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Evening

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Evening

By: Susan Minot
Narrated by: Kathryn Walker
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With two novels and one short story collection published to overwhelming critical acclaim ("Monkeys takes your breath away," said Anne Tyler; "heartbreaking, exhilarating," raved the New York Times Book Review), Susan Minot has emerged as one of the most gifted writers in America, praised for her ability to strike at powerful emotional truths in language that is sensual and commanding, mesmerizing in its vitality and intelligence. Now, with Evening, she gives us her most ambitious novel, a work of surpassing beauty. During a summer weekend on the coast of Maine, at the wedding of her best friend, Ann Grant fell in love. She was twenty-five. Forty years later--after three marriages and five children--Ann Lord finds herself in the dim claustrophobia of illness, careening between lucidity and delirium and only vaguely conscious of the friends and family parading by her bedside, when the memory of that weekend returns to her with the clarity and intensity of a fever-dream. Evening unfolds in the rushlight of that memory, as Ann relives those three vivid days on the New England coast, with motorboats buzzing and bands playing in the night, and the devastating tragedy that followed a spectacular wedding. Here, in the surge of hope and possibility that coursed through her at twenty-five--in a singular time of complete surrender--Ann discovers the highest point of her life. Superbly written and miraculously uplifting, Evening is a stirring exploration of time and memory, of love's transcendence and of its failure to transcend--a rich testament to the depths of grief and passion, and a stunning achievement.©1998 Susan Minot; (P)1998 Random House, Inc. Random House Audio, a division of Random House, Inc. Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Women's Fiction Maine

Critic reviews

“Her best work yet, assured, supple, exhilarating in its nerve and cool momentum.”—Joan Didion

“A stunning novel . . . a powerful story that cuts back and forth in time to give us both the defining moment in a woman’s life and an understanding of how that moment has reverberated through the remainder of her days . . . Her evocation of her heroine’s passion for Harris Arden is so convincing, her depiction of the world she inhabits is so fiercely observed. . . . The difference between [Monkeys and Evening] attests to Susan Minot’s growing ambition and assurance as an artist.”—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times

“An absorbing drama . . . Minot writes with quiet perceptiveness and grace, pulling the reader into Ann’s deathbed reverie.”—Elle

“A brilliant lyric performance.”—John Casey

“In spare and lovely language, Susan Minot has set forth a real life, in all its particularity and splendor and pain. This is the task of the novelist, and in Evening Minot has succeeded admirably.”—Roxana Robinson, The New York Times Book Review

“It astounds in its craftsmanship and imprints itself indelibly on the heart. . . . A haunting work of art that moves at the pace of a suspense thriller.”—Sheila Bosworth, New Orleans Times-Picayune

“Evening is a beautifully realized work . . . more mature and confident than anything she has written . . . An exquisite novel.”—Gail Caldwell, Boston Globe

“A wonderful, truthful, heartbreaking book . . . Evening vindicates the wildest assertions any of us have made about Susan Minot's talent.”—Tom McGuane

“Evening is a supremely sensual, sensitive, and dramatic novel. . . . So rich in color and motion, music and atmosphere.”—Donna Seaman, Booklist

“I was swept up in it. . . . It moved me and made me cry.”—D. T. Max, New York Observer

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A stunning short story written in beautiful lush prose and superbly narrated. Probably the most powerful audiobook I’ve listened to since I don’t know when. So glad I own this. Would like a second and even a third listen.

Excellent! Five Stars all the way

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we are capable of great love, all kinds of love, labels dont tell our whole story (wife, mother, daughter)

Beautiful, artfully presented, we are more than me

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Found this book while on vacation in the library at an Airbnb in Owls Head, Maine. Susan Minot’s writing style really engaged me. So I left the hard copy there and when I returned home purchased through Audible. Read 1/2 and listened to 1/2. Excellent.

Surprise Find

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Susan Minot shows her remarkable gift of lyrical, spare writing in this small book depicting the last days of a woman’s life. The story moves back and forth in time from Ann Lord’s death bed to the weekend when she meets the man she will remember as the love of her life. When she first meets Harris Arden, she “felt as if she’d been struck on the forehead with a brick.” The way Minot leads the reader from that fateful weekend when Ann gains and loses Harris Arden, and also one of her best friends, through her marriages and the birth of her children is smooth and effortless. The writing offers an almost uncomfortably intimate look into the memories of a dying women. At times it is hard to read, but always respectful, deeply poignant and full of compassion and understanding. Like all her writing, I will be thinking about this story far into the future.

Deeply Moving Story of a Woman’s Final Memories

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This book is a treasure. Beautifully written, the author allows you to witness a life relived in snapshots before it ends. It's a book I will not forget.

Beautiful

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