Virgins of Paradise
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Narrated by:
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Joyce Bean
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By:
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Barbara Wood
About this listen
This is a sensuous, romantic, exciting novel of women in search of identity amid historic change, and a fascinating portrait of an ancient nation mired in superstition, magic, and mythology as it emerges into the modern era.
Jasmine and Camelia Rasheed grow to womanhood under the watchful eye of their grandmother inside the walls surrounding a beautiful house on Virgins of Paradise Street in exotic Cairo. They come of age in society in which the subjugation of women is assumed - they must wear veils, are forbidden to leave the house, have no independent rights, and are circumcised to ensure purity and obedience. Each embarks on turbulent personal and professional voyages of discovery: Jasmine, cast out of the family, comes to America; and Camilia sets out to become one of the most famous dancers in the Middle East.
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Meet the Godmothers: Filomena is a clever and resourceful war refugee with a childhood secret, who comes to America to wed Mario, the family's favored son. Amie, a beautiful and dreamy French girl from upstate New York, escapes an abusive husband after falling in love with Johnny, the oldest of the brothers. Lucy, a tough-as-nails Irish nurse, ran away from a strict girls' home and marries Frankie, the sensuous middle son. And the glamorous Petrina, the family's only daughter, graduates with honors from Barnard College despite a past trauma that nearly caused a family scandal.
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Easy Enjoyable Read
- By Bunny on 06-23-21
By: Camille Aubray
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If I Were You: A Novel
- By: Lynn Austin
- Narrated by: Sarah Zimmerman
- Length: 13 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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1950. In the wake of the war, Audrey Clarkson leaves her manor house in England for a fresh start in America with her young son. As a widowed war bride, Audrey needs the support of her American in-laws, whom she has never met. But she arrives to find that her longtime friend Eve Dawson has been impersonating her for the past four years. Unraveling this deception will force Audrey and Eve’s secrets - and the complicated history of their friendship - to the surface.
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performed beautifully
- By Colby on 07-16-20
By: Lynn Austin
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The Winemakers
- A Novel of Wine and Secrets
- By: Jan Moran
- Narrated by: Erin Bennett
- Length: 13 hrs
- Unabridged
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Years ago, the Rosetta family's hard-won dreams of staking their claim in the vineyards of California came to fruition. Now high-spirited, passionate Caterina Rosetta, who has inherited both her mother's talent for crafting the finest wines and also her indomitable will, wants nothing more than to win her mother's approval and work at her side. But that can never happen, because Caterina is keeping a secret that could ruin her: a daughter of her own, fathered by the love of her life, who left her without explanation.
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awesome.
- By Joe C. Smith on 04-25-21
By: Jan Moran
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The Complete Stories
- By: Clarice Lispector, Katrina Dodson, Benjamin Moser
- Narrated by: full cast
- Length: 22 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Here, gathered in one volume, are the stories that made Clarice a Brazilian legend. Originally a cloth edition of 86 stories, now we have 89 in all, covering her whole amazing career, from her teenage years to her deathbed. In these pages, we meet teenagers becoming aware of their sexual and artistic powers, humdrum housewives whose lives are shattered by unexpected epiphanies, old people who don't know what to do with themselves - and in their stories, Clarice takes us through their lives - and hers - and ours.
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Wonderful Collection
- By XX on 04-25-20
By: Clarice Lispector, and others
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One Hundred Years of Solitude
- By: Gabriel García Márquez, Gregory Rabassa - translator
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 14 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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One of the 20th century's enduring works, One Hundred Years of Solitude is a widely beloved and acclaimed novel known throughout the world and the ultimate achievement in a Nobel Prize-winning career. The novel tells the story of the rise and fall of the mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendía family. Rich and brilliant, it is a chronicle of life, death, and the tragicomedy of humankind. In the beautiful, ridiculous, and tawdry story of the Buendía family, one sees all of humanity, just as in the history, myths, growth, and decay of Macondo, one sees all of Latin America.
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What in the heck happened?????
- By Melinda on 02-05-14
By: Gabriel García Márquez, and others
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The Parted Earth
- By: Anjali Enjeti
- Narrated by: Deepti Gupta
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Spanning more than half a century and cities from New Delhi to Atlanta, Anjali Enjeti’s debut is a heartfelt and human portrait of the long shadow of the partition of the Indian subcontinent on the lives of three generations.
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Riveting
- By MSE on 05-14-21
By: Anjali Enjeti
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The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit
- My Family's Exodus from Old Cairo to the New World
- By: Lucette Lagnado
- Narrated by: Joyce Bean
- Length: 12 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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In vivid and graceful prose, Lucette Lagnado recreates the majesty and cosmopolitan glamour of Cairo in the years before Gamal Abdel Nasser’s rise to power. With Nasser’s nationalization of Egyptian industry, her father, Leon, a boulevardier who conducted business in his white sharkskin suit, loses everything and departs with the family for any land that will take them. The poverty and hardships they encounter in their flight from Cairo to Paris to New York are strikingly juxtaposed against the beauty and comforts of the lives they left behind.
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A Touching Memoir of a Jewish Family in Egypt
- By Brustar on 06-10-20
By: Lucette Lagnado
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The Silk Weaver's Wife
- By: Debbie Rix
- Narrated by: Sophie Roberts
- Length: 12 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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A heart-wrenching and unforgettable story of two women - centuries apart - linked by the hidden secrets of a beautiful woman in a Venetian painting. Venice 1704: Anastasia is desperate to escape her controlling father and plans to marry her childhood sweetheart. But instead of the life she has always dreamed of, she finds herself trapped in Venice, the unwilling wife of a silk weaver. Anastasia seeks comfort in painting and draws strength from her talents. Despite her circumstances, two women reach out to her and give Anastasia a reason to hope....
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A little off from my usual but..
- By Reviewer and Listener 💗💗💗💗💗💗🧛❤️🩸💯❤️ on 04-11-20
By: Debbie Rix
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On Division
- A Novel
- By: Goldie Goldbloom
- Narrated by: Barrie Kreinik
- Length: 7 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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In Williamsburg, Brooklyn, just a block or two up from the East River on Division Avenue, Surie Eckstein is soon to be a great-grandmother. Her 10 children range in age from 13 to 39. Her in-laws, postwar immigrants from Romania, live on the first floor of their house. Her daughter Tzila Ruchel lives on the second. She and Yidel, a scribe in such demand that he makes only a few Torah scrolls a year, live on the third. Wed when Surie was 16, they have a happy marriage and a full life, and, at the ages of 57 and 62, they are looking forward to some quiet time together.
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A great book
- By Sab on 04-24-20
By: Goldie Goldbloom
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The Women of Chateau Lafayette
- By: Stephanie Dray
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert, Emma Bering, Rachel L. Jacobs
- Length: 23 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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An epic saga from New York Times best-selling author Stephanie Dray based on the true story of an extraordinary castle in the heart of France and the remarkable women bound by its legacy.
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An absolute masterpiece of a book!
- By Kindle Customer on 05-15-21
By: Stephanie Dray
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The Third Daughter
- A Novel
- By: Talia Carner
- Narrated by: Saskia Maarleveld
- Length: 10 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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The turn of the 20th century finds 14-year-old Batya in the Russian countryside, fleeing with her family endless pogroms. Desperate, her father leaps at the opportunity to marry Batya to a worldly, wealthy stranger who can guarantee his daughter an easy life and passage to America. Feeling like a princess in a fairytale, Batya leaves her old life behind as she is whisked away to a new world. But soon, she discovers that she’s entered a waking nightmare. Her new “husband” does indeed bring her to America.
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brilliant novel based on shocking truth
- By Rochelle Jewel Shapiro on 07-05-20
By: Talia Carner
What listeners say about Virgins of Paradise
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- C Ohana
- 11-13-08
eye opening
I enjoyed this book - it kept me intertained on a 4 day road trip. The different cultural perspectives were interesting and scary at the same time.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Hope N. Daley
- 05-24-18
Highly recommend!!
This was beautifully written and beautifully narrated. It was recommended to me by a friend from Spain, and I recommend it to you. Not only is the story heartfelt, it does a great job tracing the metamorphoses of a country and a culture during a tumultuous time in history.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Abigail
- 09-27-19
Excellent story!!
I read this book 22 years ago, still have it. Having lived in Israel for ten years, I am very familiar with their tradition (what happens is very accurate with the truth). The story will captivate you from the very beginning. It is very well narrated. I give it 7 stars!!
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- Suramericana
- 04-20-17
El Matriarcado de Egipto
Would you try another book from Barbara Wood and/or Joyce Bean?
Si. Aprendi en este libro que el ultimo rey de Egipto Faruq, el cual reino hasta el año 1952 y fue a vivir a Italia. El matriarcado de las mujeres musulmanas, y la cortada del clitoris con el fin de que la mujer sea fiel a su hombre. Esta parte no es nueva aunque Wood le pone mucha atencion como si fuera un tema nuevo o como si ella lo hubiera descubierto en sus estudio. Wood repite muchas frases y muchas partes del libro, sin embargo momentos que son mas importantes los ignora. Cambia de escenas cuando se ponen peligrosas como si el libro fuera una pelicula con el fin quizas de darle misterio al libro. Wood tiene una forma de escribir normal, nada realmente especial. Hasta el titulo es simpatico, ya que es el nombre de una calle.
How would you have changed the story to make it more enjoyable?
Contaria la historia de la bajada el Rey en una forma mas detallada y haria referencia a la mutilacion de las mujeres en una forma normal, esto es algo que el Musulman esta haciando de toda la vida y no es nuevo.
What does Joyce Bean bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
Bean esta bien, a veces lee muy rapido, pero bien aceptable
If this book were a movie would you go see it?
Si el director se esfuerza un poco mas en la caida del rey, en el derrocho de esta clase.
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