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The Wings of the Dove
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 22 hrs and 55 mins
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Publisher's summary
Milly Theale is a young, beautiful, and fabulously wealthy American. When she arrives in London and meets the equally beautiful but impoverished Kate Croy, they form an intimate friendship. But nothing is as it seems: materialism, romance, self-delusion, and ultimately fatal illness insidiously contaminate the glamorous social whirl.
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To curate a list of famous American writers who are also considered among the best American authors, a few things count: current ratings for their works, their particular time periods in history, critical reception, their prevalence in the 21st century, and yes, the awards they won. Many of these authors are taught in school today. From Hemingway to Harper Lee, these famous American authors are all worthy of enduring recognition—and a fresh listen!
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When Catherine Morland, a country clergyman's daughter, is invited to spend a season in Bath with the fashionable high society, little does she imagine the delights and perils that await her. Captivated and disconcerted by what she finds, and introduced to the joys of "Gothic novels" by her new friend, Isabella, Catherine longs for mystery and romance. When she is invited to stay with the beguiling Henry Tilney and his family at Northanger Abbey, she expects mystery and intrigue at every turn.
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Awesome
- By Johnny on 08-01-09
By: Jane Austen
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Agnes Grey
- By: Anne Brontë
- Narrated by: Emilia Fox
- Length: 6 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Having lost the family savings on risky investments, Richard Grey removes himself from family life and suffers a bout of depression. Feeling helpless and frustrated, his youngest daughter, Agnes, applies for a job as a governess to the children of a wealthy, upper-class, English family. Ecstatic at the thought that she has finally gained control and freedom over her own life, Agnes arrives at the Bloomfield mansion armed with confidence and purpose.
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Loved it
- By Kerry on 05-22-10
By: Anne Brontë
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Agnes Grey
- By: Anne Bronte
- Narrated by: Anne Flosnik
- Length: 6 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Written when women---and workers generally---had few rights in England, Agnes Grey exposes the brutal inequities of the rigid class system in mid-19th-century Britain. Agnes comes from a respectable middle-class family, but their financial reverses have forced her to seek work as a governess.
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Make.it.stop.
- By Wayne on 03-18-22
By: Anne Bronte
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The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
- By: Anne Brontë
- Narrated by: Mary Sarah Agliotta
- Length: 13 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Probably the most shocking of the Brontës' novels, this novel had an instant and phenomenal success and is widely considered to be one of the first sustained feminist novels. A mysterious widow, Mrs. Helen Graham, arrives at Wildfell Hall, a nearby old mansion. A source of curiosity for the small community, the reticent Helen and her young son Arthur are slowly drawn into the social circles of the village.
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A good story ruined by the narrator
- By i. Ski on 04-17-14
By: Anne Brontë
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The Mill on the Floss
- By: George Eliot
- Narrated by: Laura Paton
- Length: 20 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Maggie Tulliver has two lovers: Philip Wakem, son of her father’s enemy, and Stephen Guest, already promised to her cousin. But the love she wants most in the world is that of her brother Tom. Maggie’s struggle against her passionate and sensual nature leads her to a deeper understanding and to eventual tragedy
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Great compassion
- By nina lalumia on 12-26-16
By: George Eliot
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Middlemarch
- By: George Eliot
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 35 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Dorothea Brooke is an ardent idealist who represses her vivacity and intelligence for the cold, theological pedant Casaubon. One man understands her true nature: the artist Will Ladislaw. But how can love triumph against her sense of duty and Casaubon’s mean spirit? Meanwhile, in the little world of Middlemarch, the broader world is mirrored: the world of politics, social change, and reforms, as well as betrayal, greed, blackmail, ambition, and disappointment.
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Best Audible book ever
- By Molly-o on 12-25-11
By: George Eliot
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The Glimpses of the Moon
- By: Edith Wharton
- Narrated by: Kate Harper
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Nick Lansing and Susy Branch are young, attractive but impoverished New Yorkers. They are in love and decide to marry, but realise their chances of happiness are slim without the wealth and society that their more privileged friends take for granted. Nick and Susy agree to separate when either encounters a more eligible proposition.
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Great love story
- By Margaret on 02-03-23
By: Edith Wharton
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Couldn't get past the terrible American accents.
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excellent reading
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Henry James can be hard to follow but worth it
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When Isabel Archer, a beautiful, spirited American, is brought to Europe by her wealthy aunt Touchett, it is expected that she will soon marry. But Isabel, resolved to enjoy the freedom that her fortune has opened up and to determine her own fate, does not hesitate to turn down two eligible suitors, declaring that she will never marry. It is only when she finds herself irresistibly drawn to the cultivated but worthless Gilbert Osmond that she discovers that wealth is a two-edged sword.
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Highly recommended
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American Lambert Strether is sent to Paris on behalf of Mrs. Newsome, his fiancée, to collect her son, Chad. When Strether finds Chad, he discovers an altered man and becomes introduced to a free and unconventional style of life that soon intoxicates him. His views begin to change; the morality of Woollett, his hometown, becomes foreign, and the "ambassador" loses sight of his mission....
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Interesting but unfulfilling
- By Michael on 05-21-19
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If you don't love this book, it's your fault
- By Viewer on 09-14-18
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Couldn't get past the terrible American accents.
- By Sarah on 04-07-17
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excellent reading
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Henry James can be hard to follow but worth it
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Highly recommended
- By David on 06-26-10
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American Lambert Strether is sent to Paris on behalf of Mrs. Newsome, his fiancée, to collect her son, Chad. When Strether finds Chad, he discovers an altered man and becomes introduced to a free and unconventional style of life that soon intoxicates him. His views begin to change; the morality of Woollett, his hometown, becomes foreign, and the "ambassador" loses sight of his mission....
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Interesting but unfulfilling
- By Michael on 05-21-19
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The Bostonians
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From Boston's social underworld emerges Verena Tarrant, a girl with extraordinary oratorical gifts, which she deploys in tawdry meeting-houses on behalf of "the sisterhood of women". She acquires two admirers of a very different stamp: Olive Chancellor, devotee of radical causes, and marked out for tragedy; and Basil Ransom, veteran of the Civil War, with rigid views concerning society and women's place therein. Is the lovely, lighthearted Verena made for public movements or private passions?
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insightful and intricate portrayal of women from multiple perspectives in history of womens suffrage movement
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Beautiful Kate Croy may have been left penniless by her relatives, but her bold, ambitious nature ensures she will not succumb meekly to a life of poverty. If the financial circumstances of Merton Densher, the man she is passionately in love with, are not sufficient to secure her future, perhaps her cunning will.
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great book ruined by performer
- By Renate on 05-02-16
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The Golden Bowl
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The Dean of Innuendo weaves a tale of a complex romantic quadrangle when a wealthy collector of objets d'arte and his daughter innocently marry a pair of lovers, the beautiful Charlotte and a charming Italian prince. Complications ensue.
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When Isabel Archer, a young American woman with looks, wit, and imagination, arrives in Europe, she sees the world as "a place of brightness, of free expression, of irresistible action". She turns aside from suitors who offer her their wealth and devotion to follow her own path.
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Bleak and believable
- By Karen on 04-26-09
By: Henry James
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Mrs. Dalloway
- By: Virginia Woolf
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
It is a June day in London in 1923, and the lovely Clarissa Dalloway is having a party. Whom will she see? Her friend Peter, back from India, who has never really stopped loving her? What about Sally, with whom Clarissa had her life’s happiest moment? Meanwhile, the shell-shocked Septimus Smith is struggling with his life on the same London day.
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One Tough Read Perfectly Delivered
- By Chris on 06-11-12
By: Virginia Woolf
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The Tragic Muse
- By: Henry James
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- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Pressured into a political career by his traditional, establishmentarian family, Nick Dormer longs to be a painter. Eventually, encouraged by the carefree aesthete Gabriel Nash, reminiscent of Oscar Wilde, he resigns from Parliament and follows his artistic dream. His journey is counterpointed with that of budding young actress Miriam Rooth, the subject of Nick's most successful paintings, and the "tragic muse" of the title, who too sacrifices an affluent life (marriage with Nick's cousin Peter) for her art.
By: Henry James
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The House of Mirth
- By: Edith Wharton
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- Unabridged
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Performance
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Story
Beautiful, sophisticated and endlessly ambitious Lily Bart endeavours to climb the social ladder of New York's elite by securing a good match and living beyond her means. Now nearing 30 years of age and having rejected several proposals, forever in the hope of finding someone better, her future prospects are threatened. A damning commentary of 20th-century social order, Edith Wharton's tale established her as one of the greatest British novelists of the 1900s.
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Like Henry James but more accessible
- By Merlin on 08-19-12
By: Edith Wharton
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The Bostonians
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Taking place in Boston, Massachusetts, a decade after the Civil War, The Bostonians tells the story of two cousins who battle for the affections of and control over an enchanting prophetess. While visiting his cousin Olive Chancellor, a fierce feminist deeply involved in the Suffragette movement, Basil Ransom, a Confederate Civil War veteran turned lawyer, attends a speech by the talented young orator Verena Tarrant. Basil quickly falls in love with Verena, although he disagrees with her politics; Olive, however, sees her as the future of the women's rights movement.
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A satire that turns tragic
- By Tad Davis on 08-23-20
By: Henry James
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The Turn of the Screw
- By: Henry James
- Narrated by: Emma Thompson, Richard Armitage - introduction
- Length: 4 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Academy Award, Golden Globe, and Emmy winner Emma Thompson lends her immense talent and experienced voice to Henry James' Gothic ghost tale, The Turn of the Screw. When a governess is hired to care for two children at a British country estate, she begins to sense an otherworldly presence around the grounds. Are they really ghosts she's seeing? Or is something far more sinister at work?
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Great, but Mightn't be the Best on Audible
- By Gillian on 03-16-16
By: Henry James
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What Maisie Knew
- By: Henry James
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- Unabridged
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Performance
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Story
Following a violent and messy divorce, young Maisie Farange floats back and forth between her parents, Beale and Ida, who use her as a weapon to torment each other in their ongoing, internecine war. Eventually the parents both remarry, and it becomes clear that the new spouses care more for Maisie than her own parents. Beale and Ida soon embark on a series of extramarital affairs, leaving Maisie in the care of the new step-parents, who begin their own affair with each other.
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Not a book for Audible
- By Mitzi on 06-22-20
By: Henry James
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The Wings of the Dove
- By: Henry James
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- Unabridged
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This 1902 novel tells the story of Milly Theale, an American heiress suffering from an incurable disease, who comes to Europe in search of happiness. Through Milly's experiences in London and the new friends she makes, some with honorable motives, while others are more self-interested, James examines the collision of the emerging New World and Europe.
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Narrative Aberration
- By Geoff Maddison on 10-16-09
By: Henry James
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Washington Square (Blackstone Audio Edition)
- By: Henry James
- Narrated by: Lloyd James
- Length: 7 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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On New York City's Washington Square lives Catherine Sloper, a shy and plain-looking young woman who is tyrannized by her wealthy, overbearing father. When young Morris Townsend begins to court her, Dr. Sloper, distrusting his motives, threatens to disinherit Catherine. In accordance with her father's suspicions, young Townsend disappears, leaving Catherine to humiliation, heartache, and lonely spinsterhood.
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Fabulous
- By Celia on 04-14-08
By: Henry James
What listeners say about The Wings of the Dove
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- David R. Foushee
- 12-24-21
I love Juliet Stevenson
Juliet Stevenson is my favorite Audible narrator, but even she can't rescue this oblique and irritating novel. I still adore Henry James, but maybe not the late novels so much.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Francie
- 01-18-22
Difficult reading
This writing is not crystal clear. Rather, there is a vagueness to it and a formality of speech that is very challenging.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Arthur Murphy
- 08-09-21
Superb narration.
The narrator, Juliet Stevenson,is simply magnificent.I cannot imagine a more intelligent reading of such a sophisticated, demanding novel.
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- Leslie G
- 01-05-20
Not for me
Great narration for a dull book. I wanted to like this classic but James's prose just isn't for me.
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- AS st
- 06-13-24
Enjoy
There’s a message in this story, and the well crafted way that it is told is perfectly done. James is a master. His sympathies for his characters are apparent.
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- J. Leiker
- 05-02-18
No one but Juliet Stevenson...
... could do Henry James justice. I'm convinced of it. His sentences are so long, his sensitivities and observations so nuanced (and downright complicated) that one needs either large print and lots of concentrated time to delve in, or the velvety syllable-by-syllable de-ciphering of a master codebreaker. Thank you, Ms. Stevenson, for once again opening the classics to me. Please keep them coming!
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27 people found this helpful
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- William Baranowski
- 12-11-22
Brilliant rendition of a masterwork.
Two remarkable creatures entwined in the embrace of the fate of loss, one of life and the the other of love. Beneficence and sacrifice, honor borne of treachery and the freedom of a final regret. All, beautifully conveyed in an audible masterpiece.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Tad Davis
- 11-24-20
Well narrated but not a gripping story
Time to take up my pen and go after Henry James again. Of all the Victorian novelists I’ve read over the years (many out of a sense of duty — I was an English major, after all, and I never lost the habit), he’s probably my least favorite. He's like Anthony Trollope, but without any of the humor or charm.
The problem is that he's verbose, almost past the point of endurance. His prose is sometimes like being forced to read the Collected Grocery Lists of Edward Casaubon. This novel, and many of the other novels of his that I've read, would benefit enormously from a ruthless editor. Each chapter, each paragraph, maybe even each sentence could lose about 20% of its verbiage without losing its plain sense; and the meaning and impact of the story would come through all the more brilliantly.
In Wings of the Dove, Kate has a problem. She loves the (relatively) poor journalist Merton, but if she marries him, her Aunt Maud — on whom she is financially dependent — will cut her loose. Enter the bright and ridiculously rich American girl Milly, on a European tour. It gradually becomes apparent that Milly is seriously ill, maybe even terminally ill. (From cancer? Consumption? She doesn't have any obvious symptoms, and James never says.) It also gradually becomes apparent that Kate has developed an ingenious plan to solve her financial woes and set her and Merton free from the clutches of her family. All he has to do is make Milly fall in love with him, marry her, and then wait for her to die.
As unpleasant as I found James’s characters through most of the book, they began to take on an almost tragic dimension as the story drew near its end. Merton is trying to do the right thing, or the closest he can get to it; Kate acts from more questionable motives initially, but what a family! — she's in a trap not of her own making, and an argument could be made that if her plan came off, no one would actually get hurt. But it's a Henry James novel, so her plan doesn't come off; in fact it leads to a conclusion that squeezes about as much pain out of the situation as possible — and then squeezes a little more by having the novel end almost in mid-sentence.
Although the style of the book didn't always appeal to me, that is in no way the fault of Juliet Stevenson. She is a truly wonderful narrator, and is easily my favorite among the different narrators of James I've listened to. (She does an outstanding job with just about everybody: she's also one of my favorite narrators of Jane Austen and George Eliot.) I've read occasional criticism of her American accents, but I think she does just fine with Milly Theale and her annoying friend Susan Stringham. This is one of James’s later books, and his syntax became more gnarly toward the end, with one dependent clause piling up on another; but Stevenson seems to have a particular knack for parsing them out loud, and she never loses the thread.
If you like Henry James, you'll love this one. If you don't like Henry James, you might like this one, or you might enjoy the narration for its own sake. A lot may depend on whether you were an English major or not.
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6 people found this helpful
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- C. E. Fisher
- 04-08-21
A masterpiece - challenging for literary novices
There’s a reason Henry James is considered one of the finest authors of all time and most certainly among the top of American authors. This is astonishing - but requires patience and close attention
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- Julie Gray
- 10-31-17
Not an easy read but SO worth it!
Henry James's writing is not for everybody. It is incredibly dense and detailed and he deep dives into the ruminative thoughts of all the major characters at such length that for the first 1/3 of the book, you might find yourself going a little crazy, thinking WHERE IS THE PLOT?! But the book picks up in intensity after the midway mark and I literally could not stop listening. The story is deeply philosophical, about the nature of love, betrayal and just how far one would go to get what one wants - only to then have to live with the consequences. It's absolutely Shakespearian, this story. If you want to be a "well read" person, you should read at least one Henry James novel and that should be this one. Give it a chance, be patient, retrain your focus when you begin to drift, and you will be richly rewarded, in the end.
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39 people found this helpful