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Martin Dressler
- The Tale of an American Dreamer
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 8 hrs and 48 mins
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Publisher's summary
Pulitzer Prize, Fiction, 1997
The American Dream is a theme so compelling it resonates throughout our culture. In Martin Dressler, Steven Millhauser creates a young man who, in dedicating his life to it, becomes a symbol of that dream. Powerful, lyrical, finely crafted, this best-selling book won the Pulitzer Prize, was a National Book Award finalist, and was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year.
Martin Dressler, son of an immigrant cigar maker, believes he can achieve anything if he works hard enough. At the turn of the century, he rises from the shadows of his father’s shop in New York City to become a powerful entrepreneur and builder of hotels. But, as he contemplates this land of almost limitless opportunity, his plans grow impossibly grand. Through the curve of Martin’s spectacular rise and eventual downfall in the business world, his tale remains a uniquely American one. Martin may not always control an empire, but he will always be able to dream.
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Story
Virginia Miner, a 50-something, unmarried tenured professor, is in London to work on her new book about children's folk rhymes. Despite carrying a U.S. passport, Vinnie feels essentially English and rather looks down on her fellow Americans. But in spite of that, she is drawn into a mortifying and oddly satisfying affair with an Oklahoman tourist who dresses more Bronco Billy than Beau Brummel.
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Fascinating
- By Margaret on 03-16-12
By: Alison Lurie
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Interpreter of Maladies
- By: Jhumpa Lahiri
- Narrated by: Matilda Novak
- Length: 6 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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With accomplished precision and gentle eloquence, Jhumpa Lahiri traces the crosscurrents set in motion when immigrants, expatriates, and their children arrive, quite literally, at a cultural divide. The nine stories in this stunning debut collection unerringly chart the emotional journeys of characters seeking love beyond the barriers of nations and generations.
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skip it
- By Sheri on 06-30-09
By: Jhumpa Lahiri
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The Netanyahus
- An Account of a Minor and Ultimately Even Negligible Episode in the History of a Very Famous Family
- By: Joshua Cohen
- Narrated by: Joshua Cohen, David Duchovny, Ethan Herschenfeld
- Length: 8 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Corbin College, not quite upstate New York, winter 1959-1960: Ruben Blum, a Jewish historian—but not an historian of the Jews—is co-opted onto a hiring committee to review the application of an exiled Israeli scholar specializing in the Spanish Inquisition. When Benzion Netanyahu shows up for an interview, family unexpectedly in tow, Blum plays the reluctant host to guests who proceed to lay waste to his American complacencies. Mixing fiction with nonfiction, the campus novel with the lecture, The Netanyahus is a wildly inventive comedy of blending, identity, and politics.
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Phillip Roth would certainly listen!
- By Martin on 01-17-22
By: Joshua Cohen
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A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain
- By: Robert Olen Butler
- Narrated by: Robert Olen Butler
- Length: 9 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Robert Olen Butler's lyrical and poignant collection of stories about the aftermath of the Vietnam War and its impact on the Vietnamese was acclaimed by critics across the nation and won the Pulitzer Prize in 1993. This edition includes two subsequently published stories - "Salem" and "Missing" - that brilliantly complete the collection's narrative journey with a return to the jungles of Vietnam.
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RARE AND WONDERFUL STORIES!
- By Mimi Routh on 05-06-14
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The Hours
- By: Michael Cunningham
- Narrated by: Michael Cunningham
- Length: 6 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Passionate, profound, and deeply moving, The Hours tells the story of three women: Clarissa Vaughan, who one New York morning goes about planning a party in honor of a beloved friend; Laura Brown, who in a 1950s Los Angeles suburb slowly begins to feel the constraints of a perfect family and home; and Virginia Woolf, recuperating with her husband in a London suburb and beginning to write Mrs. Dalloway. By the end of the novel, the stories have intertwined, and finally come together in an act of subtle and haunting grace.
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Very literary, intentionally slight plot
- By Steve on 12-02-03
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The Yearling
- By: Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
- Narrated by: Tom Stechschulte
- Length: 13 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Young Jody lives with his ma and pa on a farm in backwoods Florida. Life is hard there: cutting wood, planting fields, hauling water from a distant sinkhole. It is dangerous: wolves and bears roam the night. It’s also lonely for a young boy. One spring day, Jody’s pa kills a deer for meat. When Jody sees her spotted fawn in the brush, he convinces his father they should bring the fawn home. Thus begins a year when deer and boy are never far from each other. But the day will come when Jody must make a terrible choice between his beloved pet and his family’s survival.
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Gorgeous
- By P. Giorgio on 10-22-13
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Johnny Tremain
- By: Esther Forbes
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 9 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Johnny had been Mr. Lapham's star pupil, a clever, industrious apprentice silversmith. But when Johnny seriously burns his hand in a furnace, he finds himself crippled and with no means of taking care of himself. Soon, trouble reaches Johnny's life in a new way. Swept along in the tide of events leading to the Boston Tea Party and the first skirmishes of Lexington and Concord, Johnny finds a job as message-carrier for the Sons of Liberty. As young and old men alike make sacrifices for a new country, Johnny prepares to take his own stand in the cause for freedom.
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Fantastic
- By Walt Griffith on 01-25-16
By: Esther Forbes
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Ironweed
- By: William Kennedy
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
- Length: 8 hrs
- Unabridged
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Francis Phelan, ex-ballplayer, part-time gravedigger, full-time drunk, has hit bottom. Years ago he left Albany in a hurry after killing a scab during a trolley workers' strike; he ran away again after accidentally – and fatally – dropping his infant son. Now, in 1938, Francis is back in town, roaming the old familiar streets with his hobo pal, Helen, trying to make peace with the ghosts of the past and the present.
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Darkly Lovely
- By Michael on 07-22-17
By: William Kennedy
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Empires of Sand
- By: David Ball
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 27 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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After four trips to the Sahara and extensive historical research, David Ball crafted this sweeping adventure novel spanning two continents and 15 years. Set against a backdrop of the crumbling French Empire’s attempts to colonize the Sahara Desert, Empires of Sand follows the lives of two cousins who are raised as brothers but destined to become enemies. It is 1870, and France is at war with Prussia.
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my first review
- By Pamela on 08-18-11
By: David Ball
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Common Ground
- A Turbulent Decade in the Lives of Three American Families
- By: J. Anthony Lukas
- Narrated by: Eric Michael Summerer
- Length: 35 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, and the American Book Award, the best-selling Common Ground is much more than the story of the busing crisis in Boston as told through the experiences of three families. As Studs Terkel remarked, it's "gripping, indelible...a truth about all large American cities."
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Don’t Bother
- By LoftyQuilts on 07-09-21
By: J. Anthony Lukas
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Empire Falls
- By: Richard Russo
- Narrated by: Ron McLarty
- Length: 20 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Dexter County, Maine, and specifically the town of Empire Falls, has seen better days, and for decades, in fact, only a succession from bad to worse. One by one, its logging and textile enterprises have gone belly-up, and the once vast holdings of the Whiting clan (presided over by the last scion’s widow) now mostly amount to decrepit real estate. The working classes, meanwhile, continue to eke out whatever meager promise isn’t already boarded up. Miles Roby gazes over this ruined kingdom from the Empire Grill, an opportunity of his youth that has become the albatross of his life.
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Hugely Enjoyable
- By margaret on 01-23-12
By: Richard Russo
What listeners say about Martin Dressler
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Heydoof
- 07-23-20
The world okay-est book
This is the world's okay-est book. It's not bad, it's well written, the prose is clear and concise, and the narrator does a superb job. I would also say the description of the turn of the century New York is also fun. However, there isn't much conflict in the story. Martin Dressler seems to coast through life having every dream and desire fulfilled, and he wants the whole world.
The final chapter almost makes the whole book worth it, almost.
I have to ask myself, if I could trade back the time spent listening to this novel in turn for the memory of it, I dont know if I would. I feel indifferent about it.
That said, Steven Millhouser is a fantastic short story writer, and I would direct anyone who want to read him there instead of here, sadly.
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- Joe Kraus
- 03-26-13
It Builds a Great Foundation
What does George Guidall bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
He's one of the greats.
Any additional comments?
You should go into this knowing that it's a period piece. Millhouser is pushing against the Naturalistic strain of the literature of a century ago, and he infuses it with a sense of the fantastic. Martin's ambitions as a builder -- and his successes -- give this a haunting beauty, and there are absolutely parts of it to savor.
Just as Martin loses interest in his own creations, however, Millhouser seems to sour on his own novel. I recognize that's part of the beauty in the conception -- this America invites us to dream things larger than the world can accommodate, and it's high art to gauge the course of our best such dreamers -- but it's nevertheless disappointing to find as little retrospective insight as we do.
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3 people found this helpful
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- robert weinstein
- 07-08-17
a great story of American Enterprise
I listen to it twice as I lived Life with Martin Dressler at the turn of the century
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- R. Smith
- 04-08-22
Descriptions are dream like
We all day dream at times but the main character in this book seems to live in one. The descriptions of his world bring you into that world.
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- Amy
- 01-17-22
mostly good but the ending was disappointing
I liked this book a lot for most of it, but at the end it got kind of weird and kind of boring and then just ended abruptly.
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- J. Herrmann
- 03-10-24
Starts out good but…..
The book starts out, enjoyably and follows a young man through his ambitious career. The ending is a fantastical, unrealistic, fantasy dream world. Didn’t understand it, didn’t like it, and didn’t think it related to the rest of the book.
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- Shanon H
- 03-14-24
boring!
this was so dull. I don't understand how/why this won any award. Don't waste your time listening to this book unless you need to fall asleep
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- English Lit major
- 08-21-23
The Beginnings of A Century
This novel describes the rapid technological, social and economic opportunities and challenges of the late 19th and early 20th century. It's really difficult to comprehend this won a Pulitzer Prize in fiction. The characters are stereotypical - the depiction of Dressler's grand hotel is tedious and just drags on and on.
Martin Dressler could be a modern man grappling with the rapid technological, social and economic opportunities and challenges of the late 20th and early 21st century. Change is never ending. But at least this novel did.
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- Todd L. Robicheaux
- 04-05-23
Dreamland or Nightmare
This book was overly predictable and tedious. I found the role of the women in the book to be offensive, a sexist prop for the main character. Had I known, I would have passed on it.
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