Amy and Isabelle

A Novel

De: Elizabeth Strout

Narrado por: Stephanie Roberts

With compassion, humor, and striking insight, Amy and Isabelle explores the secrets of sexuality that jeopardize the love between a mother and her daughter. Amy Goodrow, a shy high school student in a small mill town, falls in love with her math teacher, and together they cross the line between understandable fantasy and disturbing reality. When discovered, this emotional and physical trespass brings disgrace to Amy's mother, Isabelle, and intensifies the shame she feels about her own past. In a fury, she lashes out at her daughter's beauty and then retreats into outraged silence. Amy withdraws, too, and mother and daughter eat, sleep, and even work side by side but remain at a vast, seemingly unbridgeable distance from each other.

This conflict is surrounded by other large and small dramas in the town of Shirley Falls: a teenage pregnancy, a UFO sighting, a missing child, and the trials of Fat Bev, the community's enormous (and enormously funny and compassionate) peacemaker and amateur medical consultant. Keeping Isabelle and Amy as the main focus of her sharp, sympathetic eye, Elizabeth Strout attends to them all. As she does so, she reveals not only her deep affection for her characters, both serious and comic, but her profound wisdom about the human condition in general. She makes us care about these extraordinary ordinary people and makes us hope that they will find a way out of their often self-imposed emotional exile.

©2013 Elizabeth Strout (P)2013 Random House Audio

Reseñas de la Crítica

"A novel of shining integrity and humor, about the bravery and hard choices of what is called ordinary life." (Alice Munro)

beautiful characters

Where does Amy and Isabelle rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

#1

What was one of the most memorable moments of Amy and Isabelle?

that would be a spoiler

Have you listened to any of Stephanie Roberts’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

excellent reader

If you could take any character from Amy and Isabelle out to dinner, who would it be and why?

Isabelle, I'd like to sit down and talk to her. Or maybe Fat Bev. I liked all the women characters in this book.

Any additional comments?

Elizabeth Strout's characters are so real. Complicated people who do dumb stuff, make mistakes. But they are also capable of love, and those wonderful moments of real human love and insight. I find it easy to identify with all of them.

Amazing.

Beautiful story of mother and daughter and life in a small town. I couldn't stop listening to it.

Good story line but too much detail

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

I would not recommend this book to a friend. The mother/daughter relationship storyline appealed to me. However, the author described every little thing in unnecessary detail. For example, if a leaf is green I find it unnecessary to spend five minutes talking about the shade of green. If a character does something gross, a five minute description of just how gross is a turn-off in my opinion. In summary, the book could have held my interest if it the author had not gone on and on and on about things that had no bearing on the storyline. Since that was not the case, I got through only about 3/4 of the audio.

Would you be willing to try another book from Elizabeth Strout? Why or why not?

No, because she goes on and on and on about things that are insignificant to the story.

What about Stephanie Roberts’s performance did you like?

The narrator had a nice, professional, theatrically-trained sounding voice. She did not take deep loud breaths after each sentence like so many audible narrators do. I also appreciate that I did not hear smacking and saliva as I do with many of the narrators. I would love to hear her read a more interesting book.

Could you see Amy and Isabelle being made into a movie or a TV series? Who should the stars be?

I could see it being made into a movie,but it would be a very dark, solemn, depressing movie. It definitely would not be a movie I would want to see.

Such a honestly written book

This book is written in such an honest & beautiful way. The characters seem real & you become more invested in their lives as the story goes on. You feel for Isabelle as she decides to be honest with people about her life & as she discovers the meaning of friendship. You feel for Amy in a totally different way, as she discovers her sexuality & all the mistakes she makes. I couldn't stop listening, but didn't want the story to end.

Excellent

I have just completed an Elizabeth Strout binge. Although at first her style of seemingly unrelated vignettes and lengthy descriptions felt tiresome and heavy, the more i read the more i felt enveloped by the stories and the characters.
This book in particular was interesting from the beginning. Was immediately taken (negatively at first) by both mother & daughter yet was constantly propelled forward to share their lives and their own self discovery.
All Strouts characters, minor or central, are well rounded and clear. Each character brings their own story and relevance to the plot. I particularly love the fact that her main characters, women are all mostly independent, individualistic and deep.

Wonderful

As a glass if cool water on a hot day
. Both the story and the performance.

Depressing

Beautifully written and performed, but it is one of the most depressing books I ever read. Such loneliness!

when in doubt, Strout

She's a go-to author for me. This was one of her best. The narrator was particularly good.

Elizabeth Strout is always a unique read.

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I would recommend this title to any current Elizabeth Strout fans. I feel one must either have a) an open mind, or b) an existing appreciation for Strout's heavy exposition.

What did you like best about this story?

I love the painful believability of the characters.

What three words best describe Stephanie Roberts’s performance?

Patient. Impassioned. Believable.

If you could rename Amy and Isabelle, what would you call it?

The Sins of the Mother

Another unforgettable lesson in Compassion

Every book I listen to by Elizabeth Strout, reminds me of people I've know and forgotten about, some of whom I judged before I forgot about them. At some point during every book I think of myself in various forms. The insecure me, the child me, or the judged me. I cannot read Ms. Strout without feeling empathy and compassion for the characters who inhabited my life, and for myself. She has a gift.