-
Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?
- Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson
- Length: 6 hrs and 7 mins
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $20.00
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Publisher's summary
Jeanette Winterson’s bold and revelatory novels have established her as a major figure in world literature. She has written some of the most acclaimed books of the last three decades, including her internationally bestselling first novel, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, the story of a young girl adopted by Pentecostal parents that is considered one of the most important books in contemporary fiction. Jeanette’s adoptive mother loomed over her life until Jeanette finally moved out at sixteen because she was in love with a woman. As Jeanette left behind the strict confines of her youth, her mother asked, “Why be happy when you could be normal?”
This memoir is the chronicle of a life’s work to find happiness. It is a book full of stories: about a girl locked out of her home, sitting on the doorstep all night; about a religious zealot disguised as a mother who has two sets of false teeth and a revolver in the dresser drawer; about growing up in a north England industrial town in the 1960s and 1970s; and about the universe as a cosmic dustbin. It is the story of how a painful past, which Winterson thought she had written over and repainted, rose to haunt her later in life, sending her on a journey into madness and out again, in search of her biological mother. It is also a book about literature, one that shows how fiction and poetry can guide us when we are lost. Witty, acute, fierce, and celebratory, Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? is a tough-minded search for belonging - for love, identity, and a home.
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson
- Length: 6 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jeanette is a bright and rebellious orphan who is adopted into an evangelical household in the dour, industrial North of England and finds herself embroidering grim religious mottoes and shaking her little tambourine for Jesus. But as this budding missionary comes of age, and comes to terms with her unorthodox sexuality, the peculiar balance of her God-fearing household dissolves. Jeanette’s insistence on listening to truths of her own heart and mind - and on reporting them with wit and passion - makes for an unforgettable chronicle of an eccentric, moving passage into adulthood.
-
-
quirky and odd
- By Kelly on 01-06-20
-
12 Bytes
- How We Got Here, Where We Might Go Next
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 12 Bytes, the New York Times best-selling author of Why Be Happy When You Can Be Normal? Jeanette Winterson draws on her years of thinking and reading about artificial intelligence in all its bewildering manifestations. In her brilliant, laser focused, uniquely pointed, and witty style of storytelling, Winterson looks to history, religion, myth, literature, the politics of race and gender, and computer science, to help us understand the radical changes to the way we live and love that are happening now.
-
-
Absolute intelligent inquisitive humble reveal!!
- By olivia glass on 01-25-22
-
Pageboy
- A Memoir
- By: Elliot Page
- Narrated by: Elliot Page
- Length: 8 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
“Can I kiss you?” It was two months before the world premiere of Juno, and Elliot Page was in his first ever queer bar. The hot summer air hung heavy around him as he looked at her. And then it happened. In front of everyone. A previously unfathomable experience. Here he was on the precipice of discovering himself as a queer person, as a trans person. Getting closer to his desires, his dreams, himself, without the repression he’d carried for so long. But for Elliot, two steps forward had always come with one step back.
-
-
Ah, I wish this were better. I'm disappointed.
- By Jackson Theofore Keys on 06-07-23
By: Elliot Page
-
Sexing the Cherry
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 5 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a fantastic world that is and is not 17th-century England, a baby is found floating in the Thames. The child, Jordan, is rescued by Dog Woman and grows up to travel the world like Gulliver, though he finds that the world’s most curious oddities come from his own mind. Winterson leads the listener from discussions on the nature of time to Jordan’s fascination with journeys concealed within other journeys, all with a dizzying speed that shoots the listener from epiphany to shimmering epiphany.
-
-
Enjoyable
- By Persephone on 05-26-20
-
The Passion
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Tania Rodrigues, Daniel Pirrie
- Length: 5 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set during the tumultuous years of the Napoleonic Wars, The Passion intertwines the destinies of two remarkable people: Henri, a simple French soldier, who follows Napoleon from glory to Russian ruin; and Villanelle, the red-haired, web-footed daughter of a Venetian boatman, whose husband has gambled away her heart. In Venice’s compound of carnival, chance, and darkness, the pair meets their singular destiny.
-
-
Excellence.
- By Scottie V. on 10-07-19
-
Frankissstein
- A Love Story
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: John Sackville, Perdita Weeks
- Length: 7 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lake Geneva, 1816. Nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley is inspired to write a story about a scientist who creates a new life-form. In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI and carrying out some experiments of his own in a vast underground network of tunnels. Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with his mom again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere.
-
-
TW: SA, anti-trans bigotry, anti-gay bigotry
- By H. Myers on 11-19-19
-
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson
- Length: 6 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jeanette is a bright and rebellious orphan who is adopted into an evangelical household in the dour, industrial North of England and finds herself embroidering grim religious mottoes and shaking her little tambourine for Jesus. But as this budding missionary comes of age, and comes to terms with her unorthodox sexuality, the peculiar balance of her God-fearing household dissolves. Jeanette’s insistence on listening to truths of her own heart and mind - and on reporting them with wit and passion - makes for an unforgettable chronicle of an eccentric, moving passage into adulthood.
-
-
quirky and odd
- By Kelly on 01-06-20
-
12 Bytes
- How We Got Here, Where We Might Go Next
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 12 Bytes, the New York Times best-selling author of Why Be Happy When You Can Be Normal? Jeanette Winterson draws on her years of thinking and reading about artificial intelligence in all its bewildering manifestations. In her brilliant, laser focused, uniquely pointed, and witty style of storytelling, Winterson looks to history, religion, myth, literature, the politics of race and gender, and computer science, to help us understand the radical changes to the way we live and love that are happening now.
-
-
Absolute intelligent inquisitive humble reveal!!
- By olivia glass on 01-25-22
-
Pageboy
- A Memoir
- By: Elliot Page
- Narrated by: Elliot Page
- Length: 8 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
“Can I kiss you?” It was two months before the world premiere of Juno, and Elliot Page was in his first ever queer bar. The hot summer air hung heavy around him as he looked at her. And then it happened. In front of everyone. A previously unfathomable experience. Here he was on the precipice of discovering himself as a queer person, as a trans person. Getting closer to his desires, his dreams, himself, without the repression he’d carried for so long. But for Elliot, two steps forward had always come with one step back.
-
-
Ah, I wish this were better. I'm disappointed.
- By Jackson Theofore Keys on 06-07-23
By: Elliot Page
-
Sexing the Cherry
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 5 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a fantastic world that is and is not 17th-century England, a baby is found floating in the Thames. The child, Jordan, is rescued by Dog Woman and grows up to travel the world like Gulliver, though he finds that the world’s most curious oddities come from his own mind. Winterson leads the listener from discussions on the nature of time to Jordan’s fascination with journeys concealed within other journeys, all with a dizzying speed that shoots the listener from epiphany to shimmering epiphany.
-
-
Enjoyable
- By Persephone on 05-26-20
-
The Passion
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Tania Rodrigues, Daniel Pirrie
- Length: 5 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set during the tumultuous years of the Napoleonic Wars, The Passion intertwines the destinies of two remarkable people: Henri, a simple French soldier, who follows Napoleon from glory to Russian ruin; and Villanelle, the red-haired, web-footed daughter of a Venetian boatman, whose husband has gambled away her heart. In Venice’s compound of carnival, chance, and darkness, the pair meets their singular destiny.
-
-
Excellence.
- By Scottie V. on 10-07-19
-
Frankissstein
- A Love Story
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: John Sackville, Perdita Weeks
- Length: 7 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lake Geneva, 1816. Nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley is inspired to write a story about a scientist who creates a new life-form. In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI and carrying out some experiments of his own in a vast underground network of tunnels. Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with his mom again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere.
-
-
TW: SA, anti-trans bigotry, anti-gay bigotry
- By H. Myers on 11-19-19
-
Love Among the Ruins
- By: Catherine Maiorisi
- Narrated by: Abby Craden
- Length: 9 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Romance writer Calliope DeAndre's heart was buried with her wife, Abby. Plagued by anxiety attacks, Callie hasn't left her house since Abby's funeral. Callie's publisher is pressuring her for the travel romantic suspense she contracted to write before Abby got sick. But her writing process requires experiencing the thirty-day Romantic Italy tour leaving in two weeks. Encouraged by her friends but hoping the tour is fully booked, Callie calls and is told "we just received a cancellation."
-
-
Location location location
- By Robin Pennington on 12-13-23
-
Integrity
- Halcyon Division, Book 1
- By: E. J. Noyes
- Narrated by: Abby Craden
- Length: 9 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It’s an ordinary workday when intelligence analyst Lexie Martin learns about a horrific chemical weapon attack abroad. Just an ordinary day...until a stranger breaks into her house and warns her to forget what she saw and heard, setting off a chain of events Lexie thought only happened in movies. Falsely accused of stealing intelligence and unsure of who to trust, Lexie quickly realizes the significance of the intel and that she must do everything she can to keep it safe. And as she runs—maybe for her life—Lexie knows she needs something, or someone, to help her.
-
-
So Good!
- By csofthemidwest on 05-28-23
By: E. J. Noyes
-
A Kiss Doesn’t Lie
- By: Robin Alexander
- Narrated by: Abby Craden
- Length: 6 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jodi Grant had plans—a job interview that held promise and a date with a real woman who didn't only exist in her mind. What she had not planned on was a trip . . . at gunpoint when her father dropped a bombshell in her lap . . . at his own funeral. Dr. Blair Whittington went to Peru in search of ancient artifacts. What she discovered was the illegal antiquities trade in which she had unwittingly become embroiled. Betrayed by Nicolas Grant, Blair must rely on his estranged daughter, the key to her freedom.
-
-
Excellent
- By Sab on 11-02-23
By: Robin Alexander
-
Selected Works of Audre Lorde
- By: Audre Lorde, Roxane Gay - editor
- Narrated by: Mia Ellis
- Length: 8 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Self-described "black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet" Audre Lorde is an unforgettable voice in 20th-century literature, and one of the first to center the experiences of black, queer women. This essential collection showcases her indelible contributions to intersectional feminism, queer theory, and critical race studies in 12 landmark essays and more than 60 poems-selected and introduced by one of our most powerful contemporary voices on race and gender, Roxane Gay.
-
-
So amazing to have these essays in one place
- By Jessalyn Maguire on 11-04-23
By: Audre Lorde, and others
-
East of Eden
- By: John Steinbeck
- Narrated by: Richard Poe
- Length: 25 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This sprawling and often brutal novel, set in the rich farmlands of California's Salinas Valley, follows the intertwined destinies of two families - the Trasks and the Hamiltons - whose generations helplessly reenact the fall of Adam and Eve and the poisonous rivalry of Cain and Abel.
-
-
Why have I avoided this Beautiful Book???
- By Kelly on 03-25-17
By: John Steinbeck
-
Rubyfruit Jungle
- A Novel
- By: Rita Mae Brown
- Narrated by: Anna Paquin
- Length: 6 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In bawdy, moving prose, Rita Mae Brown tells the story of Molly Bolt, the adoptive daughter of a dirt-poor Southern couple who boldly forges her own path in America. With her startling beauty and crackling wit, Molly finds that women are drawn to her wherever she goes - and she refuses to apologize for loving them back.
-
-
Worth Every Moment
- By Kristena C on 01-02-23
By: Rita Mae Brown
-
The Woman Warrior
- Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts
- By: Maxine Hong Kingston
- Narrated by: Ming-Na
- Length: 7 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Acclaimed author Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Woman Warrior broke new ground when it was first published 35 years ago, weaving autobiography, history, folklore, and fantasy in to a candid and revelatory story about the daughter of Chinese immigrants in mid-20th century California.
-
-
Hilariously Vicious; Touchingly Empathetic
- By Horace on 08-28-11
-
New American Best Friend
- By: Olivia Gatwood
- Narrated by: Olivia Gatwood
- Length: 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One of the most recognizable young poets in America, Olivia Gatwood dazzles with her tribute to contemporary American womanhood in her debut book, New American Best Friend. Gatwood's poems deftly deconstruct traditional stereotypes. The focus shifts from childhood to adulthood, gender to sexuality, violence to joy. And always and inexorably, the book moves toward celebration, culminating in a series of odes: odes to the body, to tough women, to embracing your own journey in all its failures and triumphs.
-
-
Amazing poetry, but the music
- By Keaira on 07-29-19
By: Olivia Gatwood
-
Go Set a Watchman
- A Novel
- By: Harper Lee
- Narrated by: Reese Witherspoon
- Length: 6 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An historic literary event: the publication of a newly discovered novel, the earliest known work from Harper Lee, the beloved, best-selling author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning classic To Kill a Mockingbird. Originally written in the mid-1950s, Go Set a Watchman was the novel Harper Lee first submitted to her publishers before To Kill a Mockingbird. Assumed to have been lost, the manuscript was discovered in late 2014.
-
-
To Kill A Mockingbird vs Go Set A Watchman
- By Sara on 07-15-15
By: Harper Lee
-
America's First Daughter
- A Novel
- By: Stephanie Dray, Laura Kamoie
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 23 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a compelling, richly researched novel that draws from thousands of letters and original sources, best-selling authors Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie tell the fascinating, untold story of Thomas Jefferson's eldest daughter, Martha "Patsy" Jefferson Randolph - a woman who kept the secrets of our most enigmatic founding father and shaped an American legacy.
-
-
Great Story Great Narration
- By MissSusie66 on 03-30-16
By: Stephanie Dray, and others
-
Anna Karenina
- By: Leo Tolstoy
- Narrated by: Maggie Gyllenhaal
- Length: 35 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Leo Tolstoy's classic story of doomed love is one of the most admired novels in world literature. Generations of readers have been enthralled by his magnificent heroine, the unhappily married Anna Karenina, and her tragic affair with dashing Count Vronsky.
-
-
Need to Disclose and Highlight Name of Translator
- By Charles B on 08-27-18
By: Leo Tolstoy
-
The Poisonwood Bible
- By: Barbara Kingsolver
- Narrated by: Dean Robertson
- Length: 15 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Poisonwood Bible is a story told by the wife and four daughters of Nathan Price, a fierce, evangelical Baptist who takes his family and mission to the Belgian Congo in 1959. They carry with them everything they believe they will need from home, but soon find that all of it - from garden seeds to Scripture - is calamitously transformed on African soil. What follows is a suspenseful epic of one family’s tragic undoing and remarkable reconstruction over the course of three decades in postcolonial Africa.
-
-
Listen to the sample first!
- By Cheryl D on 07-30-08
Editorial review
By Madeline Anthony, Audible Editor
WHY BE HAPPY WHEN YOU COULD BE NORMAL? IS AN ENDURING MEMOIR ON THE LIFELONG SEARCH FOR BELONGING
Allow me to begin this review with a disclaimer: I am a massive fan of the legendary British author who penned this book, the truly iconic Jeanette Winterson. Reading and listening are a huge part of my life, and because of this, I have gotten to know many wickedly talented authors over the years. But like a first love, none of the new ones ever quite measure up.
I remember falling in love with Winterson the way a non-bibliophile might recall falling in love with another human being. The experience was visceral, bodily, and has forever implanted itself in my memory. I was 24 years old, and my Oma, who had raised me, had just died of lymphoma. I was beside myself in a way I had never known, and it was as though reading Winterson’s Written on the Body—a love story in which the main character’s lover suffers from a cancer similar to that which affected my Oma—forced out every emotion I had left. I stayed in bed for days, crying, relentlessly grieving, and, ultimately, finding solace in this profoundly timeless story of love and loss.
In the five years that have passed since that pivotal point, I endeavored to consume as much of Winterson’s work as I could get my hands on, and Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, The Gap of Time, and Sexing the Cherry proved just as riveting as my first foray into her prose. I worked my way through her repertoire the way a person might approach higher education— proudly and with purpose. And as Winterson is such a prolific writer, I was never at a loss for material. What I had first heard about Why Be Happy When You Could be Normal? is that it told a very similar story to Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, albeit without the fictional bits. Having read Oranges, I thought I knew the story already and opted instead for more of her passion-fueled fiction, leaving Why Be Happy as the last addition to my proverbial (and literal) Winterson shelf.
When I finally picked up Why Be Happy, I didn’t put it down until I had finished it a week later. It gave me that urgent feeling I sometimes get while reading, that everything else I do is just a distraction from the ultimate goal of Getting Back to The Book. I was pleasantly surprised to find that aside from the crucial, unchangeable facts of the story—that Winterson grew up in an ultra-religious household in a working-class town outside of Manchester— Oranges and Why Be Happy are distinct and not to be compared. While Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a fictionalized coming-of-age novel, Why Be Happy When You Could be Normal? is a searingly honest portrait of a middle-aged woman reflecting on a hard-won life."
Continue reading Madeline's review >
Critic reviews
Featured Article: Audible Essentials—The Top 100 LGBTQIA+ Listens of All Time
While LGBTQIA+ creators have been around for millennia, it’s only recently that we’ve been hearing more diverse, more queer-authored, and more queer-performed stories about the entire spectrum of LGBTQIA+ experiences and identities. This list—just like the community it represents—is meant to be fluid. But most importantly, it’s meant to celebrate and reflect on the issues faced by LGBTQIA+ people everywhere.
Related to this topic
-
Autumn
- By: Ali Smith
- Narrated by: Melody Grove
- Length: 5 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Fusing Keatsian mists and mellow fruitfulness with the vitality, the immediacy, and the color hit of Pop Art, Autumn is a witty excavation of the present by the past. The novel is a stripped-branches take on popular culture and a meditation, in a world growing ever more bordered and exclusive, on what richness and worth are, what harvest means.
-
-
Incredible use of language
- By Mary on 03-06-17
By: Ali Smith
-
Among Others
- By: Jo Walton
- Narrated by: Katherine Kellgren
- Length: 10 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Startling, unusual, and yet irresistably readable, Among Others is at once the compelling story of a young woman struggling to escape a troubled childhood, a brilliant diary of first encounters with the great novels of modern fantasy and SF, and a spellbinding tale of escape from ancient enchantment.
-
-
Subtle Character Piece
- By Eoin on 09-15-11
By: Jo Walton
-
Companion Piece
- A Novel
- By: Ali Smith
- Narrated by: Natalie Simpson
- Length: 4 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With an eye for rendering the timely in a timeless way and enchanting audiences with lyrical prose and grace, Ali Smith's ambitious Seasonal Quartet—a series of four stand-alone novels, separate but interconnected—artfully guided us through #MeToo, Brexit, the refugee crisis, a global pandemic, and more. Now, Smith's highly anticipated Companion Piece looks to the future and builds upon this "time-sensitive project". This new novel stands apart from the Quartet, which remains discrete unto itself.
-
-
She said she said she said
- By Cate on 05-29-22
By: Ali Smith
-
The Town House
- By: Norah Lofts
- Narrated by: Juliet Prague, Martyn Read
- Length: 17 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
"It was in the first week of October in the year 1391 that I first came face to face with the man who owned me… the man whose lightest word was to us, his villeins, weightier than the King’s law or the edicts of our Holy Father…” So began the story of Martin Reed - a serf whose resentment of the automatic rule of his feudal lord finally flared into open defiance.
-
-
Another winner by Norah Lofts
- By Bird Lady 147 on 10-03-17
By: Norah Lofts
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By: Joy Dettman
- Narrated by: Deidre Rubenstein
- Length: 20 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On a balmy midsummer's evening in 1923, a young woman - foreign, dishevelled and heavily pregnant - is found unconscious just off the railway tracks in the tiny logging community of Woody Creek. The town midwife, Gertrude Foote, is roused from her bed when the woman is brought to her door. Try as she might, Gertrude is unable to save her, but the baby lives.
-
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By Verita on 06-16-17
By: Joy Dettman
-
The Book of Ebenezer le Page
- By: G. B. Edwards
- Narrated by: Roy Dotrice
- Length: 21 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ebenezer Le Page, cantankerous, opinionated and charming, is one of the most compelling literary creations of the late 20th century. Eighty years old, Ebenezer has lived his whole life on the Channel Island of Guernsey, a stony speck of a place caught between England and France yet a world away from either. Ebenezer himself is fiercely independent, but as he reaches the end of his life he is determined to tell his own story and the story of those he has known.
-
-
I miss Ebenezer
- By Mel on 01-15-18
By: G. B. Edwards
-
Autumn
- By: Ali Smith
- Narrated by: Melody Grove
- Length: 5 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Fusing Keatsian mists and mellow fruitfulness with the vitality, the immediacy, and the color hit of Pop Art, Autumn is a witty excavation of the present by the past. The novel is a stripped-branches take on popular culture and a meditation, in a world growing ever more bordered and exclusive, on what richness and worth are, what harvest means.
-
-
Incredible use of language
- By Mary on 03-06-17
By: Ali Smith
-
Among Others
- By: Jo Walton
- Narrated by: Katherine Kellgren
- Length: 10 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Startling, unusual, and yet irresistably readable, Among Others is at once the compelling story of a young woman struggling to escape a troubled childhood, a brilliant diary of first encounters with the great novels of modern fantasy and SF, and a spellbinding tale of escape from ancient enchantment.
-
-
Subtle Character Piece
- By Eoin on 09-15-11
By: Jo Walton
-
Companion Piece
- A Novel
- By: Ali Smith
- Narrated by: Natalie Simpson
- Length: 4 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With an eye for rendering the timely in a timeless way and enchanting audiences with lyrical prose and grace, Ali Smith's ambitious Seasonal Quartet—a series of four stand-alone novels, separate but interconnected—artfully guided us through #MeToo, Brexit, the refugee crisis, a global pandemic, and more. Now, Smith's highly anticipated Companion Piece looks to the future and builds upon this "time-sensitive project". This new novel stands apart from the Quartet, which remains discrete unto itself.
-
-
She said she said she said
- By Cate on 05-29-22
By: Ali Smith
-
The Town House
- By: Norah Lofts
- Narrated by: Juliet Prague, Martyn Read
- Length: 17 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
"It was in the first week of October in the year 1391 that I first came face to face with the man who owned me… the man whose lightest word was to us, his villeins, weightier than the King’s law or the edicts of our Holy Father…” So began the story of Martin Reed - a serf whose resentment of the automatic rule of his feudal lord finally flared into open defiance.
-
-
Another winner by Norah Lofts
- By Bird Lady 147 on 10-03-17
By: Norah Lofts
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By: Joy Dettman
- Narrated by: Deidre Rubenstein
- Length: 20 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On a balmy midsummer's evening in 1923, a young woman - foreign, dishevelled and heavily pregnant - is found unconscious just off the railway tracks in the tiny logging community of Woody Creek. The town midwife, Gertrude Foote, is roused from her bed when the woman is brought to her door. Try as she might, Gertrude is unable to save her, but the baby lives.
-
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By Verita on 06-16-17
By: Joy Dettman
-
The Book of Ebenezer le Page
- By: G. B. Edwards
- Narrated by: Roy Dotrice
- Length: 21 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ebenezer Le Page, cantankerous, opinionated and charming, is one of the most compelling literary creations of the late 20th century. Eighty years old, Ebenezer has lived his whole life on the Channel Island of Guernsey, a stony speck of a place caught between England and France yet a world away from either. Ebenezer himself is fiercely independent, but as he reaches the end of his life he is determined to tell his own story and the story of those he has known.
-
-
I miss Ebenezer
- By Mel on 01-15-18
By: G. B. Edwards
-
Trumpet
- By: Jackie Kay
- Narrated by: Cathleen McCarron
- Length: 9 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The death of legendary jazz trumpeter Joss Moody exposes an extraordinary secret. Unbeknown to all but his wife Millie, Joss was a woman living as a man. The discovery is most devastating for their adopted son, Colman, whose bewildered fury brings the press to the doorstep and sends his grieving mother to the sanctuary of a remote Scottish village. Winner of the Guardian Fiction Prize, Trumpet by Jackie Kay is a starkly beautiful modern classic about the lengths to which people will go for love.
-
-
Beautiful and True
- By Colin on 05-24-17
By: Jackie Kay
-
Dear Fatty
- By: Dawn French
- Narrated by: Liza Tarbuck
- Length: 6 hrs and 36 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With a sharp eye for comic detail and a wicked ear for the absurdities of life, Dawn French shows just how an RAF girl from the west country with dreams of becoming a ballerina/bridesmaid/thief rose to become one of the best-loved comedy actresses of our time.
-
-
If you like Dawn French - You will love this book!
- By Pamela on 01-22-09
By: Dawn French
-
Bone
- By: Yrsa Daley-Ward, Kiese Laymon - foreword
- Narrated by: Yrsa Daley-Ward, Kiese Laymon
- Length: 1 hr and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From navigating the oft competing worlds of religion and desire, to balancing society’s expectations with the raw experience of being a woman in the world; from detailing the experiences of growing up as a first generation black British woman, to working through situations of dependence and abuse; from finding solace in the echoing caverns of depression and loss, to exploring the vulnerability and redemption in falling in love, each of the raw and immediate poems in Daley-Ward’s bone resonates to the core of what it means to be human.
-
-
Visceral,blood hot, thrilling poetry-prose
- By Pam on 12-28-22
By: Yrsa Daley-Ward, and others
-
Annie Dunne
- By: Sebastian Barry
- Narrated by: Caroline Lennon
- Length: 7 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is 1959 in Wicklow, Ireland, and Annie and her cousin Sarah are living and working together to keep Sarah’s small farm running. Suddenly, Annie’s young niece and nephew are left in their care. Unprepared for the chaos that two children inevitably bring, but nervously excited nonetheless, Annie finds the interruption of her normal life and her last chance at happiness complicated further by the attention being paid to Sarah by a local man with his eye on the farm.
-
-
Splendid
- By Shady on 06-21-23
By: Sebastian Barry
-
My Real Children
- By: Jo Walton
- Narrated by: Alison Larkin
- Length: 9 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's 2015, and Patricia Cowan is very old. "Confused today," read the notes clipped to the end of her bed. She forgets things she should know - what year it is, major events in the lives of her children. But she remembers things that don't seem possible. She remembers marrying Mark and having four children. And she remembers not marrying Mark and raising three children with Bee instead.
-
-
A strange take on an otherwise simple story.
- By Lauren on 01-08-15
By: Jo Walton
-
The Dark Flood Rises
- A Novel
- By: Dame Margaret Drabble
- Narrated by: Anna Bentinck
- Length: 13 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Francesca Stubbs has a very full life. A highly regarded expert on housing for the elderly who is herself getting on in age, she drives restlessly round England. Amid the professional conferences she attends, she fits in visits to old friends, brings home-cooked dinners to her ex-husband, texts her son, who is grieving over the sudden death of his girlfriend, and drops in on her daughter, a quirky young woman who lives in a floodplain in the West Country.
-
-
Life Observed By An Exceptional Writer
- By Sara on 03-22-17
-
Your Voice in My Head
- A Memoir
- By: Emma Forrest
- Narrated by: Emma Forrest
- Length: 5 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Emma Forrest, a British journalist, was just 22 and living the fast life in New York City when she realized that her quirks had gone beyond eccentricity. In a cycle of loneliness, damaging relationships, and destructive behavior, she found herself in the chair of a slim, balding, and effortlessly optimistic psychiatrist--a man whose wisdom and humanity would wrench her from the dangerous tide after she tried to end her life.
-
-
Great, quick read
- By Amazon Customer on 02-12-21
By: Emma Forrest
-
Lost for Words
- By: Stephanie Butland
- Narrated by: Imogen Church
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Loveday Cardew prefers books to people, and her job in a York bookshop is her refuge. If you look carefully, you might see the first lines of the novels she loves the most tattooed on her skin, but there are secrets Loveday will never share. Into the bookshop come a poet, a lover, a friend and three mysterious deliveries, each of which stirs unsettling memories she wants to forget. Turning the pages of her past will be the hardest thing Loveday has ever done. Can she trust those around her?
-
-
Beautiful
- By J.Durant on 05-13-17
-
The Testament of Gideon Mack
- By: James Robertson
- Narrated by: Tom Cotcher
- Length: 15 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For Gideon Mack, faithless minister, unfaithful husband, and troubled soul, the existence of God, let alone the Devil, is no more credible than that of ghosts or fairies - until the day he falls into a gorge and is rescued by someone who might just be Satan.
-
-
Fantastic
- By Christopher on 07-06-08
By: James Robertson
-
A Change of Climate
- A Novel
- By: Hilary Mantel
- Narrated by: Sandra Duncan
- Length: 12 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ralph and Anna Eldred are an exemplary couple, devoting themselves to doing good. 30 years ago as missionaries in Africa, the worst that could happen did. Shattered by their encounter with inexplicable evil, they returned to England, never to speak of it again. But when Ralph falls into an affair, Anna finds no forgiveness in her heart, and 30 years of repressed rage and grief explode, destroying not only a marriage but also their love, their faith, and everything they thought they were.
-
-
Beautifully written
- By Patricia S. on 10-11-15
By: Hilary Mantel
-
The Night Ocean
- By: Paul La Farge
- Narrated by: Elisabeth Rodgers
- Length: 13 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Marina Willett, MD, has a problem. Her husband, Charlie, has become obsessed with H. P. Lovecraft, in particular with one episode in the legendary horror writer's life: In the summer of 1934, the "old gent" lived for two months with a gay teenage fan named Robert Barlow, at Barlow's family home in central Florida. What were the two of them up to? Were they friends - or something more? Just when Charlie thinks he's solved the puzzle, a new scandal erupts, and he disappears.
-
-
Frustratingly Uneven Due to Clumsy Plot Structure
- By Adam on 06-15-17
By: Paul La Farge
-
Flesh Wounds
- By: Richard Glover
- Narrated by: Richard Glover
- Length: 7 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A mother who invented her past, a father who was often absent, a son who wondered if this could really be his family...Richard Glover's favourite dinner-party game is called 'Who's Got the Weirdest Parents?' It's a game he always thinks he'll win. There was his mother, a deluded snob who made up large swathes of her past and who ran away with Richard's English teacher, a Tolkien devotee, nudist and stuffed toy collector.
-
-
Such a Meaningful Reflection
- By Awarenessing on 11-28-15
By: Richard Glover
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
Normal Women
- A Novel
- By: Ainslie Hogarth
- Narrated by: Brittany Pressley
- Length: 9 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When her daughter Lotte was born, Dani had welcomed the chance to be a stay-at-home mother. To be good at something, for once. But now Dani can’t stop thinking about her seemingly healthy husband, Clark, dropping dead. Not because she hates him (not right now, anyway) but because it’s become abundantly clear to Dani that if he dies, she and Lotte will be left destitute. And then Dani discovers The Temple.
-
-
Amazing read and narration
- By Paige Turner on 09-03-24
By: Ainslie Hogarth
-
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson
- Length: 6 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jeanette is a bright and rebellious orphan who is adopted into an evangelical household in the dour, industrial North of England and finds herself embroidering grim religious mottoes and shaking her little tambourine for Jesus. But as this budding missionary comes of age, and comes to terms with her unorthodox sexuality, the peculiar balance of her God-fearing household dissolves. Jeanette’s insistence on listening to truths of her own heart and mind - and on reporting them with wit and passion - makes for an unforgettable chronicle of an eccentric, moving passage into adulthood.
-
-
quirky and odd
- By Kelly on 01-06-20
-
Goodbye, Vitamin
- A Novel
- By: Rachel Khong
- Narrated by: Therese Plummer
- Length: 4 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Freshly disengaged from her fiancé and feeling that life has not turned out quite the way she planned, 30-year-old Ruth quits her job, leaves town, and arrives at her parents' home to find that situation more complicated than she'd realized. Her father, a prominent history professor, is losing his memory and is only erratically lucid. Ruth's mother, meanwhile, is lucidly erratic.
-
-
Hello Sweet Sweet Book
- By Syd Young on 08-06-17
By: Rachel Khong
-
Bad Feminist
- Essays
- By: Roxane Gay
- Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
- Length: 11 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A collection of essays spanning politics, criticism, and feminism from one of the most-watched young cultural observers of her generation, Roxane Gay. In these funny and insightful essays, Roxane Gay takes us through the journey of her evolution as a woman ( Sweet Valley High) of color ( The Help) while also taking listeners on a ride through culture of the last few years ( Girls, Django in Chains) and commenting on the state of feminism today (abortion, Chris Brown).
-
-
"I am a mess of contradictions" - RG
- By Cynthia on 12-27-15
By: Roxane Gay
-
The Passion
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Tania Rodrigues, Daniel Pirrie
- Length: 5 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set during the tumultuous years of the Napoleonic Wars, The Passion intertwines the destinies of two remarkable people: Henri, a simple French soldier, who follows Napoleon from glory to Russian ruin; and Villanelle, the red-haired, web-footed daughter of a Venetian boatman, whose husband has gambled away her heart. In Venice’s compound of carnival, chance, and darkness, the pair meets their singular destiny.
-
-
Excellence.
- By Scottie V. on 10-07-19
-
I Feel Bad About My Neck
- And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman
- By: Nora Ephron
- Narrated by: Nora Ephron
- Length: 3 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With her disarming, intimate, completely accessible voice, and dry sense of humor, Nora Ephron shares with us her ups and downs in I Feel Bad About My Neck, a candid, hilarious look at women who are getting older and dealing with the tribulations of maintenance, menopause, empty nests, and life itself.
-
-
Don't make me get out of the car...
- By Kestrel on 10-09-06
By: Nora Ephron
-
Normal Women
- A Novel
- By: Ainslie Hogarth
- Narrated by: Brittany Pressley
- Length: 9 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When her daughter Lotte was born, Dani had welcomed the chance to be a stay-at-home mother. To be good at something, for once. But now Dani can’t stop thinking about her seemingly healthy husband, Clark, dropping dead. Not because she hates him (not right now, anyway) but because it’s become abundantly clear to Dani that if he dies, she and Lotte will be left destitute. And then Dani discovers The Temple.
-
-
Amazing read and narration
- By Paige Turner on 09-03-24
By: Ainslie Hogarth
-
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson
- Length: 6 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jeanette is a bright and rebellious orphan who is adopted into an evangelical household in the dour, industrial North of England and finds herself embroidering grim religious mottoes and shaking her little tambourine for Jesus. But as this budding missionary comes of age, and comes to terms with her unorthodox sexuality, the peculiar balance of her God-fearing household dissolves. Jeanette’s insistence on listening to truths of her own heart and mind - and on reporting them with wit and passion - makes for an unforgettable chronicle of an eccentric, moving passage into adulthood.
-
-
quirky and odd
- By Kelly on 01-06-20
-
Goodbye, Vitamin
- A Novel
- By: Rachel Khong
- Narrated by: Therese Plummer
- Length: 4 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Freshly disengaged from her fiancé and feeling that life has not turned out quite the way she planned, 30-year-old Ruth quits her job, leaves town, and arrives at her parents' home to find that situation more complicated than she'd realized. Her father, a prominent history professor, is losing his memory and is only erratically lucid. Ruth's mother, meanwhile, is lucidly erratic.
-
-
Hello Sweet Sweet Book
- By Syd Young on 08-06-17
By: Rachel Khong
-
Bad Feminist
- Essays
- By: Roxane Gay
- Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
- Length: 11 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A collection of essays spanning politics, criticism, and feminism from one of the most-watched young cultural observers of her generation, Roxane Gay. In these funny and insightful essays, Roxane Gay takes us through the journey of her evolution as a woman ( Sweet Valley High) of color ( The Help) while also taking listeners on a ride through culture of the last few years ( Girls, Django in Chains) and commenting on the state of feminism today (abortion, Chris Brown).
-
-
"I am a mess of contradictions" - RG
- By Cynthia on 12-27-15
By: Roxane Gay
-
The Passion
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Tania Rodrigues, Daniel Pirrie
- Length: 5 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set during the tumultuous years of the Napoleonic Wars, The Passion intertwines the destinies of two remarkable people: Henri, a simple French soldier, who follows Napoleon from glory to Russian ruin; and Villanelle, the red-haired, web-footed daughter of a Venetian boatman, whose husband has gambled away her heart. In Venice’s compound of carnival, chance, and darkness, the pair meets their singular destiny.
-
-
Excellence.
- By Scottie V. on 10-07-19
-
I Feel Bad About My Neck
- And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman
- By: Nora Ephron
- Narrated by: Nora Ephron
- Length: 3 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With her disarming, intimate, completely accessible voice, and dry sense of humor, Nora Ephron shares with us her ups and downs in I Feel Bad About My Neck, a candid, hilarious look at women who are getting older and dealing with the tribulations of maintenance, menopause, empty nests, and life itself.
-
-
Don't make me get out of the car...
- By Kestrel on 10-09-06
By: Nora Ephron
-
What My Mother and I Don't Talk About
- Fifteen Writers Break the Silence
- By: Michele Filgate
- Narrated by: Michele Filgate, Fajer Al-Kaisi, Roger Casey, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As an undergraduate, Michele Filgate started writing an essay about being abused by her stepfather. It took her more than a decade to realize that she was actually trying to write about how this affected her relationship with her mother. When it was finally published, the essay went viral, shared on social media by Anne Lamott, Rebecca Solnit, and many others. This gave Filgate an idea, and the resulting anthology offers a candid look at our relationships with our mothers.
-
-
Now I’m healing
- By wonderwoman0414 on 08-24-21
By: Michele Filgate
-
Frankissstein
- A Love Story
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: John Sackville, Perdita Weeks
- Length: 7 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lake Geneva, 1816. Nineteen-year-old Mary Shelley is inspired to write a story about a scientist who creates a new life-form. In Brexit Britain, a young transgender doctor called Ry is falling in love with Victor Stein, a celebrated professor leading the public debate around AI and carrying out some experiments of his own in a vast underground network of tunnels. Meanwhile, Ron Lord, just divorced and living with his mom again, is set to make his fortune launching a new generation of sex dolls for lonely men everywhere.
-
-
TW: SA, anti-trans bigotry, anti-gay bigotry
- By H. Myers on 11-19-19
-
Sexing the Cherry
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 5 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a fantastic world that is and is not 17th-century England, a baby is found floating in the Thames. The child, Jordan, is rescued by Dog Woman and grows up to travel the world like Gulliver, though he finds that the world’s most curious oddities come from his own mind. Winterson leads the listener from discussions on the nature of time to Jordan’s fascination with journeys concealed within other journeys, all with a dizzying speed that shoots the listener from epiphany to shimmering epiphany.
-
-
Enjoyable
- By Persephone on 05-26-20
-
12 Bytes
- How We Got Here, Where We Might Go Next
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 12 Bytes, the New York Times best-selling author of Why Be Happy When You Can Be Normal? Jeanette Winterson draws on her years of thinking and reading about artificial intelligence in all its bewildering manifestations. In her brilliant, laser focused, uniquely pointed, and witty style of storytelling, Winterson looks to history, religion, myth, literature, the politics of race and gender, and computer science, to help us understand the radical changes to the way we live and love that are happening now.
-
-
Absolute intelligent inquisitive humble reveal!!
- By olivia glass on 01-25-22
-
Peeling the Onion
- By: Gunter Grass
- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 15 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this extraordinary memoir, Nobel Prize-winning author Günter Grass remembers his early life, from his boyhood through the late 1950s, when his book The Tin Drum was published. During the Second World War, Grass was drafted into the Waffen-SS. Taken prisoner by American forces, he spent the final weeks of the war in an American POW camp. After the war, Grass resolved to become an artist and moved to Paris, where he began to write the novel that would make him famous.
-
-
A literary memoir that is maybe not for everyone
- By Grant on 09-06-13
By: Gunter Grass
-
Night Side of the River
- Ghost Stories
- By: Jeanette Winterson
- Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson, Vicky Licorish
- Length: 9 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this delightfully chilling collection, the iconic Jeanette Winterson turns her fearless gaze to the realm of ghosts, interspersing her own encounters with the supernatural alongside hair-raising fictions. Lifting the veil between the living and the dead, Winterson spirits us away to a haunted estate that ensnares a nomadic young couple in its own dark past, a staged immersive ghost tour gone awry, a West Village seance that threatens the bounds between AI and reality, and a vacation home in the metaverse where a widow visits an improved version of her deceased husband.
-
-
Break it up!
- By Jack Estberg on 05-18-24
-
A Saint from Texas
- By: Edmund White
- Narrated by: Barbara Barnes
- Length: 13 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Yvette and Yvonne Crawford are twin sisters, born on a humble patch of East Texas prairie but bound for far more dramatic and tragic fates. Just as an untold fortune of oil lies beneath their daddy’s land, both girls harbour their own secrets and dreams - ones that will carry them far from Texas and from each other. As the decades unfold, Yvonne will ascend the highest ranks of Parisian society as Yvette gives herself to a lifetime of worship and service in the streets of Jericó, Colombia.
-
-
I disliked this book.
- By Artperson on 05-12-23
By: Edmund White
-
Shadow Country
- A New Rendering of the Watson Legend
- By: Peter Matthiessen
- Narrated by: Anthony Heald
- Length: 40 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Inspired by a near-mythic event on the wild Florida frontier at the turn of the 20th century, Shadow Country re-imagines the legend of the inspired Everglades sugar planter and notorious outlaw E. J. Watson, who drives himself relentlessly toward his own violent end at the hands of neighbors who mostly admired him, in a killing that obsessed his favorite son.
-
-
A great American Novel
- By SHAWN on 02-15-09
-
She's Not There
- A Life in Two Genders
- By: Jennifer Finney Boylan
- Narrated by: Jennifer Finney Boylan
- Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The provocative best seller She's Not There is the winning, utterly surprising story of a person changing genders. By turns hilarious and deeply moving, Jennifer Finney Boylan explores the territory that lies between men and women, examines changing friendships, and rejoices in the redeeming power of family. Told in Boylan's fresh voice, She's Not There is about a person bearing and finally revealing a complex secret.
-
-
Inspiring novel of MTF transition
- By Jamie on 03-01-18
-
Drinking Coffee Elsewhere
- By: Z. Z. Packer
- Narrated by: Shirley Jordan
- Length: 6 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Z. Z. Packer's first collection of short stories is rich with unexpected turns, indelible images, and penetrating insight that belies someone so young. Her stories plunge us into the worlds of people living on the edge and to the flashpoints that make or break them, that shape their worldviews forever.
-
-
Lousy chapter breaks
- By Gatster on 10-25-14
By: Z. Z. Packer
-
Autumn
- By: Ali Smith
- Narrated by: Melody Grove
- Length: 5 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Fusing Keatsian mists and mellow fruitfulness with the vitality, the immediacy, and the color hit of Pop Art, Autumn is a witty excavation of the present by the past. The novel is a stripped-branches take on popular culture and a meditation, in a world growing ever more bordered and exclusive, on what richness and worth are, what harvest means.
-
-
Incredible use of language
- By Mary on 03-06-17
By: Ali Smith
-
Nightwood
- By: Djuna Barnes, Jeanette Winterson - preface, T. S. Eliot - introduction
- Narrated by: Gemma Dawson
- Length: 6 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Nightwood, Djuna Barnes's strange and sinuous tour de force novel unfolds in the decadent shadows of Europe's great cities, Paris, Berlin, and Vienna - a world in which the boundaries of class, religion, and sexuality are bold but surprisingly porous. The outsized characters who inhabit this world are some of the most memorable in all of fiction.
-
-
The unendurable is the beginning of the curve...
- By Darwin8u on 01-18-20
By: Djuna Barnes, and others
What listeners say about Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Pamela Harvey
- 03-20-12
The Title Says It All
I wanted to read this book from the moment I read a review in the New York Times. The title grabbed me by my inner truths and would not let me go, and I relate because my mother had the same philosophy, if she could even be said to have a "philosophy". It's the overall general sense of being "happy" vs being "normal" that got to me - not the specifics of Winterson's life. My mother, too, was big on being "normal" and also felt that being happy was an offshoot of arrogance - like "who are you to deserve happiness?" I am not attempting to define happiness here, just saying the idea was always presented as an unreachable ideal, only given to a privileged few, with the rest of us required to trudge along, suffering and miserable.
Anyway, the narration took some time getting used to - I initially found Ms. Winterson's voice to be a bit strident, with an accent I couldn't quite place, but I gradually acclimated and found a receptive space where I could listen with more peace. The accent and patterns of speech actually work to help create the ambience of mid-20th century Manchester, England.
I like that Winterson's description of the renaissance-like evolution and development of Manchester - from its dark days as Britain's foremost manufacturing town into a prosperous arcade of high-end consumer pleasures such as restaurants, art galleries, new housing created from vacated mill buildings - parallels her own journey of self-dicovery and reclamation.
The memoir proceeds chronologically, but sometimes it's not quite clear where we are in Winterson's life. Not a problem though, as things eventually do clear up, and the surface randomness of the story does not devolve into confusion for the reader; due to the beauty of the writing, sometimes it does not really matter. WInterson herself admits to not writing in a linear style, preferring a less structured way of selecting her scenes.
Although this is another story about growing up with a mother who is very odd in so many ways, unwilling and unable to show love, perhaps even to feel it, this narrative has its own animus, and I, as a reader, never tire of this subject nor of this genre. Winterson's rise from her very inauspicious and soul-destroying roots into triumph like the Phoenix from the ashes is a story that can be told again and again.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
62 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Martin A. Perea
- 11-09-12
So well-written I had to buy the actual paper book
Would you consider the audio edition of Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? to be better than the print version?
It's a toss-up. With the book I can better revel in the great prose about Manchester or libraries, while I also enjoyed hearing the author speaking her own words in her own voice about her own life.
What other book might you compare Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? to and why?
Memoirs by other writers, coming out stories, growing up in a fundamentalist family stories, self-help stories about overcoming the past.
Which scene was your favorite?
Especially loved Chapter 2 about the background of Manchester.
Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
Realizations toward the end which I don't want to spoil.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Anonymous User
- 11-17-18
YES.
I recommend listening to this while reading "Oranges." This is the best memoir I've read.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- olivia glass
- 06-05-21
wonderful in every aspect
loved it . Touching. So expansive. endearing. It is also heart-wrenching
Truly a great read!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Robin Roberts
- 06-23-23
Excellent read
If you’re into depth writing that’s a little quirky and very English, you will love this book. Scrape the bone, honest, touching, thoughtful, and filled with references to literature that enhance all the bits that she brings out about a very tough life.
I found this book to be about healing. And love.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Lydia
- 03-14-12
Beam Me Up
Jeanette's use of humor is her way of handling often difficult situations with grace and candor. I am enjoying her very interesting although sometimes painful story of growing up "odd" in a time when it was considered...uncool. Her autobiographical story of a an adopted girl who was deprived of books and ended up going to Oxford, brilliantly shining, the shine tarnishing, and somehow developing even now, a new patina. Love her conversational style of writing and bright wit.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
15 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Evelyn
- 01-19-13
Retelling, now with more truthiness
What did you love best about Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal??
The story of Winterson's adopted life and finding her birth mother. As the child of an adpotee, it gave me insight into my mother's personality quirks.
What does Jeanette Winterson bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
I loved listening to Jeanette's accent, she spends a good amount of time talking about where she is from in the UK, and had the narrator had a traditional BBC accent, I think some of the flavor would have been lost.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Coolrbreeze
- 02-24-22
Insightful
We are an adoptive family so I could identify with this author in many instances.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Natalie
- 02-04-24
Jeanette in her own words
Poignant story brimming with Jeanette’s heartbreaking observations and usual wit, made even better by her own lovely voice.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Iris Pereyra
- 02-14-15
Truly Touching & Unforgettable Memoir!!
I usually don't read lots of memoirs and biographies, in general I prefer fiction or non-fiction when it pertains to issues that interest me, I must say thought that this is one of the most genuine and emotional memoirs I've ever read.
Jeannette Winterson was born in Manchester, England, and grew up in Accrington, Lacarshire, after being adopted by Constance and John William Winterson in the early 1960's.
This book recounts her quest for her identity, origins, her (birth) mother and ultimately for love and acceptance.
It's a different kind of memoir in that is doesn't follows a chronological structure. She jumps back and forth between different periods in her life, but to me that's one of the reasons why the book sounds so authentic, you almost feel that you are sitting down with a good friend while she is telling you her story.
The author comes across as a clever, witty, and as a person in search for answers. At times her writing sounds urgent and almost desperate. It's feels that she's running out of time and want to explains things to you, she wants to make sure you understand her history. Which l suppose is one of the reasons why people write these type of books, I imagine that this process provides for many, some sort of satisfying and emotional closure.
She also has a great sense of humor and it a wonderful conversationalist. Throughout the book she takes some time to explain some of the cultural, religious and political ethos of the time.
There are also quite a few extremely funny anecdotes. I love that in the middle of such a difficult upbringing, the author has the capacity to laugh at some rather crazy circumstances.
The center theme of the memoir is her descriptions of her very peculiar Pentecostal upbringing, and her tumultuous relationship with her adoptive mother, whom she call through most of the book "Mrs. Winterson".
Mrs. Winterson is described as an "out of scale, larger than life" woman, who at times sounds pretty much deranged. A woman opposed to any sort of intimacy, sexual or otherwise,she casts a huge shadow on the Winterson's household, and little Jeannette doesn't feel loved by either parent. Her father is a withdrawn, simple man who has been belittled by his wife and is incapable of standing up for himself, let alone for his adoptive daughter.
Little Jeannette is abused, both emotionally (her mother constantly alludes that in her adoption process “The Devil led us to the wrong crib”) and physically, she is beaten, left to sleep outside of the house, and pretty much left to her own devices since a very early age.
In Mrs. Winterson's ultra fundamentalist version of Christianity, there's not room for reading secular books, so she forbids Jeannette from reading anything other than the Bible. Jeannette doesn't obeys, of course, and when Mrs. W discovers dozens of books hidden under Jeannette's matters, she burns them all. This was to me a truly disturbing passage of the book.
Later on, Mrs. Winterson discovers that Jeannette is attracted to women and has in fact started a relationship with a girl that also attends her church, this sets in motion a series of events, including the spectacle of a 3-day exorcism performed by the pastor who tries to, to put it on contemporary terms "pray the gay away".
When Jeannette is 16 years old, she is evicted from her home after Mrs. B discovers and 2nd girlfriend, initially she lives in her car, but shortly after she gets under a roof, when a sympathetic teacher takes pity on her and allows her to stay in her house.
Jeannette stars reading English Literature in Prose A-Z, there's a very good public library in her town, and she's determined to read all the authors available in alphabetical order. "A book is a door,” she discovers “You open it. You step through.”
Later on she applied “to read English at Oxford because it was the most impossible thing” she could think of; she graduates; she writes books and becomes a well known and successful author.
The memoir then makes a big jump, and for whatever reason the author decides to take us 25 years later, when she has just broken up with her girlfriend of 6 years. This is when the book becomes more introspective, a search to connect the past with the present.
By now, Mrs. B has passed away and Jeannette has managed to maintain an almost normal relationship with her father.
Jeannette then begins the search for her birth mother, which is perhaps where the reader can feel a deeper sense of empathy and connection with her . She is desperate to find that final link to her past, yet she's also petrified by fear of what she might find. Who can't relate to that feeling?
After jumping many hoops throughout the inept and insensible bureaucracy that apparently rules the adoption system in the UK (I suspect, the same is true in the US and many other Western countries), she manages to find Ann, her birth mother, makes peace with her and her decision to give Jeannette away.
Of course, this being real life, there's not exactly a happy ending, not in the strict sense of the word anyway, so after her first meeting with Ann, she quickly comes to the painful realization that the instant connection she might have been anticipating does not come.
I think that what saves Jeannette Winston is that she possesses both a very clever and inquisitive mind as well as an indomitable and defiant personality.
By the end of the book, she appears to have accomplish an exorcism of her own: what stars as a detailed and painful description of the horrible mother, ends with a sense of closure and forgiveness.
When referring to a discussion she had with Ann, she says "I notice that I hate Ann criticizing Mrs Winterson. She was a monster but she was my monster". We humans are full of contradictions, aren't we?
Jeannette Winterson is the narrator of her memoir, I am for the most part, not a fan of authors reading their own audiobooks and I do preferred that they live this to the professionals, with that said, Winterson really did a wonderful job. Perhaps because of the 1st person narrative and her writing style is so intense, I don't imagine anybody else being able to narrate this book as well as she did.
I truly enjoyed this wonderful book.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
2 people found this helpful