnant, Nora is forced to come up with a plan - a decision with repercussions they are both far too young to understand.
-
-
The narration ruined it
- By Janis Reynolds on 06-12-17
-
Fairyland
- A Memoir of My Father
- By: Alysia Abbott
- Narrated by: Alysia Abbott
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A beautiful, vibrant memoir about growing up motherless in 1970s and 80s San Francisco with an openly gay father. After his wife dies in a car accident, bisexual writer and activist Steve Abbott moves with his two-year-old daughter to San Francisco. There they discover a city in the midst of revolution, bustling with gay men in search of liberation - few of whom are raising a child. Steve throws himself into San Francisco's vibrant cultural scene.
-
-
Great representation of the time
- By AvidReader22 on 06-07-19
By: Alysia Abbott
-
The UnAmericans
- Stories
- By: Molly Antopol
- Narrated by: Jennifer Van Dyck
- Length: 7 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Again and again, Molly Antopol’s deeply sympathetic characters struggle for footing in an uncertain world, hounded by forces beyond their control. Their voices are intimate and powerful and they resonate with searing beauty. Antopol is a superb young talent, and The UnAmericans will long be remembered for its wit, humanity, and heart.
-
-
Sensational stories! Brilliant new author.
- By MidwestGeek on 05-04-14
By: Molly Antopol
-
All You Could Ask For
- A Novel
- By: Mike Greenberg
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert
- Length: 9 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Happily married Brooke discovers her loving husband has led a separate life with…another wife. Newlywed Samantha learns of her husband's cheating heart when she finds the goods on his computer. High-powered career woman Katherine works with heartbreaker Phillip, the man who hurt her early on in her career. Brooke, Samantha, and Katherine don't know one another, but their stories are about to intertwine in ways no one could have imagined. And all three are about to discover the power of friendship to conquer adversity.
-
-
Annoyed by Hidden Theme
- By parsnip on 08-12-13
By: Mike Greenberg
-
The Wife
- A Novel
- By: Meg Wolitzer
- Narrated by: Dawn Harvey
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The moment Joan Castleman decides to leave her husband, they are 35,000 feet above the ocean on a flight to Helsinki. Joan's husband, Joseph, is one of America's preeminent novelists, about to receive a prestigious international award, and Joan, who has spent 40 years subjugating her own literary talents to fan the flames of his career, has finally decided to stop.
-
-
A bit of a downer
- By Jody Cox on 08-01-18
By: Meg Wolitzer
-
Strong Motion
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: Scott Aiello
- Length: 20 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Louis Holland arrives in Boston in a spring of ecological upheaval (a rash of earthquakes on the North Shore) and odd luck: the first one kills his grandmother. Louis tries to maintain his independence, but falls in love with a Harvard seismologist whose discoveries about the earthquakes' cause complicate everything.
-
-
Compelling Story, Ridiculous Narrator
- By DianeReads on 02-28-16
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
Insomniac City
- New York, Oliver, and Me
- By: Bill Hayes
- Narrated by: Stephen Bel Davies
- Length: 6 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Bill Hayes came to New York City in 2009 with a one-way ticket and only the vaguest idea of how he would get by. But, at 48 years old, having spent decades in San Francisco, he craved change. Grieving over the death of his partner, he quickly discovered the profound consolations of the city's incessant rhythms, the sight of the Empire State Building against the night sky, and New Yorkers themselves, kindred souls that Hayes, a lifelong insomniac, encountered on late-night strolls with his camera.
-
-
Touching and Intimate Portrait
- By Amazon Customer on 01-18-19
By: Bill Hayes
-
If I Forget You
- A Novel
- By: Thomas Christopher Greene
- Narrated by: Kevin Pariseau
- Length: 6 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Twenty-one years after they were driven apart by circumstances beyond their control, two former lovers have a chance encounter on a Manhattan street. What follows is a tense, suspenseful exploration of the many facets of enduring love. Told from alternating points of view through time, If I Forget You tells the story of Henry Gold, a poet whose rise from poverty embodies the American dream, and Margot Fuller, the daughter of a prominent, wealthy family, and their unlikely, star-crossed love affair.
-
-
Good, but not great.
- By Amazon Customer on 07-01-16
-
The Night Ocean
- By: Paul La Farge
- Narrated by: Elisabeth Rodgers
- Length: 13 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Marina Willett, MD, has a problem. Her husband, Charlie, has become obsessed with H. P. Lovecraft, in particular with one episode in the legendary horror writer's life: In the summer of 1934, the "old gent" lived for two months with a gay teenage fan named Robert Barlow, at Barlow's family home in central Florida. What were the two of them up to? Were they friends - or something more? Just when Charlie thinks he's solved the puzzle, a new scandal erupts, and he disappears.
-
-
Frustratingly Uneven Due to Clumsy Plot Structure
- By Adam on 06-15-17
By: Paul La Farge
-
Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules (Unabridged Selections)
- By: Edited by David Sedaris
- Narrated by: David Sedaris, Mary-Louise Parker, Cherry Jones
- Length: 2 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules is a collection of short stories, some classic, others impending, selected and introduced by David Sedaris.
-
-
Great stories but only 5 of 17 are included
- By Terri Kirk on 07-13-12
-
The Finishing School
- A Novel
- By: Joanna Goodman
- Narrated by: Andi Arndt
- Length: 8 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One spring night in 1998, the beautiful Cressida Strauss plunges from a fourth-floor balcony at the Lycée Internationale Suisse with catastrophic consequences. Loath to draw negative publicity to the school, a bastion of European wealth and glamour, officials quickly dismiss the incident as an accident, but questions remain. Was it a suicide attempt? Or was Cressida pushed? It was no secret that she had a selfish streak and had earned as many enemies as allies in her tenure at the school.
-
-
this book was just ok
- By Josh Fields on 02-26-20
By: Joanna Goodman
-
I'm Supposed to Protect You from All This
- A Memoir
- By: Nadja Spiegelman
- Narrated by: Nadja Spiegelman
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For a long time, Nadja Spiegelman believed her mother was a fairy. More than her famous father, Maus creator Art Spiegelman, and even more than most mothers, hers - French-born New Yorker art director Françoise Mouly - exerted a force over reality that was both dazzling and daunting. As Nadja's body changed and "began to whisper to the adults around me in a language I did not understand", their relationship grew tense.
-
-
Aweful
- By Haley Abreu on 07-05-17
By: Nadja Spiegelman
-
Full Circle
- By: Michael Thomas Ford
- Narrated by: Blake Somerset
- Length: 17 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
History professor Ned Brummel is living happily with his partner of 12 years in small-town Maine when he receives a phone call from his estranged friend - Jack - telling him that another friend - Andy - is very ill and possibly near death. As Ned boards a plane to Chicago on his way to his friend's bedside, he embarks on another journey into memory, examining the major events and small moments that have shaped his world and his relationships with these two very different, very important men.
-
-
To Every Season...
- By Donald on 10-01-13
-
The Ramblers
- A Novel
- By: Aidan Donnelley Rowley
- Narrated by: Erica Sullivan
- Length: 11 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in the most magical parts of Manhattan - the Upper West Side, Central Park, Greenwich Village - The Ramblers explores the lives of three lost souls bound together by friendship and family. During the course of one fateful Thanksgiving week, a time when emotions run high and being with family can be a mixed blessing, Rowley's sharply defined characters explore the moments when decisions are deliberately made, choices accepted, and pasts reconciled.
-
-
Lovely Portrait of The City
- By Dingo27 on 02-19-16
-
After the Parade
- By: Lori Ostlund
- Narrated by: Sean Runnette
- Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
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.
-
-
Narrator
- By Barbara on 11-10-24
By: Lori Ostlund
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
Fresh Complaint
- Stories
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Jeffrey Eugenides, Ari Fliakos, Cynthia Nixon
- Length: 8 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The stories in Fresh Complaint explore equally rich—and intriguing—territory. Ranging from the bitingly reproductive antics of “Baster” to the dreamy, moving account of a young traveler’s search for enlightenment in “Air Mail” (selected by Annie Proulx for Best American Short Stories), this collection presents characters in the midst of personal and national emergencies. We meet a failed poet who, envious of other people’s wealth during the real-estate bubble, becomes an embezzler; a clavichordist whose dreams of art founder under the obligations of marriage and fatherhood.
-
-
You’ll love this book if you love hearing about bodily fluids on a regular basis.
- By Cynthia C. Stellar on 11-13-17
-
Middlesex
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Kristoffer Tabori
- Length: 21 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 1974, Calliope Stephanides, a student at a girls' school in Grosse Pointe, finds herself drawn to a chain-smoking, strawberry-blonde classmate with a gift for acting. The passion that furtively develops between them - along with Callie's failure to develop physically - leads Callie to suspect that she is not like other girls. In fact, she is not really a girl at all.
-
-
Anything but middle.
- By Michael on 05-04-03
-
The Virgin Suicides
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Nick Landrum
- Length: 8 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This nationally best-selling novel from Pulitzer Prize-winner Jeffrey Eugenides was adapted into an acclaimed film by Academy Award-winner Sofia Coppola. A haunting yet wickedly funny tale, The Virgin Suicides has captivated countless readers with its intoxicating portrait of lost innocence. A brilliant fusion of dark humor and tragedy, it is an atmospheric, allegorical masterpiece about five oppressed, suicidal sisters and the boys who dream of rescuing them.
-
-
Read this if you want to enjoy this audiobook
- By Lexi Lou on 11-06-13
-
The Tiger's Wife
- A Novel
- By: Tea Obreht
- Narrated by: Susan Duerden, Robin Sachs
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a Balkan country mending from war, Natalia, a young doctor, is compelled to unravel the mysterious circumstances surrounding her beloved grandfather’s recent death. Searching for clues, she turns to his worn copy of The Jungle Book and the stories he told her of his encounters over the years with “the deathless man.” But most extraordinary of all is the story her grandfather never told her - the legend of the tiger’s wife.
-
-
Not a fan
- By Pamela Harvey on 03-31-11
By: Tea Obreht
-
Chances Are...
- A Novel
- By: Richard Russo
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 11 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One beautiful September day, three men convene on Martha's Vineyard, friends ever since meeting in college circa the 60s. They couldn't have been more different then, or even today - Lincoln's a commercial real estate broker, Teddy a tiny-press publisher, and Mickey a musician beyond his rockin' age. But each man holds his own secrets, in addition to the monumental mystery that none of them has ever stopped puzzling over since a Memorial Day weekend right here on the Vineyard in 1971: the disappearance of the woman each of them loved - Jacy Calloway.
-
-
Incredibly Disappointing
- By Brent Duncan on 08-28-19
By: Richard Russo
-
Sorrow and Bliss
- A Novel
- By: Meg Mason
- Narrated by: Emilia Fox
- Length: 10 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Martha Friel just turned forty. Once, she worked at Vogue and planned to write a novel. Now, she creates internet content. She used to live in a pied-à-terre in Paris. Now she lives in a gated community in Oxford, the only person she knows without a PhD, a baby or both, in a house she hates but cannot bear to leave. But she must leave, now that her husband Patrick—the kind who cooks, throws her birthday parties, who loves her and has only ever wanted her to be happy—has just moved out.
-
-
Very Disappointed -- 2.75 Stars
- By Sharlotte on 06-07-21
By: Meg Mason
-
Fresh Complaint
- Stories
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Jeffrey Eugenides, Ari Fliakos, Cynthia Nixon
- Length: 8 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The stories in Fresh Complaint explore equally rich—and intriguing—territory. Ranging from the bitingly reproductive antics of “Baster” to the dreamy, moving account of a young traveler’s search for enlightenment in “Air Mail” (selected by Annie Proulx for Best American Short Stories), this collection presents characters in the midst of personal and national emergencies. We meet a failed poet who, envious of other people’s wealth during the real-estate bubble, becomes an embezzler; a clavichordist whose dreams of art founder under the obligations of marriage and fatherhood.
-
-
You’ll love this book if you love hearing about bodily fluids on a regular basis.
- By Cynthia C. Stellar on 11-13-17
-
Middlesex
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Kristoffer Tabori
- Length: 21 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 1974, Calliope Stephanides, a student at a girls' school in Grosse Pointe, finds herself drawn to a chain-smoking, strawberry-blonde classmate with a gift for acting. The passion that furtively develops between them - along with Callie's failure to develop physically - leads Callie to suspect that she is not like other girls. In fact, she is not really a girl at all.
-
-
Anything but middle.
- By Michael on 05-04-03
-
The Virgin Suicides
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Nick Landrum
- Length: 8 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This nationally best-selling novel from Pulitzer Prize-winner Jeffrey Eugenides was adapted into an acclaimed film by Academy Award-winner Sofia Coppola. A haunting yet wickedly funny tale, The Virgin Suicides has captivated countless readers with its intoxicating portrait of lost innocence. A brilliant fusion of dark humor and tragedy, it is an atmospheric, allegorical masterpiece about five oppressed, suicidal sisters and the boys who dream of rescuing them.
-
-
Read this if you want to enjoy this audiobook
- By Lexi Lou on 11-06-13
-
The Tiger's Wife
- A Novel
- By: Tea Obreht
- Narrated by: Susan Duerden, Robin Sachs
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a Balkan country mending from war, Natalia, a young doctor, is compelled to unravel the mysterious circumstances surrounding her beloved grandfather’s recent death. Searching for clues, she turns to his worn copy of The Jungle Book and the stories he told her of his encounters over the years with “the deathless man.” But most extraordinary of all is the story her grandfather never told her - the legend of the tiger’s wife.
-
-
Not a fan
- By Pamela Harvey on 03-31-11
By: Tea Obreht
-
Chances Are...
- A Novel
- By: Richard Russo
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 11 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One beautiful September day, three men convene on Martha's Vineyard, friends ever since meeting in college circa the 60s. They couldn't have been more different then, or even today - Lincoln's a commercial real estate broker, Teddy a tiny-press publisher, and Mickey a musician beyond his rockin' age. But each man holds his own secrets, in addition to the monumental mystery that none of them has ever stopped puzzling over since a Memorial Day weekend right here on the Vineyard in 1971: the disappearance of the woman each of them loved - Jacy Calloway.
-
-
Incredibly Disappointing
- By Brent Duncan on 08-28-19
By: Richard Russo
-
Sorrow and Bliss
- A Novel
- By: Meg Mason
- Narrated by: Emilia Fox
- Length: 10 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Martha Friel just turned forty. Once, she worked at Vogue and planned to write a novel. Now, she creates internet content. She used to live in a pied-à-terre in Paris. Now she lives in a gated community in Oxford, the only person she knows without a PhD, a baby or both, in a house she hates but cannot bear to leave. But she must leave, now that her husband Patrick—the kind who cooks, throws her birthday parties, who loves her and has only ever wanted her to be happy—has just moved out.
-
-
Very Disappointed -- 2.75 Stars
- By Sharlotte on 06-07-21
By: Meg Mason
-
The Goldfinch
- By: Donna Tartt
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 32 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Goldfinch is a haunted odyssey through present-day America and a drama of enthralling force and acuity. It begins with a boy. Theo Decker, a 13-year-old New Yorker, miraculously survives an accident that kills his mother. Abandoned by his father, Theo is taken in by the family of a wealthy friend. Bewildered by his strange new home on Park Avenue, disturbed by schoolmates who don't know how to talk to him, and tormented above all by his unbearable longing for his mother, he clings to one thing that reminds him of her: a small, mysteriously captivating painting that ultimately draws Theo into the underworld of art.
-
-
Boy, am I in the minority on this one.
- By Bonny on 11-04-13
By: Donna Tartt
-
The Interestings
- A Novel
- By: Meg Wolitzer
- Narrated by: Jen Tullock
- Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The summer that Nixon resigns, six teenagers at a summer camp for the arts become inseparable. Decades later the bond remains powerful, but so much else has changed. In The Interestings, Wolitzer follows these characters from the height of youth through middle age, as their talents, fortunes, and degrees of satisfaction diverge. The kind of creativity that is rewarded at age 15 is not always enough to propel someone through life at age 30; not everyone can sustain, in adulthood, what seemed so special in adolescence.
-
-
Needs a better title, but a good read (listen)
- By Tango on 04-12-13
By: Meg Wolitzer
-
The Lover
- By: Marguerite Duras
- Narrated by: Kathleen Gati
- Length: 3 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in the prewar Indochina of Marguerite Duras's childhood, this is the haunting tale of a tumultuous affair between an adolescent French girl and her Chinese lover. In spare yet luminous prose, Duras evokes life on the margins of Saigon in the waning days of France's colonial empire, and its representation in the passionate relationship between two unforgettable outcasts.
-
-
Not a favorite
- By Sharon Isaac on 10-12-24
By: Marguerite Duras
-
Eleanor & Park
- A Novel
- By: Rainbow Rowell
- Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman, Sunil Malhotra
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set over the course of one school year in 1986, this is the story of two star-crossed misfits-smart enough to know that first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try. When Eleanor meets Park, you'll remember your own first love—and just how hard it pulled you under.
-
-
Brilliantly written and truly heartwarming
- By Angela L. on 09-11-24
By: Rainbow Rowell
-
The Guest
- A Novel
- By: Emma Cline
- Narrated by: Carlotta Brentan
- Length: 8 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Summer is coming to a close on the East End of Long Island, and Alex is no longer welcome. A misstep at a dinner party, and the older man she’s been staying with dismisses her with a ride to the train station and a ticket back to the city. With few resources and a waterlogged phone, but gifted with an ability to navigate the desires of others, Alex stays on Long Island and drifts like a ghost through the hedged lanes, gated driveways, and sun-blasted dunes of a rarefied world that is, at first, closed to her.
-
-
We’ve known an Alex
- By Will Cathcart on 06-20-23
By: Emma Cline
-
The Best Short Stories 2024
- The O. Henry Prize Winners
- By: Amor Towles - editor, Jenny Minton Quigley - editor
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini, Kristen DiMercurio, Blair Young, and others
- Length: 13 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The prestigious annual story anthology, featuring prize-winning stories by Kate DiCamillo, Jess Walter, Dave Eggers, Allegra Goodman, Jai Chakrabarti, Francisco Gonzalez, and more.
-
-
Superb!
- By Andre on 10-12-24
By: Amor Towles - editor, and others
-
The Corrections
- A Novel
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 21 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Corrections is a grandly entertaining novel for the new century--a comic, tragic masterpiece about a family breaking down in an age of easy fixes. After almost 50 years as a wife and mother, Enid Lambert is ready to have some fun. Unfortunately, her husband, Alfred, is losing his sanity to Parkinson's disease, and their children have long since flown the family nest to the catastrophes of their own lives. Enid has set her heart on an elusive goal: bringing her family together for one last Christmas at home.
-
-
"Grandly Entertaining"? Really?
- By Georgia Burns on 10-08-13
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
The Secret History
- A Novel
- By: Donna Tartt
- Narrated by: Donna Tartt
- Length: 22 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Under the influence of a charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at a New England college discover a way of thought and life a world away from their banal contemporaries. But their search for the transcendent leads them down a dangerous path, beyond human constructs of morality.
-
-
Horrible narration
- By M. Cardoso on 07-23-23
By: Donna Tartt
-
Stoner
- By: John Williams
- Narrated by: Robin Field
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
William Stoner is born at the end of the 19th century into a dirt-poor Missouri farming family. Sent to the state university to study agronomy, he instead falls in love with English literature and embraces a scholar's life, far different from the hardscrabble existence he has known. And yet as the years pass, Stoner encounters a succession of disappointments.
-
-
A story of sadness and serenity
- By Anton on 10-13-12
By: John Williams
-
Crossroads
- A Novel
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 24 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jonathan Franzen’s novels are celebrated for their unforgettably vivid characters and for their keen-eyed take on contemporary America. Now, in Crossroads, Franzen ventures back into the past and explores the history of two generations. With characteristic humor and complexity, and with even greater warmth, he conjures a world that resonates powerfully with our own.
-
-
How do narrators still do clownish stuff like this in 2021?
- By Hotrodimus on 10-30-21
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
Atonement
- By: Ian McEwan
- Narrated by: Jill Tanner
- Length: 14 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Atonement, three children lose their innocence, as the sweltering summer heat bears down on the hottest day in 1935, and their lives are changed forever. Cecilia Tallis is of England's priviledged class; Robbie Turner is the housekeeper's son. In their moment of intimate surrender, they are interrupted by Cecilia's hyperimaginative and scheming 13-year-old sister, Briony. And as chaos consumes the family, Briony commits a crime, the guilt of which she shall carry throughout her life.
-
-
An amazing book about complex human perception
- By Amazon Customer on 08-17-04
By: Ian McEwan
-
Absolution
- A Novel
- By: Alice McDermott
- Narrated by: Jesse Vilinsky, Rachel Kenney
- Length: 10 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
American women—American wives—have been mostly minor characters in the literature of the Vietnam War, but in Absolution they take center stage. Tricia is a shy newlywed, married to a rising attorney on loan to navy intelligence. Charlene is a practiced corporate spouse and mother of three, a beauty and a bully. In Saigon in 1963, the two women form a wary alliance as they balance the era’s mandate to be “helpmeets” to their ambitious husbands with their own, inchoate impulse to “do good” for the people of Vietnam.
-
-
Hung in there for 2 1/2 hours but had to return it
- By Jackie in MI on 11-14-23
By: Alice McDermott
What listeners say about The Marriage Plot
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amanda
- 12-04-11
A Great Deal More Than Meets The Eye
I repeatedly disregarded this selection, worried it would be a trite romance story that would have little to engage me. I was wrong.
The year is 1982, and three young people are graduating from Brown University. They have qualities that are often found in young graduates; very sure of their own opinions, very proud of their own intellect, and perhaps a bit unaware of their own self-indulgence. Most of us have been there; it's easy for the world to appear "black and white" when you're young.
For me, this book was a beautiful, smart, and effective novel of how people transition from those qualities, to adults that better understand the difficult, complicated realities of the "real world". The story is everything the characters are not; it's self aware, humble, and honest. It took situations that are often glossed over or romanticized, and instead presented them in realistic terms; addressing mental illness, poverty, and the unexpected consequences that so often follow rash decisions. It was refreshing to see these presented as they really are.
This could sound like a depressing topic; but the book was far from it. It was funny, sensitive, and insightful. The story begins at Brown, but travels to France, Monaco, Greece, and India. The unique way the narrative moves backwards and forwards in time highlighted how often we work off of partial information; having you form one opinion of an event, only to go back later and provide more information that may make you re-think your opinion.
I loved this book. For me, it's one of those novels that makes it hard to pick the next book, because you don't want another one - you want more of this story, of these people. I'm so glad I finally gave it a chance.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
46 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Dorothy
- 03-10-14
Fantastic Comtemporary Twist on the Marriage Plot
If you could sum up The Marriage Plot in three words, what would they be?
Expectant. Youthful. Attraction.
What was one of the most memorable moments of The Marriage Plot?
The description of the the alums lining up on graduation day reminded me of my daughter's graduation from a similar school. One old alum is described in Madeline's mind as a 'bog person" and it made me laugh out loud. Since I attended college during this exact time period, the book felt very nostalgic. I think he captured the era, the late 70's early 80's perfectly.
What about David Pittu’s performance did you like?
I adore David Pittu. I avoided reading this book due to the mediocre reviews it received. What a shame! Yet, I loved David Pittu's reading of the Goldfinch SO MUCH, I decided to try this one just because I enjoy him so much. He reads Northeastern charachters so well and I enjoy his interpretation of women more than so many other male readers. I love Mitchell's voice and Madeline's mother.
If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?
"What if Mr.Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett really weren't meant for each other after all..."
Any additional comments?
I loved this book. I loved it more than Middlesex. I think many of the tepid reviews are a result of intellectual jealousy and bias. I found this book to be incredibly thought provoking and the author's ability to convey the inner turmoil and intellectual struggles of young, newly graduated twenty somethings was moving and something I found myself remembering about my own post graduate experience. I am an amateur Victorianist myself and great lover of Jane Austen, Eliot and Trollope. This novel is perfectly constructed as a 'marriage plot" novel. It reminded me at times of Middlemarch. The twist comes at the end and is quite real and very human. I also loved the refreshing exploration of spirituality the character Mitchell indulges in. It was not gratuitous in the least. I really did enjoy this book and listened to it in two sittings.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
9 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Anna Sikorsky
- 09-08-18
I loved this book!
I have enjoyed other books by this author and this one did not disappoint. It is a well constructed plot with sympathetic, complex characters and refreshingly different than any fiction I've read recently. And well narrated too.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- ccinpdx
- 01-16-12
Surprising
Don't let the title fool you. There is so much depth and many layers to this book.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Pamela M
- 02-14-12
It's a true 5 star book
Where does The Marriage Plot rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?
This book is at the top of my list
Who was your favorite character and why?
Mitchell - he had the most to learn
Which character – as performed by David Pittu – was your favorite?
Mitchell
Who was the most memorable character of The Marriage Plot and why?
Leonard and his manic depression was extraordinary
Any additional comments?
I loved this book - kept my attention each and every minute.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Taryn
- 11-08-11
realistic
I enjoyed listening to this book probably because I am living a little bit of this story with my 3 adult children right now. Eugenides describes them and their peers to a tee, their lifestyle, their behaviors, their beliefs that by being privledged and intellectual they have somehow reinvented life, love, sex, relationships, marriage, work, etc..... I think he did a great job of updating the marriage plot and I was neither bored nor disapointed. This is not, Middlesex, but it has its own merits and I think he succeeds.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
13 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- connie
- 10-22-11
reframing marriage plot, post industrial, post mdn
Like one of the 19th Brit masterpieces centered on the marriage plot, you can get lost in this listen just through the characters, story and gentle social comedy of manners; however, instead of examining an ISSUE through its plot, it's a bit Orlando-like in examining the state of narrative fiction (post-post modern in disguise?).
Though set in the 1980s, it seems really to be about narrative fiction today, much like the traditional masterpiece referents were often written slightly out of the timeframe they address. I rated it overall as a only 4 star listen because I did not think the narrator the best voice for all three major characters, and at my age, narrative fiction (even at its best) about 20th century 20- something Ivy Leaguers, WASP and otherwise, is not my first choice of subject matter.
Long live the novel, and the marriage plot, however they emerge in western postindustrial, post modern society. Both are worth the journey in this listen.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
10 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Maria
- 01-21-12
Feels like a book you'd read in school
The Marriage Plot is an easy read. It's one of those books though that reminds me of something you would read in school. Filled with symbolically significant bits that reflect on each character, the book takes on, at least for me, a very scholastic demeanour.
If you like a plot-centred book, this might not be for you. There is a lot of character development but action is slow. Too slow, at times...
Still, an enjoyable listen and an interesting portrayal on how marriage and sexuality is dealt with these days.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Mary
- 08-06-12
Forgettable
Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?
Not really. None of the characters was all that memorable. I didn't identify with anyone or root for them. I kept listening wanting it to blossom into something. But it didn't.
Would you be willing to try another book from Jeffrey Eugenides? Why or why not?
I loved MIDDLESEX.
Any additional comments?
Literally, I can't remember any scenes as my favorites because it all seemed so forgettable.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Actius Citius
- 06-28-12
No puede compararse con Middlesex, pero engancha
Would you listen to The Marriage Plot again? Why?
Aunque está bien, no, no es para escucharlo dos veces.
What did you like best about this story?
Me gustó la frescura de los tres personajes principales. La descripción del paso de la adolescencia al mundo de los adultos.
What does David Pittu bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
Sus voces son buenas, y su pronunciación del inglés fantástica :) Yo estoy aprendiendo y me gustó.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!