Thirteen Ways of Looking
Fiction
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Narrated by:
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Colum McCann
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By:
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Colum McCann
About this listen
Named one of the 10 best books of the year by Chicago Tribune and one of the best books of the year by:
- The New York Times Book Review
- NPR
- Los Angeles Times
- The Boston Globe
- The Seattle Times
- The Independent
In such acclaimed novels as Let the Great World Spin and TransAtlantic, National Book Award-winning author Colum McCann has transfixed listeners with his precision, tenderness, and authority. Now, in his first collection of short fiction in more than a decade, McCann charts the territory of chance and the profound and intimate consequences of even our smallest moments.
"As it was, it was like being set down in the best of poems, carried into a cold landscape, blindfolded, turned around, unblindfolded, forced, then, to invent new ways of seeing."
In the exuberant title novella, a retired judge reflects on his life's work, unaware as he goes about his daily routines that this particular morning will be his last. In "Sh'khol", a mother spending Christmas alone with her son confronts the unthinkable when he disappears while swimming off the coast near their home in Ireland. In "Treaty", an elderly nun catches a snippet of a news report in which it is revealed that the man who once kidnapped and brutalized her is alive, masquerading as an agent of peace. And in "What Time Is It Now, Where You Are?", a writer constructs a story about a Marine in Afghanistan calling home on New Year's Eve.
Deeply personal, subtly subversive, at times harrowing, and indeed funny, yet also full of comfort, Thirteen Ways of Looking is a striking achievement. With unsurpassed empathy for his characters and their inner lives, Colum McCann forges from their stories a profound tribute to our search for meaning and grace. The collection is a rumination on the power of storytelling in a world where language and memory can sometimes falter, but in the end do not fail us, and a contemplation of the healing power of literature.
Praise for Thirteen Ways of Looking:
“Extraordinary...incandescent.” (Chicago Tribune)
“The irreducible mystery of human experience ties this small collection together, and in each of these stories McCann explores that theme in some strikingly effective ways.... [The first story] is as fascinating as it is poignant.... [The second] captures the mundane and mysterious aspects of shaping characters from the gray clay of words, placing them in realistic settings and breathing life into their lungs.... That he makes the story so emotionally compelling is a sign of his genius.... The most remarkable [piece] is Sh’khol.... Caught in the rushing currents of this drama, you know you’re reading a little masterpiece.” (The Washington Post)
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Critic reviews
“McCann is a writer of power and subtlety and beauty.... The powerful title story loiters in the mind long after you’ve read it.” (Sarah Lyall, The New York Times)
“[McCann] unspools complex and unforgettable stories in this, his first collection in more than a decade.” (The Boston Globe)
“McCann is a passionate writer whose impulse is always toward a generous understanding of his diverse characters.” (The Wall Street Journal)
Editor's Pick
Brought to life in audio
"Every story in this collection is masterfully written, but Colum McCann’s mesmerizing narration alone is worth picking this one up. The title story is one of the best short stories I’ve heard in years."
—Aaron S., Audible Editor
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Why we think it’s a great listen: Never before has an author’s narration of his fiction been so important to fully grasping the book’s impact and global implications. Taking us from Afghanistan in the final days of its monarchy to the present, The Kite Runner is the unforgettable story of the friendship between two boys growing up in Kabul. Their intertwined lives, and their fates, reflect the eventual tragedy of the world around them.
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A Worhty Read
- By P. C..S. on 08-17-03
By: Khaled Hosseini
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Her Body and Other Parties
- Stories
- By: Carmen Maria Machado
- Narrated by: Amy Landon
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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In Her Body and Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado blithely demolishes the arbitrary borders between psychological realism and science fiction, comedy and horror, fantasy and fabulism. While her work has earned her comparisons to Karen Russell and Kelly Link, she has a voice that is all her own. In this electric and provocative debut, Machado bends genre to shape startling narratives that map the realities of women's lives and the violence visited upon their bodies.
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Beautiful
- By Anonymous User on 11-17-17
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Stories
- All-New Tales
- By: Neil Gaiman - author/editor, Al Sarrantonio - editor, Joe Hill, and others
- Narrated by: Anne Bobby, Jonathan Davis, Katherine Kellgren, and others
- Length: 18 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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The best stories pull readers in and keep them turning the pages, eager to discover more—to find the answer to the question: "And then what happened?" The true hallmark of great literature is great imagination, and as Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio prove with this outstanding collection, when it comes to great fiction, all genres are equal.
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Something for Everyone
- By Nicole on 05-24-17
By: Neil Gaiman - author/editor, and others
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The Boy Who Drew Monsters
- By: Keith Donohue
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 9 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Ever since he nearly drowned in the ocean three years earlier, 10-year-old Jack Peter Keenan has been deathly afraid to venture outdoors. Refusing to leave his home in a small coastal town in Maine, Jack Peter spends his time drawing monsters. When those drawings take on a life of their own, no one is safe from the terror they inspire.
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troubled boy, troubled waters
- By Debra B on 10-29-14
By: Keith Donohue
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A Doubter's Almanac
- A Novel
- By: Ethan Canin
- Narrated by: David Aaron Baker
- Length: 19 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Milo Andret is born with an unusual mind. A lonely child growing up in the woods of Northern Michigan in the 1950s, he gives little thought to his own talent. But with his acceptance at UC Berkeley, he realizes the extent - and the risks - of his singular gifts. California in the '70s is a seduction, opening Milo's eyes to the allure of both ambition and indulgence. The research he begins there will make him a legend; the woman he meets there - and the rival he meets alongside her - will haunt him for the rest of his life.
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The curse of genius?
- By Bonny on 03-03-16
By: Ethan Canin
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Laguna Heat
- By: T. Jefferson Parker
- Narrated by: Christopher Lane
- Length: 9 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Laguna: a place where a crazed killer has turned paradise into a Disneyland of depraved violence - with a fiery vengeance - and where homicide cop Tom Shephard unravels a grisly mystery. It reaches back across 40 years of sordid sex, blackmail, and suicide into the dark corners of his own past.
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Fabulous
- By Stacy on 02-24-09
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Revenge
- Eleven Dark Tales
- By: Yoko Ogawa
- Narrated by: Kaleo Griffith, Johanna Parker
- Length: 4 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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An aspiring writer moves into a new apartment and discovers that her landlady has murdered her husband. Elsewhere, an accomplished surgeon is approached by a cabaret singer, whose beautiful appearance belies the grotesque condition of her heart. And while the surgeon's jealous lover vows to kill him, a violent envy also stirs in the soul of a lonely craftsman. Desire meets with impulse and erupts, attracting the attention of the surgeon's neighbor - who is drawn to a decaying residence that is now home to instruments of human torture.
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Maybe, more Gray then Dark?
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 10-28-14
By: Yoko Ogawa
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The Night Ferry
- By: Michael Robotham
- Narrated by: Clare Corbett
- Length: 12 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Police detective Ali Barba receives an urgent letter from her estranged friend Cate. Startled by the letter's alarming tone and eager to atone for egregious past actions, Ali meets Cate at their high-school class reunion. The obviously pregnant Cate begs Ali to stop those who are trying to take her baby. But the plot takes a bizarre twist when a careening car kills Cate - and Ali discovers the truth about Cate's pregnancy.
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An ok read
- By Elgee on 02-11-08
By: Michael Robotham
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Outside Looking In
- A Novel
- By: T. C. Boyle
- Narrated by: Johnathan McClain
- Length: 14 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1943, LSD is synthesized in Basel. Two decades later, a coterie of grad students at Harvard are gradually drawn into the inner circle of renowned psychologist and psychedelic drug enthusiast Timothy Leary. Fitzhugh Loney, a psychology PhD student, and his wife, Joanie, become entranced by the drug’s possibilities such that their “research” becomes less a matter of clinical trials and academic papers and instead turns into a freewheeling exploration of mind expansion, group dynamics, and communal living.
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STORYTELLING AS CONSCIOUSNESS-RAISING
- By Christopher Meeks on 05-25-19
By: T. C. Boyle
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The Things We Never Said
- By: Susan Elliot Wright
- Narrated by: Kate Lee
- Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1964, Maggie wakes to find herself in a mental asylum, with no idea who she is or how she got there. Remnants of memories swirl in her mind - a familiar song, a storm, a moment of violence. Slowly, she begins to piece together the past and the events which brought her to this point.
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Disappointing
- By Anonymous User on 01-18-22
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Dark at the Crossing
- By: Elliot Ackerman
- Narrated by: Vikas Adam
- Length: 7 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Haris Abadi is a man in search of a cause. An Arab American with a conflicted past, he is now in Turkey, attempting to cross into Syria and join the fight against Bashar al-Assad's regime. But he is robbed before he can make it, and is taken in by Amir, a charismatic Syrian refugee and former revolutionary, and Amir's wife, Daphne, a sophisticated beauty haunted by grief. As it becomes clear that Daphne is also desperate to return to Syria, Haris's choices become ever more wrenching: Whose side is he really on?
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Beautiful Story Well Told
- By Michael - Audible Editor on 01-07-17
By: Elliot Ackerman
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The Bone Clocks
- By: David Mitchell
- Narrated by: Jessica Ball, Leon Williams, Colin Mace, and others
- Length: 24 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Following a scalding row with her mother, 15-year-old Holly Sykes slams the door on her old life. But Holly is no typical teenage runaway: A sensitive child once contacted by voices she knew only as "the radio people," Holly is a lightning rod for psychic phenomena. Now, as she wanders deeper into the English countryside, visions and coincidences reorder her reality until they assume the aura of a nightmare brought to life.
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Not Short Listed, This Time
- By Mel on 09-23-14
By: David Mitchell
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Wonder Boys
- By: Michael Chabon
- Narrated by: David Colacci
- Length: 11 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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A wildly successful first novel made Grady Tripp a young star, and seven years later he still hasn't grown up. He's now a writing professor in Pittsburgh, plummeting through middle age, stuck with an unfinishable manuscript, an estranged wife, a pregnant girlfriend, and a talented but deeply disturbed student named James Leer.
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A strong, early Chabon (sounds like grading wine)
- By Darwin8u on 03-09-14
By: Michael Chabon
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What listeners say about Thirteen Ways of Looking
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Sid Smith
- 05-18-21
Superb!
As always, reading, or especially listening to Colum McCann’s writing is like immersing yourself in the finest works of art in the Louvre or anywhere else. Thank you!
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- Sharlotte
- 11-18-19
Worth Hearing
These were very good stories but I could not rate them five stars because the endings were too abstruse and thus unsatisfying.
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- SuZ
- 06-21-19
McCann captures the essence of humanity.
This collection of Thirteen Ways of Looking is excellent. (I have it in print and Audible).
The author's reading of his work is could not be more lovely. McCann has captured the character and essence of humanity in his stories, so that as wrenching or stunning the subject might be, we are moved and challenged to understand another more deeply.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Jessica
- 01-26-18
Love
Very interesting subjects, beautifully rendered. I also love his voice. Overall an excellent audiobook. Definitely worth a listen.
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- Tom
- 01-28-21
A Glorious Mistake, Corrected.
For some reason I thought this book was McCann’s reflections on the art of writing, an art he has mastered, as evidenced by Let the Great World Spin and Apeirogon. Instead it was a novella and a couple of short stories, but that doesn’t mean I was wrong.
It wasn’t his reflections. It was a tutorial! This man is a Genius. His ability to paint word portraits using the subtlest, most nuanced pigments is unsurpassed. He draws the reader into each scene by describing every small detail of his characters and settings. You take in all this “data” without even realizing its impact on the story until the scene is over, but when you’re finished and you step back, the masterpiece is displayed before you.
I won’t disclose the details here, but the Old Judge, the Marine, and the Nun are three characters that will live in my mind for a very long time and should live in yours if you’re lucky enough to read this book. And I recommend that you experience his narration of the Audiobook to get its full impact. Five Stars!
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- Eagle Eye
- 04-29-24
Beautiful stories
As is everything written by this fabulous author, these stories were beautiful. I listened to the entire book twice.
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- Gary
- 09-14-24
Narrator breathes every few words
What a shame that the author chose to narrate this otherwise engrossing work. He breathes every few words, even in the middle of phrases, all of the time, as if he is chronically out of breath. It is terribly distracting.
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- Dorothy
- 04-07-18
The title story is a masterpiece
McCann makes a reference to James Joyce’s story The Dead which has been called the greatest short story in English. I would say that Thirteen Ways of Looking is equally well written, equally perceptive and McCann’s reading makes it unforgettable. This is the only audiobook I’ve listened to twice and then bought the book so I could read it. It is a treasure.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Molly-o
- 02-22-16
Beautifully written short stories
I was a bit ambushed by this book because I tell people that I don't like short stories in general. It may be a bit odd since I relish great writing, but somehow short stories just don't keep going and I end up disappointed. Well, when I started this book, I didn't know it was a collection -- but when I discovered it, I was more than sucked into it. Each story was better than the previous one -- or so it felt. I shouldn't have been surprised because I have loved everything he has written but these pieces just knocked me out. His use of language is simply exquisite - to the point of my rewinding several times just to hear it again.
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- Jeff Lacy
- 04-19-21
Masterfully written, soundly performed
Colum McCann does a nice job narrating his short fiction collection. All great stories, masterfully written—tight, visceral, structured with architectural scrutiny, word selection as meaningful as a poet, characters developed with authenticity, and a tactile sensitivity to the vice of tension. This is an entertaining collection of short fiction and worthwhile reading.
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