• The Year of Magical Thinking

  • By: Joan Didion
  • Narrated by: Barbara Caruso
  • Length: 5 hrs and 5 mins
  • 4.1 out of 5 stars (4,199 ratings)

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The Year of Magical Thinking

By: Joan Didion
Narrated by: Barbara Caruso
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Publisher's summary

National Book Award, Nonfiction, 2005

"Life changes fast....You sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends." These were among the first words Joan Didion wrote in January 2004. Her daughter was lying unconscious in an intensive care unit, a victim of pneumonia and septic shock. Her husband, John Gregory Dunne, was dead. The night before New Year's Eve, while they were sitting down to dinner, he suffered a massive and fatal coronary. The two had lived and worked side by side for nearly 40 years.

The weeks and months that followed "cut loose any fixed idea I had about death, about illness, about probability and luck...about marriage and children and memory...about the shallowness of sanity, about life itself."

In The Year of Magical Thinking, Didion explores with electric honesty and passion a private yet universal experience. Her portrait of a marriage, and a life, in good times and bad, will speak directly to anyone who has ever loved a husband, a wife, or a child.

Listen to Joan Didion's full-hour interview with Charlie Rose.
©2005 Joan Didion (P)2005 HighBridge Company

Critic reviews

  • 2005 Audie Award Nominee, Biography/Memoir
  • National Book Critics Circle Award Nominee, Autobiography, 2005

"Many will greet this taut, clear-eyed memoir of grief as a long-awaited return to the terrain of Didion's venerated, increasingly rare personal essays....This is an indispensable addition to Didion's body of work and a lyrical, disciplined entry in the annals of mourning literature." (Publishers Weekly)
"The Year of Magical Thinking is not a downer. On the contrary. Though the material is literally terrible, the writing is exhilarating and what unfolds resembles an adventure narrative." (The New York Times)

Featured Article: The top 100 memoirs of all time


All genres considered, the memoir is among the most difficult and complex for a writer to pull off. After all, giving voice to your own lived experience and recounting deeply painful or uncomfortable memories in a way that still engages and entertains is a remarkable feat. These autobiographies, often narrated by the authors themselves, shine with raw, unfiltered emotion sure to resonate with any listener. But don't just take our word for it—queue up any one of these listens, and you'll hear exactly what we mean.

What listeners say about The Year of Magical Thinking

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    5 out of 5 stars

Ah, So That's It

It's 2023 and I finally listened this book of which I've been aware for years. My mother was killed almost instantly by a drunk driver in a head-on collision in 1997. I changed. Having now read this beautiful and eloquent account, I now know the difference between grieving and mourning and which of these I still struggle with. I also now know not to be a cheerleader for anyone in either of these states. Finally, it's a stretch, I know, but it would be ok to encourage the reading of this book before losing someone so dear as a family member. Fore-warned is for-armed, and for the survivor this account may elicit the necessary grace we need to allow in such times.

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    3 out of 5 stars
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Good but not great

The performance was great. The writing was great. The topics covered were interesting. However, this made me feel nothing.

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Excellent!

Fascinating trip into Joan Didion’s stream of consciousness, but what a terribly sad time she had.

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? Zero stars if it was a choice

Managed to suffer through chapter 7
Is just so boring
What magical thinking.
Total snore

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Touchingly accurate; what a griever feels

Ms. Didion’s sophisticated style and concise descriptions, brought to life in the brilliant narration by Ms. Caruso, unite for a somber yet oftentimes delightful account of one woman’s journey through loss and the resultant grief.

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Somehow relatable

I’m not rich or famous but this story had moments where I understood the grief and how it sneaks up on you.

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Very analytical and reserved

I found this book challenging to engage with. I understand that the flashbacks, circular narratives, and bouncing around with memories and how things tie together are realistic and reflective of how one thinks and processes grief on their own. That piece of the way the book is written is interesting, but I agree with other reviews that overall, it feels repetitive and lacks warmth and emotion in her processing. It felt like a diary or stream of consciousness where she was analyzing herself and her experiences from the outside without really showing us the heart of what she was going through. There were a lot of specific details (particularly medical details) that were unnecessary and tedious, often losing my attention. She is clearly an intellectual writer, but it all came across as feeling very reserved. I kept hoping for more depth that never came.

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This book took my breath away

A true study of love and grief - I discovered this book after my brother took his life, it helped me more than any other book.

I’m now reading everything she’s ever written. I love her words.

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Wonderfully sad

Thank god people like Joan Didion can write about their emotions so that the rest of us can recognize our own patterns in their emotions, too. This is an emotionally difficult book, but definitely worth a read/listen.

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Helpful to the grieving

I’ve been listening to this book while grieving and found truth in her words, would recommend for those lost in this kind of sadness.

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