They May Not Mean To, But They Do
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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Cynthia Darlow
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By:
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Cathleen Schine
About this listen
Joy Bergman is not slipping into old age with the quiet grace her children, Molly and Daniel, would prefer. She won't take their advice, and she won't take an antidepressant. Her marriage to their father, Aaron, has lasted through health and dementia, as well as some phenomenally lousy business decisions. The Bergman clan has always stuck together, growing as it incorporated in-laws, ex-in-laws, and same-sex spouses. But families don't just grow, they grow old.
Cathleen Schine's They May Not Mean To, but They Do is a tender, sometimes hilarious intergenerational story about searching for where you belong as your family changes with age.
When Aaron dies, Molly and Daniel have no shortage of solutions for their mother's loneliness and despair, but there is one challenge they did not count on: the reappearance of an ardent suitor from Joy's college days. They didn't count on Joy suddenly becoming as willful and rebellious as their own kids.
With sympathy, humor, and truth, Schine explores the intrusion of old age into a large and loving family. They May Not Mean To, but They Do is a radiantly compassionate look at three generations, all coming of age together.
©2016 Cathleen Schine (P)2016 Macmillan AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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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.
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The narration ruined it
- By Janis Reynolds on 06-12-17
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Never Change
- By: Elizabeth Berg
- Narrated by: Elizabeth Berg
- Length: 7 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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A self-anointed spinster at 51, Myra Lipinski is reasonably content with her quiet life, her dog, Frank, and her career as a visiting nurse. But everything changes when Chip Reardon, the golden boy she adored in high school, is assigned as her new patient. Choosing to forgo treatment for an incurable illness, Chip has returned to his New England hometown to spend what time he has left. Now, Myra and Chip find themselves engaged in a poignant redefinition of roles, and a complicated dance of memory, ambivalence, and longing.
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sweet story and lovely writing
- By LVG on 07-21-22
By: Elizabeth Berg
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Making Spirits Bright
- By: Fern Michaels, Elizabeth Bass, Rosalind Noonan, and others
- Narrated by: Laural Merlington
- Length: 12 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Melanie McLaughlin desperately wants to adopt two orphaned siblings and give them a real home for Christmas. A just-for-the-holiday marriage to Bryce Landry fits her plan perfectly...until unexpected sparks have Melanie dreaming of forever by his side....
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So so book
- By John on 08-25-22
By: Fern Michaels, and others
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Custody
- A Novel
- By: Nancy Thayer
- Narrated by: Angela Dawe
- Length: 11 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Ambitious, brilliant, and engaged to a wonderful guy, Kelly MacLeod feels like her dreams are coming true when she lands a prestigious appointment as a judge in the Massachusetts Family Court. A passionate advocate on behalf of children of divorce, she can at long last put her fierce intellect to good use in the courtroom. But a chance meeting with a charismatic man forever changes Kelly’s life.
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Tempered and Forged by the Kiln of Experience
- By Empress Karen on 10-04-18
By: Nancy Thayer
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Chanel Bonfire
- By: Wendy Lawless
- Narrated by: Wendy Lawless
- Length: 6 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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By the time Wendy Lawless turned 17, she'd known for quite some time that she didn't have a normal mother. But that didn't stop her from wanting one.... Georgann Rea didn't bake cookies or go to PTA meetings; she wore a mink coat and always had a lit Dunhill plugged into her cigarette holder. She went through men like Kleenex, and didn't like dogs or children. Georgann had the ice queen beauty of a Hitchcock heroine and the cold heart to match.
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Not an Engaging Listen
- By Sobriquet on 03-13-13
By: Wendy Lawless
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The Portable Veblen
- By: Elizabeth Mckenzie
- Narrated by: Julia Gibson
- Length: 12 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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An exuberant, one-of-a-kind novel about love and family, war and nature, new money and old values by a brilliant New Yorker contributor. The Portable Veblen is a dazzlingly original novel that's as big-hearted as it is laugh-out-loud funny. Set in and around Palo Alto amid the culture clash of new money and old (antiestablishment) values, and with the specter of our current wars looming across its words, The Portable Veblen is an unforgettable look at the way we live now.
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Not what it was cracked up to be
- By Linda on 02-03-16
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The Visiting Privilege
- New and Collected Stories
- By: Joy Williams
- Narrated by: Richard Powers, Emily Woo Zeller, Elisabeth Rodgers, and others
- Length: 20 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Joy Williams has been celebrated as a master of the short story for four decades, her renown passing from one generation to the next even in the shifting landscape of contemporary writing. And at long last the incredible scope of her singular achievement is put on display: 33 stories drawn from three much-lauded collections and another 13 appearing here for the first time in book form.
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I sure tried.
- By A.C. CALLOWAY on 01-28-24
By: Joy Williams
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Breakwater Bay
- By: Shelley Noble
- Narrated by: Kirsten Potter
- Length: 11 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Preservationist Meri Hollis loves her latest project, restoring one of Newport's forgotten Gilded Age mansions. And with summer approaching, she'll be able to spend more time with her Gran on the Rhode Island shore. She has a great job, a loving family and she's pretty sure her boyfriend is going to propose on her thirtieth birthday. But everything Meri believes about family, happiness, truth, and love is shattered when her family's darkest secret is exposed.
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Wasted Potential
- By Rusty on 03-15-15
By: Shelley Noble
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Love Walked In
- By: Marisa de los Santos
- Narrated by: Jennifer Ikeda
- Length: 11 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Award-winning poet Marisa de los Santos crafts an irresistibly touching debut novel. Love Walked In is a contemporary tale, steeped in nostalgic, cinematic charm, of love in all its forms. Unapologetically idealistic about love, Cornelia Brown appears to catch the break of a lifetime when the dashing Martin Grace, her own personal Cary Grant, comes strolling into her life. But it is Martin's connection to 11-year-old Clare Hobbes that touches Cornelia's heart in ways she never imagined.
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Dreadful audio quality
- By Marenghi on 09-16-11
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The Daisy Children
- A Novel
- By: Sofia Grant
- Narrated by: Teri Schnaubelt
- Length: 10 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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When Katie Garrett gets the news that she’s received an inheritance from the grandmother she hardly knew, it couldn’t have come at a better time. She flees Boston and travels to rural Texas. There, she’s greeted by her distant cousin Scarlett. Friendly and flamboyant, Scarlett couldn’t be more different from sensible Katie. And as they begin the task of sorting through their grandmother’s possessions, they discover letters and photographs that uncover the hidden truths about their shared history, and the long-forgotten tragedy of the New London school explosion of 1937 that binds them.
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a little odd to me
- By G-Mom on 11-09-24
By: Sofia Grant
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One Amazing Thing
- By: Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
- Narrated by: Purva Bedi, Soneela Nankani, Neil Shah
- Length: 7 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Winner of a Pushcart Prize for poetry and an American Book Award for her short stories, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni explores themes of women, immigration, and her vibrant Indian culture to great effect. Divakaruni expands on these ideas in One Amazing Thing, a project long in the making and full of electric prose.
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An ok way to kill some time
- By R.Reader on 11-07-12
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It Happens Every Spring
- By: Catherine Palmer, Gary Chapman
- Narrated by: Jill Mueller
- Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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The first in a new series, Four Seasons, takes us to Deepwater Cove, a small community on the shore of the Lake of the Ozarks, where we're introduced to four couples in different stages of life. It Happens Every Spring centers on Brenda, a lonely wife, and Steve, a go-getter real estate agent, in the mid-winter of their relationship. When a stranger appears at their door one night, change blows through their house and their marriage.
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Amazing book!
- By Rad on 10-07-22
By: Catherine Palmer, and others
What listeners say about They May Not Mean To, But They Do
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Bobra Tahan
- 09-06-17
Excellent Story of Aging!!
A little slow at the end, but a overall great book. Made me think of my Mother! Every age has its own trials, especially old age! You lose control and "others" think THEY know what's best for you. But is it??
Bobra T.
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- L. Wroten
- 08-01-16
Funny, touching and spot on
If you have an elderly parent or parents in your life, or if you are experiencing firsthand the tragicomic vicissitudes of growing old, this book is for you. My mother suffered with dementia for a decade and my 90-year-old father lives with my husband and me, so I am well-acquainted with the subject matter! There are lots of memoirs and novels out there about aging parents, and they are usually told from the point of view of the adult child, with emphasis on all the crap the child has to endure. This one is told mostly from the pov of the elderly mother and the result is both more entertaining and more illuminating. Brilliantly observed down to the smallest cringeworthy detail, yet not at all depressing. I laughed out loud throughout. Thanks Cathleen Schine for helping me understand my parents, and myself, a little better. You and your wonderful characters felt like old friends by the end.
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4 people found this helpful
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- ShoShoD
- 01-14-17
Wonderful wonderful book
Extraordinary look at again. Funny, touching, sad, and more. Left me thinking. Cannot wait for my book club meeting so 8 can discuss it.
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Overall
- joanne blodgett
- 07-16-16
Schine shines
If you haven't already been one of these characters, hang on. You will be. Loved it.
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- Alba
- 01-13-21
Lots of laughs
This book has me laughing quite a bit. The ending was not what I expected but it makes you think.
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- Mom of three
- 09-20-16
Fabulous performance.Better than reading.
Performance was fantastic. Reader does voices of characters exceptionally well, making this a far better listen than a book for reading. The story is painfully realistic, accurate, and thankfully, funny. If you want resolution, you won't get it, as is so often true in life. I enjoyed this book, and didn't love it. No life insights for me, though I appreciated the journey.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Matches don’t light!
- 07-19-23
Resonated with my experiences.
Having lived in NYC and being a mother, daughter, sibling and wife enriched this story for me. Wonderful narration mixed with humor and sadness, but the love between the characters presented a novel I’ve already recommended to friends my age, as well my kids, and my parents. Loved it!
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- David P
- 07-14-16
Funny, Honest
Cathleen Schine is a very funny and smart writer. She combines broad comedy here with genuine insights into the difficulties of aging and the difficulties of having an aging parent. Having recently been through the illness and death of a parent, I found sections of this novel deeply moving and stunningly accurate.
She gets into the heads of most of the characters, so you see things from all points of view--the adult children trying to do their best, the aging parent attempting to maintain independence and dignity. There are some wonderful bits of social satire, too, as when a child reared in our post-indoor-cigarette world asks, "What are ashtrays for?"
Schine has tremendous love and tenderness for all her characters, and this gives the novel a warmth that's pretty irresistible.
I found some of the comedy a little too broad and cartoony in places, and a climactic section that takes place on a family vacation seemed both rushed (thinly described) and (because the set-up seemed wrong) too long.
Overall, I was happy to listen and entertained and moved, which is a lot of to ask of any novel.
Cynthia Darlow has a fantastically rich, nuanced voice. Her tone for the aging mother can be a little schticky in places (stereotype of New York "Jewish mother" character) but she brought the story and copious dialogue to life. She communicated the love in the family exceptionally well.
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8 people found this helpful
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- colprubin
- 07-18-16
Everything an audible book should be
Wonderful reader who gave texture and nuance to every character
Not for readers who want plot-driven novels but much enjoyed by this reader for its humor and insights into character
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- Deevee
- 01-17-18
Great narrator.
This book came to life by the excellent narrator of the story. A very true to life experience.
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