A Book of Common Prayer

By: Joan Didion

Narrated by: Marisa Vitali

Length: 6 hrs and 42 mins

Publisher's summary

Writing with the telegraphic swiftness and microscopic sensitivity that have made her one of our most distinguished journalists, Joan Didion creates a shimmering novel of innocence and evil.

A Book of Common Prayer is the story of two American women in the derelict Central American nation of Boca Grande. Grace Strasser-Mendana controls much of the country's wealth and knows virtually all of its secrets; Charlotte Douglas knows far too little. "Immaculate of history, innocent of politics," she has come to Boca Grande vaguely and vainly hoping to be reunited with her fugitive daughter. As imagined by Didion, her fate is at once utterly particular and fearfully emblematic of an age of conscienceless authority and unfathomable violence.

©1977 Joan Didion (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

"An articulate witness to the most stubborn and intractable truths of our time, a memorable voice." (Joyce Carol Oates, The New York Times Book Review)
"A novelist with important things to say about the dislocations of our time.... Joan Didion is stellar." ( Newsday)

A SomewhatSlow Starting, Intricate Audiobook

As a product, the narration is excellent. However this is not an easy work to turn into an audiobook. It moves slowly at first. The story meanders. It is difficult to connect with many of the characters. I read and listened simultaneously. That helped. This is no reflection on the performance of the narrator. I love Joan Didion. However except for Run River, I very much like her non fiction more than fiction.

Excellent!!!

This is written in an almost surrealistic idiom and performed perfectly. I will enjoy this novel Adair and again.

Narration a problem

This is a well written good book by Joan Didion. However the narration just doesn’t seem to catch the mood of Grace a mature, dying, wealthy woman living in a Central American country. She rushes through important points as if she doesn’t understand the story she is telling.

Distractingly bad narration.

I am pretty tolerant of different narrator voices, but this one is so distractingly bad that I found it difficult to get into the story. I will probably re-read it from an actual book and hope the narrator’s voice hasn’t infected my memory.

Meh...

Found the plot boring. Only finished the book so I could talk about it at book club.

Strong tale badly told

This narrator reads Charlotte Douglas' voice like a child's, and she is not a child. Think how much more mysterious she would be if allowed to sound like the strong, sensual, grownup, maternal character she is.

Great writing, awful reading

The narrator needs to develop a better range. Makes a wonderful book a test to finish.

Horrible reader

It's impossible to know if the story is good or not, because rendered by this reader it is impossible to listen to.

Dreadful narrative ruins an otherwise great story

While the words, the language, the actual story in Joan Didion's A Book of Common Prayer is marvelous, you'd never know that if you had not read the story before listening to this audio version. This narration by Marisa Vitali's sounds absolutely robotic; very close to some of the audio stories that are available free from the Gutenberg Project that are, I believe, actually recorded using some sort of "read out loud" software. It is so bad, it's like a 6th grade girl who thinks she's doing a bang-up job reading out loud to the class, but she pauses in odd places and seems to often confuse the end of a line with the end of a sentence. Almost never is the emphasis on the right word. I've purchases many, many Audible books and count on them to feature top-notch talent. Most do, but this is the rare (so far) exception. If you want to enjoy, or even really understand this book, do NOT listen to this version - it will kill the story for you.

Badly narrated

I could not bear to listen beyond the first few sentences. I will need to read the book the old fashioned way, and hope I find the time to do it.

In a nutshell, the reader rushed through every phrase like a robot on speed, tonal shift or consideration of Didion’s beautiful spare, emotionally nuanced writing.