Unpolished Gem Audiobook By Alice Pung cover art

Unpolished Gem

My Mother, My Grandmother, and Me

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Unpolished Gem

By: Alice Pung
Narrated by: Melissa Chambers
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"This story does not begin on a boat." So commences Alice Pung’s memoir. This is an original take on a classic story - how a child of immigrants moves between two cultures. In place of piety and predictability, however, Unpolished Gem offers a vivid and ironic sense of both worlds. It combines the story of Pung’s life growing up in suburban Footscray with the inherited stories of the women in her family - stories of madness, survival, and heartbreak. Original and brave, this is a girl’s own story that introduces an unforgettable voice and captures the experience of Asian immigrants to Australia.

©2006 Alice Pung (P)2012 Bolinda Publishing Pty Ltd Emigration & Immigration Social Sciences Women Witty Heartfelt

Critic reviews

"There’s something striking on every page of Unpolished Gem." (Helen Garner)
"Pung has a seductive way with language, an eye for telling detail, and a gift for comic dialogue." ( Australian Book Review)
"... an intelligent and touching insight into the culture-hopping that so many first-generation Australians undertake." ( The Herald Sun)
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Where does Unpolished Gem rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

It was my first ever audiobook and it was average. Not really impressive enough so that I would like to listen to more audiobooks, but not bad enough for me to give it a low rating either.

Any additional comments?

The slightly awkward, cautious way the narrator read the parts and names that were foreign to her detracted from this book. Otherwise, I think she made a good effort to bring out the drama of the conversations using different talking voices for different characters.

I preferred the hardcopy book to the audio

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