You Exist Too Much
A Novel
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 $17.19
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Zehra Jane Naqvi
-
By:
-
Zaina Arafat
About this listen
On a hot day in Bethlehem, a 12-year-old Palestinian-American girl is yelled at by a group of men outside the Church of the Nativity. She has exposed her legs in a biblical city, an act they deem forbidden, and their judgement will echo on through her adolescence. When our narrator finally admits to her mother that she is queer, her mother's response only intensifies a sense of shame: "You exist too much," she tells her daughter.
Told in vignettes that flash between the US and the Middle East, Zaina Arafat's debut novel traces her protagonist's progress from blushing teen to sought-after DJ and aspiring writer. In Brooklyn, she moves into an apartment with her first serious girlfriend and tries to content herself with their comfortable relationship. But soon her longings, so closely hidden during her teenage years, explode out into reckless romantic encounters. Her desire to thwart her own destructive impulses will eventually lead her to The Ledge, an unconventional treatment center that identifies her affliction as "love addiction." In this strange, enclosed society she will start to consider the unnerving similarities between her own internal traumas and divisions and those of the places that have formed her.
You Exist Too Much is a captivating story charting two of our most intense longings - for love, and a place to call home.
©2020 Zaina Arafat (P)2020 HighBridge, a division of Recorded BooksListeners also enjoyed...
-
Detransition, Baby
- A Novel
- By: Torrey Peters
- Narrated by: Renata Friedman
- Length: 12 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Reese almost had it all: a loving relationship with Amy, an apartment in New York City, a job she didn't hate. She had scraped together what previous generations of trans women could only dream of: a life of mundane, bourgeois comforts. The only thing missing was a child. But then her girlfriend, Amy, detransitioned and became Ames, and everything fell apart. Now Reese is caught in a self-destructive pattern: avoiding her loneliness by sleeping with married men.
-
-
Emotional Torture
- By Teh Micha on 04-27-21
By: Torrey Peters
-
On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous
- A Novel
- By: Ocean Vuong
- Narrated by: Ocean Vuong
- Length: 7 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel is a shattering portrait of a family, a first love, and the redemptive power of storytelling. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late 20s, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born - a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam - and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation.
-
-
Beautifully written, but painful.
- By NB on 06-10-19
By: Ocean Vuong
-
Crying in H Mart
- A Memoir
- By: Michelle Zauner
- Narrated by: Michelle Zauner
- Length: 7 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this exquisite story of family, food, grief, and endurance, Michelle Zauner proves herself far more than a dazzling singer, songwriter, and guitarist. With humor and heart, she tells of growing up one of the few Asian-American kids at her school in Eugene, Oregon; of struggling with her mother's particular high expectations of her; of a painful adolescence; of treasured months spent in her grandmother's tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond, late at night, over heaping plates of food.
-
-
Broken Korean
- By Tim on 04-21-21
By: Michelle Zauner
-
In the Dream House
- A Memoir
- By: Carmen Maria Machado
- Narrated by: Carmen Maria Machado
- Length: 5 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the Dream House is Carmen Maria Machado's engrossing and wildly innovative account of a relationship gone bad, and a bold dissection of the mechanisms and cultural representations of psychological abuse. Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming. And it's that struggle that gives the book its original structure: each chapter is driven by its own narrative trope - the haunted house, erotica, the bildungsroman....
-
-
Devastatingly Beautiful
- By SeattleBookLover on 02-04-20
-
I'm Glad My Mom Died
- By: Jennette McCurdy
- Narrated by: Jennette McCurdy
- Length: 6 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jennette McCurdy was six years old when she had her first acting audition. Her mother’s dream was for her only daughter to become a star, and Jennette would do anything to make her mother happy. So she went along with what Mom called “calorie restriction." She endured extensive at-home makeovers while Mom chided, “Your eyelashes are invisible, okay? You think Dakota Fanning doesn’t tint hers?” She was even showered by Mom until age sixteen while sharing her diaries, email, and all her income. In I’m Glad My Mom Died, Jennette recounts all this in unflinching detail.
-
-
Unexpectedly poor narration
- By Blurryface on 08-10-22
By: Jennette McCurdy
-
My Year of Rest and Relaxation
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 7 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Our narrator should be happy, shouldn't she? She's young, thin, pretty, a recent Columbia graduate; she works an easy job at a hip art gallery and lives in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan paid for, like the rest of her needs, by her inheritance. But there is a dark and vacuous hole in her heart, and it isn't just the loss of her parents, or the way her Wall Street boyfriend treats her, or her sadomasochistic relationship with her best friend, Reva. It's the year 2000 in a city aglitter with wealth and possibility; what could be so terribly wrong?
-
-
I love it...
- By Claudia Gallegos on 07-12-18
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
-
Detransition, Baby
- A Novel
- By: Torrey Peters
- Narrated by: Renata Friedman
- Length: 12 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Reese almost had it all: a loving relationship with Amy, an apartment in New York City, a job she didn't hate. She had scraped together what previous generations of trans women could only dream of: a life of mundane, bourgeois comforts. The only thing missing was a child. But then her girlfriend, Amy, detransitioned and became Ames, and everything fell apart. Now Reese is caught in a self-destructive pattern: avoiding her loneliness by sleeping with married men.
-
-
Emotional Torture
- By Teh Micha on 04-27-21
By: Torrey Peters
-
On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous
- A Novel
- By: Ocean Vuong
- Narrated by: Ocean Vuong
- Length: 7 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel is a shattering portrait of a family, a first love, and the redemptive power of storytelling. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late 20s, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born - a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam - and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation.
-
-
Beautifully written, but painful.
- By NB on 06-10-19
By: Ocean Vuong
-
Crying in H Mart
- A Memoir
- By: Michelle Zauner
- Narrated by: Michelle Zauner
- Length: 7 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this exquisite story of family, food, grief, and endurance, Michelle Zauner proves herself far more than a dazzling singer, songwriter, and guitarist. With humor and heart, she tells of growing up one of the few Asian-American kids at her school in Eugene, Oregon; of struggling with her mother's particular high expectations of her; of a painful adolescence; of treasured months spent in her grandmother's tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond, late at night, over heaping plates of food.
-
-
Broken Korean
- By Tim on 04-21-21
By: Michelle Zauner
-
In the Dream House
- A Memoir
- By: Carmen Maria Machado
- Narrated by: Carmen Maria Machado
- Length: 5 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the Dream House is Carmen Maria Machado's engrossing and wildly innovative account of a relationship gone bad, and a bold dissection of the mechanisms and cultural representations of psychological abuse. Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming. And it's that struggle that gives the book its original structure: each chapter is driven by its own narrative trope - the haunted house, erotica, the bildungsroman....
-
-
Devastatingly Beautiful
- By SeattleBookLover on 02-04-20
-
I'm Glad My Mom Died
- By: Jennette McCurdy
- Narrated by: Jennette McCurdy
- Length: 6 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jennette McCurdy was six years old when she had her first acting audition. Her mother’s dream was for her only daughter to become a star, and Jennette would do anything to make her mother happy. So she went along with what Mom called “calorie restriction." She endured extensive at-home makeovers while Mom chided, “Your eyelashes are invisible, okay? You think Dakota Fanning doesn’t tint hers?” She was even showered by Mom until age sixteen while sharing her diaries, email, and all her income. In I’m Glad My Mom Died, Jennette recounts all this in unflinching detail.
-
-
Unexpectedly poor narration
- By Blurryface on 08-10-22
By: Jennette McCurdy
-
My Year of Rest and Relaxation
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 7 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Our narrator should be happy, shouldn't she? She's young, thin, pretty, a recent Columbia graduate; she works an easy job at a hip art gallery and lives in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan paid for, like the rest of her needs, by her inheritance. But there is a dark and vacuous hole in her heart, and it isn't just the loss of her parents, or the way her Wall Street boyfriend treats her, or her sadomasochistic relationship with her best friend, Reva. It's the year 2000 in a city aglitter with wealth and possibility; what could be so terribly wrong?
-
-
I love it...
- By Claudia Gallegos on 07-12-18
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
-
The Will to Change
- Men, Masculinity, and Love
- By: bell hooks
- Narrated by: Janina Edwards
- Length: 6 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Everyone needs to love and be loved - even men. But to know love, men must be able to look at the ways that patriarchal culture keeps them from knowing themselves, from being in touch with their feelings, from loving. In The Will to Change, bell hooks gets to the heart of the matter and shows men how to express the emotions that are a fundamental part of who they are - whatever their age, marital status, ethnicity, or sexual orientation.
-
-
A unique call to an ethic of creative love
- By Amazon Customer on 09-26-20
By: bell hooks
-
The Thirty Names of Night
- A Novel
- By: Zeyn Joukhadar
- Narrated by: Samy Figaredo, Lameece Issaq
- Length: 9 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the award-winning author of The Map of Salt and Stars, a new novel about three generations of Syrian Americans haunted by a mysterious species of bird and the truths they carry close to their hearts - a “vivid exploration of loss, art, queer and trans communities, and the persistence of history. Often tender, always engrossing, The Thirty Names of Night is a feat” (R.O. Kwon, author of The Incendiaries).
-
-
Might be easier to follow in print
- By Kate on 12-30-20
By: Zeyn Joukhadar
-
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
-
Real Life
- A Novel
- By: Brandon Taylor
- Narrated by: Kevin R. Free
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Almost everything about Wallace is at odds with the Midwestern university town where he is working uneasily toward a biochem degree. An introverted young man from Alabama, black and queer, he has left behind his family without escaping the long shadows of his childhood. For reasons of self-preservation, Wallace has enforced a wary distance even within his own circle of friends—some dating each other, some dating women, some feigning straightness.
-
-
Not My Gay Real Life
- By Haynes on 02-29-20
By: Brandon Taylor
-
Conversations with Friends
- A Novel
- By: Sally Rooney
- Narrated by: Aoife McMahon
- Length: 8 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Frances is a cool-headed and darkly observant young woman vaguely pursuing a career in writing while studying in Dublin. Her best friend and comrade-in-arms is the beautiful and endlessly self-possessed Bobbi. At a local poetry performance one night, Frances and Bobbi catch the eye of Melissa, a well-known photographer, and as the girls are then gradually drawn into Melissa's world, Frances is reluctantly impressed by the older woman's sophisticated home and tall, handsome husband, Nick.
-
-
Interesting point of view; glad I listened!
- By Amazon Customer on 08-23-17
By: Sally Rooney
-
Girls Can Kiss Now
- Essays
- By: Jill Gutowitz
- Narrated by: Jill Gutowitz
- Length: 7 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Jill Gutowitz’s life—for better and worse—has always been on a collision course with pop culture. There’s the time the FBI showed up at her door because of something she tweeted about Game of Thrones. The pop songs that have been the soundtrack to the worst moments of her life.
-
-
GOOD AND GAY
- By Sarah Griffin on 03-17-22
By: Jill Gutowitz
-
We Have Always Been Here
- A Queer Muslim Memoir
- By: Samra Habib
- Narrated by: Parmida Vand
- Length: 5 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Samra Habib has spent most of their life searching for the safety to be themself. As an Ahmadi Muslim growing up in Pakistan, they faced regular threats from Islamic extremists who believed the small, dynamic sect to be blasphemous. From their parents, they internalized the lesson that revealing their identity could put them in grave danger.
-
-
Wow.
- By Lannah E. on 05-19-21
By: Samra Habib
-
The Wives
- By: Tarryn Fisher
- Narrated by: Lauren Fortgang
- Length: 9 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
You’ve never met the other wives. None of you know each other, and because of this unconventional arrangement, you can see your husband only one day a week. But you love him so much you don’t care. Or at least that’s what you’ve told yourself. But one day, while you’re doing laundry, you find a scrap of paper in his pocket—an appointment reminder for a woman named Hannah, and you just know it’s another of the wives.
-
-
Unlikeable main character, author cheats
- By Timothy Masters on 02-12-20
By: Tarryn Fisher
-
Everything I Know About Love
- A Memoir
- By: Dolly Alderton
- Narrated by: Dolly Alderton
- Length: 8 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The wildly funny, occasionally heart-breaking internationally best-selling memoir about growing up, growing older, and learning to navigate friendships, jobs, loss, and love along the ride. When it comes to the trials and triumphs of becoming an adult, journalist and former Sunday Times columnist Dolly Alderton has seen and tried it all.
-
-
Loved it
- By Jessica on 04-02-20
By: Dolly Alderton
-
A Woman Is No Man
- A Novel
- By: Etaf Rum
- Narrated by: Ariana Delawari, Dahlia Salem, Susan Nezami
- Length: 10 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Three generations of Palestinian-American women living in Brooklyn are torn between individual desire and the strict mores of Arab culture in this powerful debut - a heart-wrenching story of love, intrigue, courage, and betrayal that will resonate with women from all backgrounds, giving voice to the silenced and agency to the oppressed.
-
-
Powerful and Terrifying
- By Emmst51 on 05-04-19
By: Etaf Rum
-
The Lesbiana's Guide to Catholic School
- By: Sonora Reyes
- Narrated by: Karla Serrato
- Length: 9 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sixteen-year-old Yamilet Flores prefers to be known for her killer eyeliner, not for being one of the only Mexican kids at her new, mostly white, very rich Catholic school. But at least here no one knows she’s gay, and Yami intends to keep it that way.
-
-
Good Topics - Not as engaging as I’d hope
- By AlyssaKate on 09-22-23
By: Sonora Reyes
-
Olga Dies Dreaming
- A Novel
- By: Xochitl Gonzalez
- Narrated by: Almarie Guerra, Inés del Castillo, Armando Riesco
- Length: 11 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It’s 2017, and Olga and her brother, Pedro “Prieto” Acevedo” are bold-faced names in their hometown of New York. Prieto is a popular Congressman representing their gentrifying Latinx neighborhood in Brooklyn while Olga is the tony wedding planner for Manhattan’s powerbrokers. Despite their alluring public lives, behind closed doors things are far less rosy. Sure, Olga can orchestrate the love stories of the one percent, but she can’t seem to find her own...until she meets Matteo, who forces her to confront the effects of long-held family secrets.
-
-
Funny, romantic, serious, substantial—all of these things and more
- By Diana on 01-07-22
By: Xochitl Gonzalez
Related to this topic
-
Bad Habits
- By: Amy Gentry
- Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman
- Length: 10 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Claire "Mac" Woods—a professor enjoying her newfound hotshot status at an academic conference—finally has the acceptance and admiration she has long craved. But at the conference's hotel bar, Mac is surprised to run into a face from a past she'd rather forget: the moneyed, effortlessly perfect Gwendolyn Whitney, Mac's foil, rival, and former best friend.
-
-
Outstanding!
- By SLuzaz on 02-15-21
By: Amy Gentry
-
Arrange Me
- By: Katy Regnery
- Narrated by: Brooke Hayden, J.F. Harding
- Length: 5 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
My name is Courtney Jane Salinger...and I'm sick of games. Sick of the Friday night bar-scene-cum-meat-market. Sick of awful dates and one-night stands, booty calls and guys who don’t call back, mixed messages or no messages and - and - and...I'm sick of all of it. I’m done. It's too hard, and worse: little by little, it's making me hard. It's breaking my heart. What do I want? That's easy. I want a house in suburbia with a white picket fence. I want babies to buckle into a minivan. But most of all, I want to be married. I want a husband.
-
-
Good story...female narrator weak
- By Janice in Muskogee on 02-02-20
By: Katy Regnery
-
F*ck Marriage
- By: Tarryn Fisher
- Narrated by: Meg Sylvan, Connor Crais
- Length: 9 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Two years ago, Billie Tarrow's husband left her for another woman. Shamed and divorced, Billie retreated to her family home in Port Townsend, far from her old life in New York. After a near-death encounter, Billie decides to return to the city that took everything from her. But sometimes in the midst of heartache, hope suffocates the pain. Satcher Gable has carried a torch for Billie for 10 years. When she suddenly returns to New York a single woman, he can't believe his good fortune. But convincing Billie to walk away from her heartache is proving more difficult than he anticipated.
-
-
So many emotions
- By ANON on 06-16-20
By: Tarryn Fisher
-
The Nine Lives of Rose Napolitano
- A Novel
- By: Donna Freitas
- Narrated by: Kristen Sieh
- Length: 9 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Rose Napolitano is fighting with her husband, Luke, about prenatal vitamins. She promised she’d take them, but didn’t. He promised before they got married that he’d never want children, but now he’s changed his mind. Their marriage has come to rest on this one question: Can Rose find it in herself to become a mother? Rose is a successful professor and academic. She's never wanted to have a child. The fight ends, and with it their marriage.
-
-
Amateurish and Frustrating Book
- By Nerd on 06-04-21
By: Donna Freitas
-
The Stuff that Never Happened
- A Novel
- By: Maddie Dawson
- Narrated by: Teri Clark Linden
- Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Annabelle McKay knows she shouldn’t have any complaints. She’s been in a stable marriage that’s lasted almost three decades and has provided her with two wonderful children and thousands of family dinners around a sturdy oak table. Other wives envy the fact that Grant is not the type of man who would ever cheat on her or leave her for a younger woman. The trouble is Annabelle isn’t sure she wants to be married to Grant anymore. The trouble is she’s still in love with someone else.
-
-
Don’t pass this one up.
- By Lauren on 03-10-20
By: Maddie Dawson
-
Surrender Bay
- A Nantucket Love Story, Book 1
- By: Denise Hunter
- Narrated by: Kathryn Lynhurst
- Length: 8 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Samantha Owens' estranged stepfather has died, leaving her his cottage in Nantucket - a place she fled years ago, never planning to return. As a single mom, Samantha can't afford to pass up a financial windfall like oceanfront property. So she travels home to fix up the house and sell it...never suspecting that Landon Reed still lives two doors down. As their long-dormant romance begins to bud again, Samantha must face a past that separated her from the God of her childhood. And she must tell Landon why she fled the island in the first place - a secret that could tear them apart.
-
-
Disappointing
- By Cody Wheeler on 04-28-20
By: Denise Hunter
-
Bad Habits
- By: Amy Gentry
- Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman
- Length: 10 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Claire "Mac" Woods—a professor enjoying her newfound hotshot status at an academic conference—finally has the acceptance and admiration she has long craved. But at the conference's hotel bar, Mac is surprised to run into a face from a past she'd rather forget: the moneyed, effortlessly perfect Gwendolyn Whitney, Mac's foil, rival, and former best friend.
-
-
Outstanding!
- By SLuzaz on 02-15-21
By: Amy Gentry
-
Arrange Me
- By: Katy Regnery
- Narrated by: Brooke Hayden, J.F. Harding
- Length: 5 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
My name is Courtney Jane Salinger...and I'm sick of games. Sick of the Friday night bar-scene-cum-meat-market. Sick of awful dates and one-night stands, booty calls and guys who don’t call back, mixed messages or no messages and - and - and...I'm sick of all of it. I’m done. It's too hard, and worse: little by little, it's making me hard. It's breaking my heart. What do I want? That's easy. I want a house in suburbia with a white picket fence. I want babies to buckle into a minivan. But most of all, I want to be married. I want a husband.
-
-
Good story...female narrator weak
- By Janice in Muskogee on 02-02-20
By: Katy Regnery
-
F*ck Marriage
- By: Tarryn Fisher
- Narrated by: Meg Sylvan, Connor Crais
- Length: 9 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Two years ago, Billie Tarrow's husband left her for another woman. Shamed and divorced, Billie retreated to her family home in Port Townsend, far from her old life in New York. After a near-death encounter, Billie decides to return to the city that took everything from her. But sometimes in the midst of heartache, hope suffocates the pain. Satcher Gable has carried a torch for Billie for 10 years. When she suddenly returns to New York a single woman, he can't believe his good fortune. But convincing Billie to walk away from her heartache is proving more difficult than he anticipated.
-
-
So many emotions
- By ANON on 06-16-20
By: Tarryn Fisher
-
The Nine Lives of Rose Napolitano
- A Novel
- By: Donna Freitas
- Narrated by: Kristen Sieh
- Length: 9 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Rose Napolitano is fighting with her husband, Luke, about prenatal vitamins. She promised she’d take them, but didn’t. He promised before they got married that he’d never want children, but now he’s changed his mind. Their marriage has come to rest on this one question: Can Rose find it in herself to become a mother? Rose is a successful professor and academic. She's never wanted to have a child. The fight ends, and with it their marriage.
-
-
Amateurish and Frustrating Book
- By Nerd on 06-04-21
By: Donna Freitas
-
The Stuff that Never Happened
- A Novel
- By: Maddie Dawson
- Narrated by: Teri Clark Linden
- Length: 11 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Annabelle McKay knows she shouldn’t have any complaints. She’s been in a stable marriage that’s lasted almost three decades and has provided her with two wonderful children and thousands of family dinners around a sturdy oak table. Other wives envy the fact that Grant is not the type of man who would ever cheat on her or leave her for a younger woman. The trouble is Annabelle isn’t sure she wants to be married to Grant anymore. The trouble is she’s still in love with someone else.
-
-
Don’t pass this one up.
- By Lauren on 03-10-20
By: Maddie Dawson
-
Surrender Bay
- A Nantucket Love Story, Book 1
- By: Denise Hunter
- Narrated by: Kathryn Lynhurst
- Length: 8 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Samantha Owens' estranged stepfather has died, leaving her his cottage in Nantucket - a place she fled years ago, never planning to return. As a single mom, Samantha can't afford to pass up a financial windfall like oceanfront property. So she travels home to fix up the house and sell it...never suspecting that Landon Reed still lives two doors down. As their long-dormant romance begins to bud again, Samantha must face a past that separated her from the God of her childhood. And she must tell Landon why she fled the island in the first place - a secret that could tear them apart.
-
-
Disappointing
- By Cody Wheeler on 04-28-20
By: Denise Hunter
-
It Had to Be You
- A Novel
- By: Georgia Clark
- Narrated by: Danny Campbell, Feodor Chin, Frankie Corzo, and others
- Length: 13 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For the past 20 years, Liv and Eliot Goldenhorn have run In Love in New York, Brooklyn’s beloved wedding-planning business. When Eliot dies unexpectedly, he even more unexpectedly leaves half of the business to his younger, blonder girlfriend, Savannah. Liv and Savannah are not a match made in heaven, to say the least. But what starts as a personal and professional nightmare transforms into something even savvy, cynical Liv Goldenhorn couldn’t begin to imagine.
-
-
Distractingly bad narration
- By maggie walsh on 05-12-21
By: Georgia Clark
-
Fault Lines
- A Novel
- By: Emily Itami
- Narrated by: Lydia Wilson
- Length: 5 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Mizuki is a Japanese housewife. She has a hardworking husband, two adorable children, and a beautiful Tokyo apartment. It’s everything a woman could want, yet sometimes she wonders whether she would rather throw herself off the high-rise balcony than spend another evening not talking to her husband and hanging up laundry.
-
-
Confused by the choice of narrator
- By Bri T. on 02-13-22
By: Emily Itami
-
Confessions of a Latter-Day Virgin
- A Memoir
- By: Nicole Hardy
- Narrated by: Nicole Hardy
- Length: 10 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Nicole Hardy’s eye-opening "Modern Love" column appeared in the New York Times, the response from readers was overwhelming. Hardy’s essay, which exposed the conflict between being true to herself as a woman and remaining true to her Mormon faith, struck a chord with women coast-to-coast. Now in her funny, intimate, and thoughtful memoir, Nicole Hardy explores how she came, at the age of 35, to a crossroads regarding her faith and her identity.
-
-
This Book Spoke to Me
- By Allison on 04-08-14
By: Nicole Hardy
-
She Regrets Nothing
- A Novel
- By: Andrea Dunlop
- Narrated by: Rachel Dulude
- Length: 11 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Laila Lawrence becomes an orphan at 23, the sudden loss unexpectedly introduces her to three glamorous cousins from New York who show up unannounced at her mother's funeral. The three siblings are scions of the wealthy family from which Laila's father had been estranged long before his own untimely demise 10 years before. Two years later, Laila has left behind her quiet life in Grosse Point, Michigan to move to New York City, landing her smack in the middle of her cousins' decadent world.
-
-
Good Listen
- By Vallena on 02-19-18
By: Andrea Dunlop
-
Surfside Sisters
- A Novel
- By: Nancy Thayer
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 10 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A Nantucket woman returns home to find that reunions aren’t always simple, in this heartwarming novel from the New York Times bestselling author. Keely Green always dreamed of leaving the beautiful shores of Nantucket to become a writer. Now she’s a bestselling novelist living in New York City, attending glamorous cocktail parties, mingling with the literary elite, and dating a charming pediatric surgeon. But a moment of clarity strikes when Keely’s boyfriend suddenly wants to settle down and her editor rejects her latest novel.
-
-
Too fluffy!
- By LoRe Bolling on 07-10-19
By: Nancy Thayer
-
The UnAmericans
- Stories
- By: Molly Antopol
- Narrated by: Jennifer Van Dyck
- Length: 7 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Again and again, Molly Antopol’s deeply sympathetic characters struggle for footing in an uncertain world, hounded by forces beyond their control. Their voices are intimate and powerful and they resonate with searing beauty. Antopol is a superb young talent, and The UnAmericans will long be remembered for its wit, humanity, and heart.
-
-
Sensational stories! Brilliant new author.
- By MidwestGeek on 05-04-14
By: Molly Antopol
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
The Skin and Its Girl
- A Novel
- By: Sarah Cypher
- Narrated by: Victoria Nassif, Haneen Arafat Murphy
- Length: 12 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a Pacific Northwest hospital far from the Rummani family’s ancestral home in Palestine, the heart of a stillborn baby begins to beat and her skin turns vibrantly, permanently cobalt blue. On the same day, the Rummanis’ centuries-old soap factory in Nablus is destroyed in an air strike. The family matriarch and keeper of their lore, Aunt Nuha, believes that the blue girl embodies their sacred history, harkening back to a time when the Rummanis were among the wealthiest soap-makers and their blue soap was a symbol of a legendary love.
-
-
Beautiful
- By Hope on 08-29-24
By: Sarah Cypher
-
The Words We Keep
- By: Erin Stewart
- Narrated by: Phoebe Strole
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's been three months since The Night on the Bathroom Floor--when Lily found her older sister Alice hurting herself. Ever since then, Lily has been desperately trying to keep things together, for herself and for her family. But now Alice is coming home from her treatment program and it is becoming harder for Lily to ignore all of the feelings she's been trying to outrun.
-
-
Amazing
- By Kristen on 12-25-23
By: Erin Stewart
-
All the Things We Never Said
- By: Yasmin Rahman
- Narrated by: Zehra Jane Naqvi
- Length: 9 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sixteen-year-old Mehreen is overwhelmed by her anxiety and depression, and she doesn't believe anyone in her life will understand if she tries to talk about it. She's been thinking about suicide for a while when she discovers a website called MementoMori.com. The site matches people with partners and assigns them a date on which to end their lives, together. Mehreen is partnered with Cara and Olivia, strangers dealing with their own struggles.
By: Yasmin Rahman
-
Think Like a Breadwinner
- A Wealth-Building Manifesto for Women Who Want to Earn More (and Worry Less)
- By: Jennifer Barrett
- Narrated by: Jennifer Barrett
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Nearly half of working women in the United States are now their household's main breadwinner. And yet, the majority of women still aren't being brought up to think like breadwinners. In fact, they're actually discouraged - by institutional bias and subconscious beliefs - from building their own wealth, pursuing their full earning potential, and providing for themselves and others financially. In Think Like a Breadwinner, financial expert Jennifer Barrett reframes what it really means to be a breadwinner.
-
-
Great advice
- By Dreda Phoenix on 04-16-21
By: Jennifer Barrett
-
I Am Not Who You Think I Am
- By: Eric Rickstad
- Narrated by: Steven Weber
- Length: 7 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Wayland Maynard is just eight years old when he sees his father kill himself, finds a note that reads I am not who you think I am, and is left reeling with grief and shock. Who was his father if not the loving man Wayland knew? Terrified, Wayland keeps the note a secret, but his reasons for being afraid are just beginning.
-
-
Dear Steven Weber,
- By Julie Ann on 10-07-21
By: Eric Rickstad
-
Salt Houses
- By: Hala Alyan
- Narrated by: Leila Buck
- Length: 12 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On the eve of her daughter Alia's wedding, Salma reads the girl's future in a cup of coffee dregs. She sees an unsettled life for Alia and her children; she also sees travel, and luck. While she chooses to keep her predictions to herself that day, they will all soon come to pass when the family is uprooted in the wake of the Six-Day War of 1967.
-
-
A Palestinian Family in Exile
- By zaina on 08-25-17
By: Hala Alyan
-
The Skin and Its Girl
- A Novel
- By: Sarah Cypher
- Narrated by: Victoria Nassif, Haneen Arafat Murphy
- Length: 12 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a Pacific Northwest hospital far from the Rummani family’s ancestral home in Palestine, the heart of a stillborn baby begins to beat and her skin turns vibrantly, permanently cobalt blue. On the same day, the Rummanis’ centuries-old soap factory in Nablus is destroyed in an air strike. The family matriarch and keeper of their lore, Aunt Nuha, believes that the blue girl embodies their sacred history, harkening back to a time when the Rummanis were among the wealthiest soap-makers and their blue soap was a symbol of a legendary love.
-
-
Beautiful
- By Hope on 08-29-24
By: Sarah Cypher
-
The Words We Keep
- By: Erin Stewart
- Narrated by: Phoebe Strole
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's been three months since The Night on the Bathroom Floor--when Lily found her older sister Alice hurting herself. Ever since then, Lily has been desperately trying to keep things together, for herself and for her family. But now Alice is coming home from her treatment program and it is becoming harder for Lily to ignore all of the feelings she's been trying to outrun.
-
-
Amazing
- By Kristen on 12-25-23
By: Erin Stewart
-
All the Things We Never Said
- By: Yasmin Rahman
- Narrated by: Zehra Jane Naqvi
- Length: 9 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sixteen-year-old Mehreen is overwhelmed by her anxiety and depression, and she doesn't believe anyone in her life will understand if she tries to talk about it. She's been thinking about suicide for a while when she discovers a website called MementoMori.com. The site matches people with partners and assigns them a date on which to end their lives, together. Mehreen is partnered with Cara and Olivia, strangers dealing with their own struggles.
By: Yasmin Rahman
-
Think Like a Breadwinner
- A Wealth-Building Manifesto for Women Who Want to Earn More (and Worry Less)
- By: Jennifer Barrett
- Narrated by: Jennifer Barrett
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Nearly half of working women in the United States are now their household's main breadwinner. And yet, the majority of women still aren't being brought up to think like breadwinners. In fact, they're actually discouraged - by institutional bias and subconscious beliefs - from building their own wealth, pursuing their full earning potential, and providing for themselves and others financially. In Think Like a Breadwinner, financial expert Jennifer Barrett reframes what it really means to be a breadwinner.
-
-
Great advice
- By Dreda Phoenix on 04-16-21
By: Jennifer Barrett
-
I Am Not Who You Think I Am
- By: Eric Rickstad
- Narrated by: Steven Weber
- Length: 7 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Wayland Maynard is just eight years old when he sees his father kill himself, finds a note that reads I am not who you think I am, and is left reeling with grief and shock. Who was his father if not the loving man Wayland knew? Terrified, Wayland keeps the note a secret, but his reasons for being afraid are just beginning.
-
-
Dear Steven Weber,
- By Julie Ann on 10-07-21
By: Eric Rickstad
-
Salt Houses
- By: Hala Alyan
- Narrated by: Leila Buck
- Length: 12 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On the eve of her daughter Alia's wedding, Salma reads the girl's future in a cup of coffee dregs. She sees an unsettled life for Alia and her children; she also sees travel, and luck. While she chooses to keep her predictions to herself that day, they will all soon come to pass when the family is uprooted in the wake of the Six-Day War of 1967.
-
-
A Palestinian Family in Exile
- By zaina on 08-25-17
By: Hala Alyan
-
The Blue Between Sky and Water
- By: Susan Abulhawa
- Narrated by: Jennifer Woodward
- Length: 9 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is 1947, and Beit Daras, a quiet village in Palestine surrounded by olive groves, is home to the Baraka family. Eldest daughter Nazmiyeh looks after her widowed mother, prone to wandering and strange outbursts, while her brother, Mamdouh, tends to the village bees. Their younger sister, Mariam, with her striking mismatched eyes, spends her days talking to imaginary friends and writing.
-
-
Horrible pronunciation
- By Debra Sabah Press on 11-08-18
By: Susan Abulhawa
-
The Life-Changing Science of Detecting Bullshit
- By: John V. Petrocelli
- Narrated by: Larry Herron
- Length: 7 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Expanding upon his viral TEDx Talk, psychology professor and social scientist John V. Petrocelli's The Life-Changing Science of Detecting Bullshit reveals the critical thinking habits you can develop to recognize and combat pervasive false information and delusional thinking that has become a common feature of everyday life.
-
-
Grab a pair of hip high waders...
- By Daniel on 03-29-22
-
My Heart and Other Black Holes
- By: Jasmine Warga
- Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman
- Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sixteen-year-old physics nerd Aysel is obsessed with plotting her own death. With a mother who can barely look at her without wincing, classmates who whisper behind her back, and a father whose violent crime rocked her small town, Aysel is ready to turn her potential energy into nothingness.
-
-
Depressingly Delightful
- By FanB14 on 06-20-15
By: Jasmine Warga
-
Against the Loveless World
- A Novel
- By: Susan Abulhawa
- Narrated by: Susan Abulhawa
- Length: 13 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As Nahr sits, locked away in solitary confinement, she spends her days reflecting on the dramatic events that landed her in prison in a country she barely knows. Born in Kuwait in the 70s to Palestinian refugees, she dreamed of falling in love with the perfect man, raising children, and possibly opening her own beauty salon. Instead, the man she thinks she loves jilts her after a brief marriage, her family teeters on the brink of poverty, she’s forced to prostitute herself, and the US invasion of Iraq makes her a refugee, as her parents had been.
-
-
Don’t narrate your own books!
- By Sara on 11-21-20
By: Susan Abulhawa
-
Something to Live For
- By: Richard Roper
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 8 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
All Andrew wants is to be normal. That's why his coworkers believe he has the perfect wife and two children waiting at home for him after a long day. But the truth is, his life isn't exactly as people think...and his little white lie is about to catch up with him. Because in all of Andrew's efforts to fit in, he's forgotten one important thing: how to really live. And maybe, it's finally time for him to start.
-
-
Funny and touching
- By Ceclila on 05-31-19
By: Richard Roper
-
The Five Elements of Effective Thinking
- By: Edward B. Burger, Michael Starbird
- Narrated by: Brian Troxell
- Length: 3 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The 5 Elements of Effective Thinking presents practical, lively, and inspiring ways for you to become more successful through better thinking. The idea is simple: You can learn how to think far better by adopting specific strategies. Brilliant people aren't a special breed--they just use their minds differently.
-
-
Thinking about Thinking
- By Cynthia on 05-20-14
By: Edward B. Burger, and others
-
The Silent Treatment
- A Novel
- By: Abbie Greaves
- Narrated by: Alison Downing, Adrian Rawlins, Olivia Darnley
- Length: 9 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
By all appearances, Frank and Maggie share a happy, loving marriage. But for the past six months, they have not spoken. Not a sentence, not a single word. Maggie isn’t sure what, exactly, provoked Frank’s silence, though she has a few ideas. Day after day, they have eaten meals together and slept in the same bed in an increasingly uncomfortable silence that has become, for Maggie, deafening.
-
-
A tender page turner
- By M. Diamonti on 04-17-20
By: Abbie Greaves
-
Please Stop Trying to Leave Me
- A Novel
- By: Alana Saab
- Narrated by: Barrie Kreinik
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
While god is sending her signs through Instagram and Spotify demanding she break up with her girlfriend, Norma meets with a new therapist for one reason: she really needs to write again. With only one chapter missing in her manuscript, Norma is desperate to know if she needs to leave her girlfriend in order to write The Last Story. The new therapist diagnoses Norma with Depersonalization/Derealization Disorder, but Norma isn’t having it. It’s just Oblivion.
By: Alana Saab
-
Brat
- A Novel
- By: Gabriel Smith
- Narrated by: Gabriel Smith
- Length: 5 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
We meet our ill-tempered protagonist—the story’s titular “brat”—at a low moment, but not yet at rock bottom. The Gabriel of the novel is mourning the death of his father as well as a recent breakup and struggling to finish writing his second book. Alone and aimless, he agrees to move back into his parents’ house to clear it out for sale. Here, the clichés end.
-
-
Phenomenal Writer
- By Andre on 12-07-24
By: Gabriel Smith
-
Pretty as a Picture
- A Novel
- By: Elizabeth Little
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 9 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Marissa Dahl, a shy but successful film editor, travels to a small island off the coast of Delaware to work with the legendary - and legendarily demanding - director Tony Rees on a feature film with a familiar logline: Some girl dies. It's not much to go on, but the specifics don't concern Marissa. Whatever the script is, her job is the same. She'll spend her days in the editing room, doing what she does best: Turning pictures into stories. But she soon discovers that on this set, nothing is as it's supposed to be - or as it seems.
-
-
Rewards you in a careful read through
- By K. S. on 02-26-20
By: Elizabeth Little
-
Your Driver Is Waiting
- A Novel
- By: Priya Guns
- Narrated by: Priya Guns
- Length: 6 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Damani is tired. Her father just died on the job at a fast-food joint, and now she lives paycheck to paycheck in a basement, caring for her mom and driving for an app that is constantly cutting her take. The city is roiling in protests—everybody's in solidarity with somebody—but while she keeps hearing that they’re fighting for change on behalf of people like her, she literally can’t afford to pay attention.
-
-
Did not deliver
- By Alexis on 05-31-23
By: Priya Guns
-
The Art of the Good Life
- 52 Surprising Shortcuts to Happiness, Wealth, and Success
- By: Rolf Dobelli
- Narrated by: Keith Wickham
- Length: 6 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Since antiquity, people have been asking themselves what it means to live a good life. How should I live? What constitutes a good life? Find out.The Art of the Good Life is a toolkit designed for practical living. Here you'll find 52 happiness hacks - from guilt-free shunning of technology to gleefully paying your parking tickets - that are certain to optimize your happiness. These tips may not guarantee you a good life, but they'll give you a better chance (and that's all any of us can ask for).
-
-
Author doesn't know what he is talking about
- By Lahiru Gunathilake on 08-11-20
By: Rolf Dobelli
What listeners say about You Exist Too Much
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Ann Sahlstrom
- 01-11-24
The unvarnished honesty
There was so much I related with, although my demographic background differs. The red threads of trauma running through generations. Shame, love, impotence, care, longing
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- OwlLover
- 09-09-20
Interesting, but disjointed and hard to follow
This is a tremendously flawed and troubled character, and it is easy to understand how she has come to be as she is. This is not so much novel, or even short stories, so much as a piecing together. There are times that it is quite disjointed. There is no signal that the narrator is taking us elsewhere. She swings from one moment to the next and back again, and it can be disorienting. It feels like it could have been organized better. It is also tricky to follow the voice of the narrator because, at first she uses a more baby-like voice for secondary characters, but starts slipping into it with the main character, so it takes a while to figure out who is speaking. It may be easier to read than listen to.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Miss M
- 10-16-24
Wonderful, Rich and Entertaining Narrative
I really enjoyed exploring this main character’s world. It was profound and thought provoking but also funny at times and definitely entertaining.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- K. Tannous
- 09-11-20
Narrator is distractingly bad
What could have been a wonderful book to get lost in turned into a painful slog because of a really poor narrating job. The narrator uses a quasi-Indian accent for Arabic speakers throughout the book, mispronounces Arabic words like Ramallah and teta. Other accents are equally bad—noticeably French and Spanish. It was appallingly bad, and I feel very sorry for the author of this book. This audio recording massacres her work. Is it possible to re-record with a more competent narrator? Haram.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
6 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amazon Customer
- 07-31-23
Interesting but tough to follow
The story was interesting and entertaining, but the order of events was difficult to follow at times
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amber S.
- 01-11-24
The main characters past /intergenerational trauma
This was really well thought through. I felt her relationships with her mother, father, girlfriends , boyfriend s… that was so intense. Her obsessions and self destructive tendencies were so hurtful. Her mom was hurtful and yet her mom has her own problems… this is a really great book.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Robert
- 04-08-24
Wow! Wow! WOW!
Such an excellent story and performance! It’s so well written, I was hooked from chapter 1!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Nicole Feleo
- 08-07-20
Relatable, rich story
This story is so fresh and realistic in its telling. The way the author writes the protagonist allows for a very long and nuanced look at a lived life – the many parts that make someone who they are as they grow. In real life, as in the story, the protagonist sees different setbacks and falls into old patterns. Meanwhile, so many traumatic instances from childhood and different past failures that inform current ones are being told.
My own lived experience with my mother was eerily similar to the fictional protagonists’. There was abuse that echoed my own very closely. I am a fairly privileged Southeast Asian woman who has always been heterosexual. Even so, in many ways, I identified with the protagonist consistently. In my own mistakes, in my journey, my relationships, etc.
While the character is frustratingly flawed, there are so many potential moments for redemption and hope. There is, in the end, that satisfying possibility as well. I enjoyed listening to this story, though I will agree that the narrator’s voice and accents were off-putting. The protagonist herself has moments where she makes incredible and horrific mistakes. Her mistakes, however, do not obscure her potential for redemption.
One other thing to address: I am glad to see a book that has nuance about first generation American citizens with immigrant parents. While there are many books out there that will gladly villainize Islamic and Arab culture, I am glad to see this was not one of them. While it is a part of her experience, it is not depicted as evil, monolithic, etc. The Middle East tends to be alluded to as a backwards place in a lot of places, but this book focuses on her individual experiences and proves that nuance matters.
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
- If
- 06-16-22
Different, special, enchanting
I really liked it. The narrator was nothing I would expect, the voice a little like by a child but quickly it became very special, enchanting, keeping me in the story. The story was nothing I would expect, I haven’t even read the description I only loved absolutely loved the title and for the title I wanted to read the book for a long long time. But then it was such a good story. Took me to a world unfamiliar to me and yet so familiar. Will never forget it. Worth reading for sure. So much.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amazon Customer
- 12-13-23
Intriguing perspective
I really enjoyed the character development throughout the story and the insight into the mental health disorder.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!