-
Shotgun Lovesongs
- A Novel
- Narrated by: Scott Shepherd, Ari Fliakos, Maggie Hoffman, Scott Sowers, Gary Wilmes
- Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $20.24
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Godspeed
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Jon Orsini
- Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Why is it being built here, and why so quickly? These are the questions Cole, Bart, and Teddy, the three principals of True Triangle Construction, ask themselves when they are hired to finish a project for a mysteriously wealthy homeowner. Nestled in the mountains outside of Jackson, Wyoming, the house is a masterpiece, unlike anything they've done before. Once finished, it promises to be the architectural prize of Jackson and could put True Triangle on the map. But despite the project's lure, the owner is intent on having it built in a matter of months.
-
-
first class story; first class performance!
- By Peter S on 11-20-21
By: Nickolas Butler
-
Beneath the Bonfire
- Stories
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Holter Graham
- Length: 6 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Young couples gather to participate in an annual "chainsaw party", cutting down trees for firewood in anticipation of the winter. A group of men spend a weekend hunting for mushrooms in the wilderness where they grew up, and where some still find themselves trapped. An aging environmentalist takes out his frustration and anger on a singular, unsuspecting target. A woman helps another get revenge against a man whose crime extends far beyond him to an entire community.
By: Nickolas Butler
-
Little Faith
- A Novel
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Danny Campbell
- Length: 8 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lyle Hovde is at the onset of his golden years, living a mostly content life in rural Wisconsin with his wife, Peg, daughter, Shiloh, and six-year old grandson, Isaac. After a troubled adolescence and subsequent estrangement from her parents, Shiloh has finally come home. But while Lyle is thrilled to have his whole family reunited, he’s also uneasy: In Shiloh’s absence, she has become deeply involved with an extremist church, and the devout pastor courting her is convinced Isaac has the spiritual ability to heal the sick.
-
-
Character-driven drama in the Midwest
- By Amazon Customer on 03-25-19
By: Nickolas Butler
-
The Night Watchman
- By: Louise Erdrich
- Narrated by: Louise Erdrich
- Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Based on the extraordinary life of National Book Award-winning author Louise Erdrich’s grandfather who worked as a night watchman and carried the fight against Native dispossession from rural North Dakota all the way to Washington, DC, this powerful novel explores themes of love and death with lightness and gravity and unfolds with the elegant prose, sly humor, and depth of feeling of a master craftsman.
-
-
Beautiful
- By Melanie on 03-09-20
By: Louise Erdrich
-
The Hearts of Men
- A Novel
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Adam Verner
- Length: 11 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Camp Chippewa, 1962. Nelson Doughty, age 13, social outcast and overachiever, is the bugler, sounding the reveille proudly each morning. Yet this particular summer marks the beginning of an uncertain and tenuous friendship with a popular boy named Jonathan. Over the years Nelson, irrevocably scarred from the Vietnam War, becomes scoutmaster of Camp Chippewa while Jonathan marries, divorces, and turns his father's business into a highly profitable company.
-
-
The heart is a lonely hunter
- By JudyKay Lindholm on 11-03-18
By: Nickolas Butler
-
The Sentence
- By: Louise Erdrich
- Narrated by: Louise Erdrich
- Length: 11 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Louise Erdrich's latest novel, The Sentence, asks what we owe to the living, the dead, to the reader and to the book. A small independent bookstore in Minneapolis is haunted from November 2019 to November 2020 by the store's most annoying customer. Flora dies on All Souls' Day, but she simply won't leave the store. Tookie, who has landed a job selling books after years of incarceration that she survived by reading "with murderous attention", must solve the mystery of this haunting.
-
-
Addictive and surprising
- By Amazon Customer on 11-25-21
By: Louise Erdrich
-
Godspeed
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Jon Orsini
- Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Why is it being built here, and why so quickly? These are the questions Cole, Bart, and Teddy, the three principals of True Triangle Construction, ask themselves when they are hired to finish a project for a mysteriously wealthy homeowner. Nestled in the mountains outside of Jackson, Wyoming, the house is a masterpiece, unlike anything they've done before. Once finished, it promises to be the architectural prize of Jackson and could put True Triangle on the map. But despite the project's lure, the owner is intent on having it built in a matter of months.
-
-
first class story; first class performance!
- By Peter S on 11-20-21
By: Nickolas Butler
-
Beneath the Bonfire
- Stories
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Holter Graham
- Length: 6 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Young couples gather to participate in an annual "chainsaw party", cutting down trees for firewood in anticipation of the winter. A group of men spend a weekend hunting for mushrooms in the wilderness where they grew up, and where some still find themselves trapped. An aging environmentalist takes out his frustration and anger on a singular, unsuspecting target. A woman helps another get revenge against a man whose crime extends far beyond him to an entire community.
By: Nickolas Butler
-
Little Faith
- A Novel
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Danny Campbell
- Length: 8 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lyle Hovde is at the onset of his golden years, living a mostly content life in rural Wisconsin with his wife, Peg, daughter, Shiloh, and six-year old grandson, Isaac. After a troubled adolescence and subsequent estrangement from her parents, Shiloh has finally come home. But while Lyle is thrilled to have his whole family reunited, he’s also uneasy: In Shiloh’s absence, she has become deeply involved with an extremist church, and the devout pastor courting her is convinced Isaac has the spiritual ability to heal the sick.
-
-
Character-driven drama in the Midwest
- By Amazon Customer on 03-25-19
By: Nickolas Butler
-
The Night Watchman
- By: Louise Erdrich
- Narrated by: Louise Erdrich
- Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Based on the extraordinary life of National Book Award-winning author Louise Erdrich’s grandfather who worked as a night watchman and carried the fight against Native dispossession from rural North Dakota all the way to Washington, DC, this powerful novel explores themes of love and death with lightness and gravity and unfolds with the elegant prose, sly humor, and depth of feeling of a master craftsman.
-
-
Beautiful
- By Melanie on 03-09-20
By: Louise Erdrich
-
The Hearts of Men
- A Novel
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Adam Verner
- Length: 11 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Camp Chippewa, 1962. Nelson Doughty, age 13, social outcast and overachiever, is the bugler, sounding the reveille proudly each morning. Yet this particular summer marks the beginning of an uncertain and tenuous friendship with a popular boy named Jonathan. Over the years Nelson, irrevocably scarred from the Vietnam War, becomes scoutmaster of Camp Chippewa while Jonathan marries, divorces, and turns his father's business into a highly profitable company.
-
-
The heart is a lonely hunter
- By JudyKay Lindholm on 11-03-18
By: Nickolas Butler
-
The Sentence
- By: Louise Erdrich
- Narrated by: Louise Erdrich
- Length: 11 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Louise Erdrich's latest novel, The Sentence, asks what we owe to the living, the dead, to the reader and to the book. A small independent bookstore in Minneapolis is haunted from November 2019 to November 2020 by the store's most annoying customer. Flora dies on All Souls' Day, but she simply won't leave the store. Tookie, who has landed a job selling books after years of incarceration that she survived by reading "with murderous attention", must solve the mystery of this haunting.
-
-
Addictive and surprising
- By Amazon Customer on 11-25-21
By: Louise Erdrich
-
Tom Lake
- A Novel
- By: Ann Patchett
- Narrated by: Meryl Streep
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.
-
-
So incredibly boring
- By Rhonda Morrison on 08-05-23
By: Ann Patchett
-
Wellness
- A Novel (Oprah's Book Club)
- By: Nathan Hill
- Narrated by: Ari Fliakos
- Length: 18 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Jack and Elizabeth meet as college students in the gritty '90s Chicago art scene, the two quickly join forces and hold on tight, each eager to claim a place in the thriving underground scene with an appreciative kindred spirit. Fast-forward twenty years to suburban married life, and alongside the challenges of parenting, they encounter the often-baffling pursuits of health and happiness from polyamorous would-be suitors to home-renovation hysteria.
-
-
you have to believe it'll work
- By Alex halladay on 09-22-23
By: Nathan Hill
-
Lessons in Chemistry
- A Novel
- By: Bonnie Garmus
- Narrated by: Miranda Raison, Bonnie Garmus, Pandora Sykes
- Length: 11 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing as an average woman. But it’s the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute takes a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans; the lonely, brilliant, Nobel–prize nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with—of all things—her mind. True chemistry results.
-
-
Making my 3 adult daughters read this
- By Teresa H. on 04-07-22
By: Bonnie Garmus
-
Remarkably Bright Creatures
- A Novel
- By: Shelby Van Pelt
- Narrated by: Marin Ireland, Michael Urie
- Length: 11 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After Tova Sullivan’s husband died, she began working the night shift at the Sowell Bay Aquarium, mopping floors and tidying up. Keeping busy has always helped her cope, which she’s been doing since her eighteen-year-old son, Erik, mysteriously vanished on a boat in Puget Sound over thirty years ago. Tova becomes acquainted with curmudgeonly Marcellus, a giant Pacific octopus living at the aquarium. Marcellus knows more than anyone can imagine but wouldn’t dream of lifting one of his eight arms for his human captors—until he forms a remarkable friendship with Tova.
-
-
Hidden gem, incredible narration!
- By Christine T on 05-17-22
By: Shelby Van Pelt
-
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo
- A Novel
- By: Taylor Jenkins Reid
- Narrated by: Alma Cuervo, Julia Whelan, Robin Miles
- Length: 12 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Aging and reclusive Hollywood movie icon Evelyn Hugo is finally ready to tell the truth about her glamorous and scandalous life. But when she chooses unknown magazine reporter Monique Grant for the job, no one in the journalism community is more astounded than Monique herself. Why her? Why now? Monique is not exactly on top of the world. Her husband, David, has left her, and her career has stagnated.
-
-
Glucose Gluttony
- By W Perry Hall on 03-17-18
-
The Light Pirate
- By: Lily Brooks-Dalton
- Narrated by: Rosemary Benson
- Length: 11 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Florida is slipping away. As devastating weather patterns and rising sea levels wreak gradual havoc on the state’s infrastructure, a powerful hurricane approaches a small town on the southeastern coast. Kirby Lowe, an electrical line worker, his pregnant wife, Frida, and their two sons, Flip and Lucas, prepare for the worst. When the boys go missing just before the hurricane hits, Kirby heads out into the high winds in search of his children. Left alone, Frida goes into premature labor and gives birth to an unusual child, Wanda, whom she names after the catastrophic storm.
-
-
Listed under "action adventure"????
- By NMwritergal on 12-14-22
-
The Personal Librarian
- A GMA Book Club Pick (A Novel)
- By: Marie Benedict, Victoria Christopher Murray
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 12 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In her twenties, Belle da Costa Greene is hired by J. P. Morgan to curate a collection of rare manuscripts, books, and artwork for his newly built Pierpont Morgan Library. Belle becomes a fixture in New York City society and one of the most powerful people in the art and book world, known for her impeccable taste and shrewd negotiating for critical works as she helps create a world-class collection.
-
-
A Treat For This Academic Librarian!
- By AlTonya on 07-14-21
By: Marie Benedict, and others
-
The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry
- By: Gabrielle Zevin
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 7 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The irascible A. J. Fikry, owner of Island Books - the only bookstore on Alice Island - has already lost his wife. Now his most prized possession, a rare book, has been stolen from right under his nose in the most embarrassing of circumstances. The store itself, it seems, will be next to go. One night upon closing, he discovers a toddler in his children’s section with a note from her mother pinned to her Elmo doll: I want Maya to grow up in a place with books and among people who care about such kinds of things. I love her very much, but I can no longer take care of her.
-
-
The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry
- By teatime on 05-07-14
By: Gabrielle Zevin
-
The Interestings
- A Novel
- By: Meg Wolitzer
- Narrated by: Jen Tullock
- Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The summer that Nixon resigns, six teenagers at a summer camp for the arts become inseparable. Decades later the bond remains powerful, but so much else has changed. In The Interestings, Wolitzer follows these characters from the height of youth through middle age, as their talents, fortunes, and degrees of satisfaction diverge. The kind of creativity that is rewarded at age 15 is not always enough to propel someone through life at age 30; not everyone can sustain, in adulthood, what seemed so special in adolescence.
-
-
Needs a better title, but a good read (listen)
- By Tango on 04-12-13
By: Meg Wolitzer
-
Beartown
- By: Fredrik Backman
- Narrated by: Marin Ireland
- Length: 13 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
People say Beartown is finished. A tiny community nestled deep in the forest, it is slowly losing ground to the ever encroaching trees. But down by the lake stands an old ice rink, built generations ago by the working men who founded this town. And in that ice rink is the reason people in Beartown believe tomorrow will be better than today. Their junior ice hockey team is about to compete in the national semifinals, and they actually have a shot at winning.
-
-
Miserable
- By Dee Garza on 06-12-17
By: Fredrik Backman
-
The Queen of Dirt Island
- A Novel
- By: Donal Ryan
- Narrated by: Emma Lowe
- Length: 6 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Aylward women of Nenagh, Tipperary, are mad about each other, but you wouldn’t always think it. You’d have to know them to know that—in spite of what the neighbors might say about raised voices and dramatic scenes—their house is a place of peace, filled with love, a refuge from the sadness and cruelty of the world. Their story begins at an end and ends at a beginning. It involves wives and widows, gunrunners and gougers, sinners and saints. It’s a story of terrible betrayals and fierce loyalties, isolation and togetherness, of transgression, forgiveness, desire, and love.
-
-
Donal Ryan never disappoints
- By Pat Murray on 03-17-23
By: Donal Ryan
-
Mansfield Park
- By: Jane Austen
- Narrated by: Alison Larkin
- Length: 17 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Award-winning Jane Austen narrator Alison Larkin is back with this hugely entertaining recording of Mansfield Park, followed by fascinating bonus material! Eleven-year-old Fanny Price is "adopted" by wealthy relatives and leaves her life of poverty in Portsmouth for a much better life at Mansfield Park. Mansfield Park is followed by opinions on the novel by Austen's family and friends, never before heard on audio.
-
-
Excellent narration
- By Diane S. on 05-14-18
By: Jane Austen
Editorial reviews
Publisher's summary
Welcome to Little Wing.
It’s a place like hundreds of others, nothing special, really. But for four friends—all born and raised in this small Wisconsin town—it is home. And now they are men, coming into their own, or struggling to do so.
One of them never left, still working the family farm that has been tilled for generations. But others felt the need to move on, with varying degrees of success. One trades commodities, another took to the rodeo circuit, and one of them even hit it big as a rock star. And then there’s Beth, a woman who has meant something special in each of their lives.
Now all four are brought together for a wedding. Little Wing seems even smaller than before. While lifelong bonds are still strong, there are stresses—between the friends, between husbands and wives. There will be heartbreak, but there will also be hope, healing, even heroism as these memorable people learn the true meaning of adult friendship and love.
Seldom has the American heartland been so richly and accurately portrayed. Though the town may have changed, the one thing that hasn’t is the beauty of the Wisconsin farmland, the lure of which, in Nickolas Butler’s hands, emerges as a vibrant character in the story. Shotgun Lovesongs is that rare work of fiction that evokes a specific time and place yet movingly describes the universal human condition. It is, in short, a truly remarkable audiobook—a novel that once listened to will never be forgotten.
Critic reviews
More from the same
Narrator
Related to this topic
-
She's Come Undone
- By: Wally Lamb
- Narrated by: Linda Stephens
- Length: 18 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Meet Dolores Price. She's 13, wise-mouthed but wounded, having bid her childhood goodbye. Beached like a whale in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips, and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies. When she finally rolls into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this time she's determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before really going belly-up.
-
-
Really disappointing narrator!
- By Jessica Williams on 01-21-12
By: Wally Lamb
-
Battleborn
- By: Claire Vaye Watkins
- Narrated by: Ali Ahn, Morgan Hallett, Laura Knight Keating, and others
- Length: 8 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Like the work of Cormac McCarthy, Denis Johnson, Richard Ford, and Annie Proulx, Battleborn represents a near-perfect confluence of sensibility and setting, and the introduction of an exceptionally powerful and original literary voice. In each of these ten unforgettable stories, Claire Vaye Watkins writes her way fearlessly into the mythology of the American West, utterly reimagining it.
-
-
Wonderful magnificent stories beautifully told
- By Pedro Ramirez on 12-03-15
-
Homesick for Another World
- Stories
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan, Richard Poe
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
There's something eerily unsettling about Ottessa Moshfegh's stories, something almost dangerous, while also being delightful and even laugh-out-loud funny. Her characters are all unsteady on their feet in one way or another; they all yearn for connection and betterment, though each in very different ways, but they are often tripped up by their own baser impulses and existential insecurities.
-
-
Funny, Dynamic Writing
- By Sofia Macht on 06-13-18
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
-
Fourth of July Creek
- A Novel
- By: Smith Henderson
- Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews, Jenna Lamia
- Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After trying to help Benjamin Pearl, an undernourished, nearly feral 11-year-old boy living in the Montana wilderness, social worker Pete Snow comes face-to-face with the boy's profoundly disturbed father, Jeremiah. With courage and caution, Pete slowly earns a measure of trust from this paranoid survivalist itching for a final conflict that will signal the coming End Times. But as Pete's own family spins out of control, Pearl's activities spark the full-blown interest of the FBI, putting Pete at the center of a massive manhunt from which no one will emerge unscathed.
-
-
The Ghost of Tom Joad & the Wrath of Grapes
- By Mel on 06-30-14
By: Smith Henderson
-
Our Story Begins
- New and Selected Stories
- By: Tobias Wolff
- Narrated by: Anthony Heald
- Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Wolff here returns with fresh revelations - about biding one's time, or experiencing first love, or burying one's mother - that come to a variety of characters in circumstances at once everyday and extraordinary. A retired Marine enrolls in college while her son trains for Iraq. A lawyer takes a difficult deposition. An American in Rome indulges the Gypsy who's picked his pocket.
-
-
Great
- By chris on 04-11-08
By: Tobias Wolff
-
Where I'm Calling From
- Selected Stories
- By: Raymond Carver
- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 16 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
By the time of his early death in 1988, Raymond Carver had established himself as one of the great practitioners of the American short story. Where I'm Calling From, his last collection, encompasses classic stories from Cathedral, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, and earlier Carver volumes, along with seven new works previously unpublished in book form.
-
-
Love Carver, But Dietz Ruins It With Reading
- By Noirbat on 05-10-18
By: Raymond Carver
-
She's Come Undone
- By: Wally Lamb
- Narrated by: Linda Stephens
- Length: 18 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Meet Dolores Price. She's 13, wise-mouthed but wounded, having bid her childhood goodbye. Beached like a whale in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips, and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies. When she finally rolls into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this time she's determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before really going belly-up.
-
-
Really disappointing narrator!
- By Jessica Williams on 01-21-12
By: Wally Lamb
-
Battleborn
- By: Claire Vaye Watkins
- Narrated by: Ali Ahn, Morgan Hallett, Laura Knight Keating, and others
- Length: 8 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Like the work of Cormac McCarthy, Denis Johnson, Richard Ford, and Annie Proulx, Battleborn represents a near-perfect confluence of sensibility and setting, and the introduction of an exceptionally powerful and original literary voice. In each of these ten unforgettable stories, Claire Vaye Watkins writes her way fearlessly into the mythology of the American West, utterly reimagining it.
-
-
Wonderful magnificent stories beautifully told
- By Pedro Ramirez on 12-03-15
-
Homesick for Another World
- Stories
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan, Richard Poe
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
There's something eerily unsettling about Ottessa Moshfegh's stories, something almost dangerous, while also being delightful and even laugh-out-loud funny. Her characters are all unsteady on their feet in one way or another; they all yearn for connection and betterment, though each in very different ways, but they are often tripped up by their own baser impulses and existential insecurities.
-
-
Funny, Dynamic Writing
- By Sofia Macht on 06-13-18
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
-
Fourth of July Creek
- A Novel
- By: Smith Henderson
- Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews, Jenna Lamia
- Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After trying to help Benjamin Pearl, an undernourished, nearly feral 11-year-old boy living in the Montana wilderness, social worker Pete Snow comes face-to-face with the boy's profoundly disturbed father, Jeremiah. With courage and caution, Pete slowly earns a measure of trust from this paranoid survivalist itching for a final conflict that will signal the coming End Times. But as Pete's own family spins out of control, Pearl's activities spark the full-blown interest of the FBI, putting Pete at the center of a massive manhunt from which no one will emerge unscathed.
-
-
The Ghost of Tom Joad & the Wrath of Grapes
- By Mel on 06-30-14
By: Smith Henderson
-
Our Story Begins
- New and Selected Stories
- By: Tobias Wolff
- Narrated by: Anthony Heald
- Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Wolff here returns with fresh revelations - about biding one's time, or experiencing first love, or burying one's mother - that come to a variety of characters in circumstances at once everyday and extraordinary. A retired Marine enrolls in college while her son trains for Iraq. A lawyer takes a difficult deposition. An American in Rome indulges the Gypsy who's picked his pocket.
-
-
Great
- By chris on 04-11-08
By: Tobias Wolff
-
Where I'm Calling From
- Selected Stories
- By: Raymond Carver
- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 16 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
By the time of his early death in 1988, Raymond Carver had established himself as one of the great practitioners of the American short story. Where I'm Calling From, his last collection, encompasses classic stories from Cathedral, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, and earlier Carver volumes, along with seven new works previously unpublished in book form.
-
-
Love Carver, But Dietz Ruins It With Reading
- By Noirbat on 05-10-18
By: Raymond Carver
-
Pay Dirt Road
- By: Samantha Jayne Allen
- Narrated by: Sandy Rustin
- Length: 8 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Annie McIntyre has a love/hate relationship with Garnett, Texas. Recently graduated from college and home waitressing, lacking not in ambition but certainly in direction, Annie is lured into the family business—a private investigation firm—by her supposed-to-be-retired grandfather, Leroy, despite the rest of the clan's misgivings.
-
-
Great Narration
- By Cindy Buell NZ on 05-04-22
-
A Death in Kitchawank, and Other Stories
- By: T. C. Boyle
- Narrated by: T. C. Boyle
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Few authors write with such sheer love of story and language as T. C. Boyle, and that is nowhere more evident than in his inventive, wickedly funny, and always entertaining short stories. Here are 14 new tales previously unpublished in book form. By turns mythic and realistic, farcical and tragic, ironic and moving, Boyle's stories have mapped a wide range of human emotions. The stories here reflect his maturing themes.
-
-
Mixed Bag
- By AuntGert on 09-22-20
By: T. C. Boyle
-
Marlena
- A Novel
- By: Julie Buntin
- Narrated by: Emma Galvin
- Length: 9 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Everything about 15-year-old Cat's new town in rural Michigan is lonely and off-kilter until she meets her neighbor, the manic, beautiful, pill-popping Marlena. Cat, inexperienced and desperate for connection, is quickly lured into Marlena's orbit by little more than an arched eyebrow and a shake of white-blond hair. As the two girls turn the untamed landscape of their desolate small town into a kind of playground, Cat catalogues a litany of firsts - first drink, first cigarette, first kiss - while Marlena's habits harden and calcify.
-
-
A Brilliant, Agonizing Portrait of a Young Woman
- By Sudi on 06-06-17
By: Julie Buntin
-
Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?
- Stories
- By: Raymond Carver
- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With this, his first collection of stories, Raymond Carver breathed new life into the American short story and instantly became both the recognized master of the form and one of our best-loved fiction writers. Carver shows us the humor and tragedy that dwell in the hearts of ordinary people; his stories are the classics of our time.
-
-
Humanity at the Breaking Point
- By Darwin8u on 03-31-19
By: Raymond Carver
-
Whiskey & Ribbons
- By: Leesa Cross-Smith
- Narrated by: Larry Heron, Joe Bearor, Tunisia Hardison
- Length: 8 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in contemporary Louisville, Leesa Cross-Smith's mesmerizing first novel surrounding the death of a police officer is a requiem for marriage, friendship, and family, from an author Roxane Gay has called "a consummate storyteller". Evi - a classically-trained ballerina - was nine months pregnant when her husband Eamon was killed in the line of duty on a steamy morning in July. Now, it is winter, and Eamon's adopted brother Dalton has moved in to help her raise six-month-old Noah.
-
-
Beautifully Tragic and Heart Healing
- By Jennifer Glover on 08-17-18
-
Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving
- By: Jonathan Evison
- Narrated by: Jeff Woodman
- Length: 9 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Benjamin Benjamin has lost virtually everything - his wife, his family, his home, his livelihood. With few options, Ben enrolls in a night class called The Fundamentals of Caregiving taught in the basement of a local church. There Ben is instructed in the art of inserting catheters and avoiding liability and how to keep physical and emotional distance between client and provider. But when Ben is assigned to 19-year-old Trev, he discovers that the endless mnemonics and service plan checklists have done little to prepare him.
-
-
Unlike!
- By Pamela Harvey on 01-02-13
By: Jonathan Evison
-
Signals: New and Selected Stories
- By: Tim Gautreaux
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 13 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After the stunning historical novels The Clearing and The Missing, Tim Gautreaux now ranges freely through contemporary life with 12 new stories and eight from previous collections. Most are set in his beloved Louisiana, many hard by or on the Mississippi River, others in North Carolina, and even in midwinter Minnesota. But generally it's heat, humidity, and bugs that beset his people as they wrestle with affairs of the heart, matters of faith, and the pros and cons of tight-knit communities.
-
-
Perfection! Amazing writer/amazing reader
- By Monique on 01-08-19
By: Tim Gautreaux
-
Strong Motion
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: Scott Aiello
- Length: 20 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Louis Holland arrives in Boston in a spring of ecological upheaval (a rash of earthquakes on the North Shore) and odd luck: the first one kills his grandmother. Louis tries to maintain his independence, but falls in love with a Harvard seismologist whose discoveries about the earthquakes' cause complicate everything.
-
-
Compelling Story, Ridiculous Narrator
- By DianeReads on 02-28-16
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
The Visiting Privilege
- New and Collected Stories
- By: Joy Williams
- Narrated by: Richard Powers, Emily Woo Zeller, Elisabeth Rodgers, and others
- Length: 20 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Joy Williams has been celebrated as a master of the short story for four decades, her renown passing from one generation to the next even in the shifting landscape of contemporary writing. And at long last the incredible scope of her singular achievement is put on display: 33 stories drawn from three much-lauded collections and another 13 appearing here for the first time in book form.
-
-
I sure tried.
- By A.C. CALLOWAY on 01-28-24
By: Joy Williams
-
The Wangs vs. the World
- By: Jade Chang
- Narrated by: Nancy Wu
- Length: 14 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Charles Wang is mad at America. A brash, lovable immigrant businessman who built a cosmetics empire and made a fortune, he's just been ruined by the financial crisis. Now all Charles wants is to get his kids safely stowed away so that he can go to China and attempt to reclaim his family's ancestral lands - and his pride. Outrageously funny and full of charm, The Wangs vs. the World is an entirely fresh look at what it means to belong in America - and how going from glorious riches to (still name-brand) rags brings one family together in a way money never could.
-
-
Spectacular
- By Barbara on 10-11-16
By: Jade Chang
-
My True Love Gave to Me
- Twelve Holiday Stories
- By: Stephanie Perkins - editor
- Narrated by: Various
- Length: 12 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
You're going to fall in love with My True Love Gave to Me: Twelve Holiday Stories by twelve bestselling young adult writers, edited by the international bestselling Stephanie Perkins. Whether you celebrate Christmas or Hanukkah, Winter Solstice or Kwanzaa, there's something here for everyone. So curl up by the fireplace and get cozy. You have twelve reasons this season to stay indoors and fall in love.
-
-
Nice Holiday Read
- By Doha on 11-23-16
-
Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules (Unabridged Selections)
- By: Edited by David Sedaris
- Narrated by: David Sedaris, Mary-Louise Parker, Cherry Jones
- Length: 2 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules is a collection of short stories, some classic, others impending, selected and introduced by David Sedaris.
-
-
Great stories but only 5 of 17 are included
- By Terri Kirk on 07-13-12
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
Godspeed
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Jon Orsini
- Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Why is it being built here, and why so quickly? These are the questions Cole, Bart, and Teddy, the three principals of True Triangle Construction, ask themselves when they are hired to finish a project for a mysteriously wealthy homeowner. Nestled in the mountains outside of Jackson, Wyoming, the house is a masterpiece, unlike anything they've done before. Once finished, it promises to be the architectural prize of Jackson and could put True Triangle on the map. But despite the project's lure, the owner is intent on having it built in a matter of months.
-
-
first class story; first class performance!
- By Peter S on 11-20-21
By: Nickolas Butler
-
Little Faith
- A Novel
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Danny Campbell
- Length: 8 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lyle Hovde is at the onset of his golden years, living a mostly content life in rural Wisconsin with his wife, Peg, daughter, Shiloh, and six-year old grandson, Isaac. After a troubled adolescence and subsequent estrangement from her parents, Shiloh has finally come home. But while Lyle is thrilled to have his whole family reunited, he’s also uneasy: In Shiloh’s absence, she has become deeply involved with an extremist church, and the devout pastor courting her is convinced Isaac has the spiritual ability to heal the sick.
-
-
Character-driven drama in the Midwest
- By Amazon Customer on 03-25-19
By: Nickolas Butler
-
I Miss You When I Blink
- Essays
- By: Mary Laura Philpott
- Narrated by: Mary Laura Philpott
- Length: 6 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Acclaimed essayist and bookseller Mary Laura Philpott presents a charmingly relatable and wise memoir in essays about what happened after she checked off all the boxes on her successful life’s to-do list and realized she might need to reinvent the list - and herself.
-
-
Good for 30 somethings
- By beach lover on 07-30-19
-
The Hearts of Men
- A Novel
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Adam Verner
- Length: 11 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Camp Chippewa, 1962. Nelson Doughty, age 13, social outcast and overachiever, is the bugler, sounding the reveille proudly each morning. Yet this particular summer marks the beginning of an uncertain and tenuous friendship with a popular boy named Jonathan. Over the years Nelson, irrevocably scarred from the Vietnam War, becomes scoutmaster of Camp Chippewa while Jonathan marries, divorces, and turns his father's business into a highly profitable company.
-
-
The heart is a lonely hunter
- By JudyKay Lindholm on 11-03-18
By: Nickolas Butler
-
Raft of Stars
- A Novel
- By: Andrew J. Graff
- Narrated by: Lincoln Hoppe
- Length: 11 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It’s the summer of 1994 in Claypot, Wisconsin, and the lives of 10-year-old Fischer “Fish” Branson and Dale “Bread” Breadwin are shaped by the two fathers they don’t talk about. One night, tired of seeing his best friend bruised and terrorized by his no-good dad, Fish takes action. A gunshot rings out and the two boys flee the scene, believing themselves murderers. They head for the woods, where they find their way onto a raft, but the natural terrors of Ironsforge gorge threaten to overwhelm them.
-
-
Bad
- By Lukester454 on 05-03-21
By: Andrew J. Graff
-
Love and Ruin
- A Novel
- By: Paula McLain
- Narrated by: January LaVoy
- Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1937, 28-year-old Martha Gellhorn travels alone to Madrid to report on the atrocities of the Spanish Civil War and becomes drawn to the stories of ordinary people caught in the devastating conflict. It's the adventure she's been looking for and her chance to prove herself a worthy journalist in a field dominated by men. But she also finds herself unexpectedly - and uncontrollably - falling in love with Hemingway, a man on his way to becoming a legend. In the shadow of the impending Second World War, Martha and Ernest's relationship and their professional careers ignite.
-
-
Over-dramatic lamenting
- By Liz on 08-17-18
By: Paula McLain
-
Godspeed
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Jon Orsini
- Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Why is it being built here, and why so quickly? These are the questions Cole, Bart, and Teddy, the three principals of True Triangle Construction, ask themselves when they are hired to finish a project for a mysteriously wealthy homeowner. Nestled in the mountains outside of Jackson, Wyoming, the house is a masterpiece, unlike anything they've done before. Once finished, it promises to be the architectural prize of Jackson and could put True Triangle on the map. But despite the project's lure, the owner is intent on having it built in a matter of months.
-
-
first class story; first class performance!
- By Peter S on 11-20-21
By: Nickolas Butler
-
Little Faith
- A Novel
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Danny Campbell
- Length: 8 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lyle Hovde is at the onset of his golden years, living a mostly content life in rural Wisconsin with his wife, Peg, daughter, Shiloh, and six-year old grandson, Isaac. After a troubled adolescence and subsequent estrangement from her parents, Shiloh has finally come home. But while Lyle is thrilled to have his whole family reunited, he’s also uneasy: In Shiloh’s absence, she has become deeply involved with an extremist church, and the devout pastor courting her is convinced Isaac has the spiritual ability to heal the sick.
-
-
Character-driven drama in the Midwest
- By Amazon Customer on 03-25-19
By: Nickolas Butler
-
I Miss You When I Blink
- Essays
- By: Mary Laura Philpott
- Narrated by: Mary Laura Philpott
- Length: 6 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Acclaimed essayist and bookseller Mary Laura Philpott presents a charmingly relatable and wise memoir in essays about what happened after she checked off all the boxes on her successful life’s to-do list and realized she might need to reinvent the list - and herself.
-
-
Good for 30 somethings
- By beach lover on 07-30-19
-
The Hearts of Men
- A Novel
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Adam Verner
- Length: 11 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Camp Chippewa, 1962. Nelson Doughty, age 13, social outcast and overachiever, is the bugler, sounding the reveille proudly each morning. Yet this particular summer marks the beginning of an uncertain and tenuous friendship with a popular boy named Jonathan. Over the years Nelson, irrevocably scarred from the Vietnam War, becomes scoutmaster of Camp Chippewa while Jonathan marries, divorces, and turns his father's business into a highly profitable company.
-
-
The heart is a lonely hunter
- By JudyKay Lindholm on 11-03-18
By: Nickolas Butler
-
Raft of Stars
- A Novel
- By: Andrew J. Graff
- Narrated by: Lincoln Hoppe
- Length: 11 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It’s the summer of 1994 in Claypot, Wisconsin, and the lives of 10-year-old Fischer “Fish” Branson and Dale “Bread” Breadwin are shaped by the two fathers they don’t talk about. One night, tired of seeing his best friend bruised and terrorized by his no-good dad, Fish takes action. A gunshot rings out and the two boys flee the scene, believing themselves murderers. They head for the woods, where they find their way onto a raft, but the natural terrors of Ironsforge gorge threaten to overwhelm them.
-
-
Bad
- By Lukester454 on 05-03-21
By: Andrew J. Graff
-
Love and Ruin
- A Novel
- By: Paula McLain
- Narrated by: January LaVoy
- Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1937, 28-year-old Martha Gellhorn travels alone to Madrid to report on the atrocities of the Spanish Civil War and becomes drawn to the stories of ordinary people caught in the devastating conflict. It's the adventure she's been looking for and her chance to prove herself a worthy journalist in a field dominated by men. But she also finds herself unexpectedly - and uncontrollably - falling in love with Hemingway, a man on his way to becoming a legend. In the shadow of the impending Second World War, Martha and Ernest's relationship and their professional careers ignite.
-
-
Over-dramatic lamenting
- By Liz on 08-17-18
By: Paula McLain
-
The Kid Stays in the Picture
- By: Robert Evans
- Narrated by: Robert Evans
- Length: 6 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Robert Evans' The Kid Stays in the Picture is universally recognized as the greatest, most outrageous, and most unforgettable show business memoir ever written. The basis of an award-winning documentary film, it remains the gold standard of Hollywood storytelling. An extraordinary raconteur, Evans spares no one, least of all himself. The Kid Stays in the Picture is sharp, witty, self-aggrandizing, and self-lacerating in equal measure.
-
-
Not even close to unabridged
- By Shaun Bossio on 09-08-16
By: Robert Evans
-
Shotgun Lovesongs
- By: Nickolas Butler
- Narrated by: Karoline Schuch, Fabian Busch, Andreas Döhler, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 53 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Hank und Beth, schon in der Schule ein Paar, haben ihren Heimatort Little Wing nie verlassen. Sie kämpfen um ihre Farm und unterstützen Ronny, der nach einem schweren Unfall vom Rodeo-Star zum Alkoholiker wurde. Kip war als Rohstoffmakler in Chicago erfolgreich und will frisch verheiratet in seiner alten Heimat neu beginnen. Lee hat es mit seinem Debütalbum "Shotgun Lovesongs" zum internationalen Indierock-Star gebracht. Doch auch ihn zieht es immer wieder zurück.
By: Nickolas Butler
-
Lessons
- By: Ian McEwan
- Narrated by: Simon McBurney
- Length: 17 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When the world is still counting the cost of the Second World War and the Iron Curtain has closed, eleven-year-old Roland Baines's life is turned upside down. 2,000 miles from his mother's protective love, stranded at an unusual boarding school, his vulnerability attracts piano teacher Miss Miriam Cornell, leaving scars as well as a memory of love that will never fade.
-
-
Narrator Simon McBurney gets my 100% rating
- By Peggy M on 09-26-22
By: Ian McEwan
-
The Winter People
- A Novel
- By: Jennifer McMahon
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell, Kathe Mazur
- Length: 10 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
West Hall, Vermont, has always been a town of strange disappearances and old legends. The most mysterious is that of Sara Harrison Shea, who, in 1908, was found dead in the field behind her house just months after the tragic death of her daughter, Gertie. Now, in present day, 19-year-old Ruthie lives in Sara's farmhouse with her mother, Alice, and her younger sister, Fawn. Alice has always insisted that they live off the grid, a decision that suddenly proves perilous when Ruthie wakes up one morning to find that Alice has vanished without a trace. Searching for clues, she is startled to find a copy of Sara Harrison Shea's diary....
-
-
Get past the narration of the first chapter
- By Brook on 04-19-14
By: Jennifer McMahon
-
The Secret Book of Flora Lea
- A Novel
- By: Patti Callahan Henry
- Narrated by: Cynthia Erivo, Patti Callahan Henry
- Length: 12 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
1939: Fourteen-year-old Hazel and five-year-old Flora evacuate their London home for a rural village to escape the horrors of the Second World War. Living with the Aberdeen family in a charming stone cottage, Hazel distracts her young sister with a fairy tale about a magical land, a secret place they can escape to that is all their own: Whisperwood. But the unthinkable happens when Flora suddenly vanishes after playing near the banks of the River Thames. Shattered, Hazel blames herself for her sister’s disappearance, carrying the guilt into adulthood.
-
-
My mum was an evacuee…
- By Bettie on 06-09-23
-
Wandering Stars
- A Novel
- By: Tommy Orange
- Narrated by: Shaun Taylor-Corbett, MacLeod Andrews, Alma Cuervo, and others
- Length: 9 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Colorado, 1864. Star, a young survivor of the Sand Creek Massacre, is brought to the Fort Marion prison castle, where he is forced to learn English and practice Christianity by Richard Henry Pratt, an evangelical prison guard who will go on to found the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, an institution dedicated to the eradication of Native history, culture, and identity. A generation later, Star’s son, Charles, is sent to the school, where he is brutalized by the man who was once his father’s jailer.
-
-
Beautiful
- By Anonymous User on 03-17-24
By: Tommy Orange
What listeners say about Shotgun Lovesongs
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Mel
- 03-13-14
Love Song to Home Town
Shotgun Lovesongs takes a real human look not only at four guy-friends that grow up together in a small mid-western town, but what *home* means. That pull and push away, safe but suffocating, "place where everybody knows your name," and how it fits inside of us. The friends each strike out on a different path: leaving to find their voice, build a career better than they could have had if they'd stayed, drawn to a bigger life, staying and carrying on a legacy. Throughout their journeys, the four friends, and Beth, the girl that had a connection to them all, nurture each other and repel each other, and draw each other back together...home again.
The friends gather to attend a wedding in their home town. Each looks back nostalgically, narrating sections of the book from their point of view up to the wedding, when the events become current tense. Butler works the town into the traits of each of his characters, like an entity that molds and shapes who they become, then brings the story full circle proving that home is a place in the heart.
Butler's writing is at times poetic. There is an almost peaceful beauty to the writing, an honest and respectful voice redolent of hard-worked land and salt of the earth people. Though there is also a Big Chill / high school yearbook feel to the book, with plenty of capers, laughs, and tragedies that accompany life, the story doesn't rely on a catastrophic event to re-unite the characters. It is a slow and steady gurgling stream that gently flows by and through the seasons. [The buzz associated with the release of this book is the connection between author Butler and the Indie-folk band founded by Justin Vernon, Bon Iver; Butler went to high school with Justin Vernon. A fact I saw in every press release.]
The inherent problem with creating several voices from one head is -- that they all come from one head. The characters take on similarities, whether that is because they are all creations of Butler -- or all creations from Little Wing, Wisconsin -- is debatable. Either way, the audio narration could have benefitted from differentiating the voices. With similar thoughts and characteristics, even with a full cast, it was sometimes difficult to tell one character from the other, thus the 3 *'s.
I enjoyed this listen. It wasn't a grab-you-by-the-throat listen, I wasn't hanging on to hear what happened next, and I won't take away new wisdom, but I didn't want to put it down . It was a warm cozy blanket, curling up with your back against a tree on a blue-skied day and watching a peaceful stream -- recalling your own safe places, fond memories, and good friends. A poetic, peaceful stroll.
"Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home..." John H. Payne
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
22 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Janice
- 03-17-14
Thirty-Something angst
I think our mid-thirties may be the time of our lives (other than our teens) when we are most likely to take ourselves too seriously. Worried about how we have defined and sought success, wondering if we made mistakes and if it’s too late to take them back and start over. That seems to be where the five friends of Shotgun Lovesongs are in their lives. Probably because I am two decades older than they are and have already been through the twenty year college reunion that proved that we all grew older if not wiser, that I was able to find many gentle smiles of recognition as these friends work through the beginnings of their mid-life angst. I did like all of them because they seemed nicely and not so nicely real. There was plenty of humor along with the worries, and Butler was able to infuse small town sensibilities into the narrative as if Little Wing was another character. Sometimes the prose got a bit overdone - like too much frosting on a cake - but I was willing to forgive.
This love song was fine up to the point of The Conflict, when a secret is accidently let out, putting two friends at odds with each other in a way that may be impossible to repair. How Butler chose to resolve The Conflict lost the authenticity of the story. The final scenes, essentially in the final hour of the book, he went a bit off the tracks and I turned off my IPod kind of shaking my head. Perhaps guys really would behave that way and as a woman I just don’t get it. But I’m doubtful. Anyway, a star fell off the rating as the final credits rolled.
3/5s of the narration was excellent – Henry, Leland and Kip being very real and natural. Beth and Ronny tried too hard, like catching an actor in a movie working at staying in character. The harder they try, the more you are aware of the acting. Not awful, but broke the spell enough to drop from 5 to 4 stars.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
13 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Pamela Harvey
- 03-17-14
Not bad, not great, either...
This one begins like they tell you how to run a marathon: start slow and get slower. And it's a hard call to rate a book that has so few parts for women. Mostly this book is about men and all their stuff - golf, drinking, farming, music gigs, coupling and uncoupling with various women who are only interesting as sexual partners.
Aren't there any female (or male, for that matter) editors who could have steered this book towards a more balanced perspective?
There were some good prose snippets, with good flow and musicality, but mostly this was a flat narrative. Not much happens, and character development? Not so much, I'm afraid.
It's all about men and how they go about populating their lives with accessories: farm equipment, kids, drinking, people, music.
I am not so much a fan of "plot" for its own sake, and I can just as easily enjoy a book that meanders through decent and layered psychobabble. However, without any interior landscape nor circumstantial forces that drive the characters, "Shotgun Lovesongs" doesn't have much to grab on to. Excellent title, though.
A smaller group of characters and their stories would have served to provide some fresh depth, and to give spark and nuance to the monochromatic scenes, and a few piercing insights here and there wouldn't have hurt, either.
We are well into the 2000's, and fiction still is all about who is hooking up with whom. Isn't there anything else to think about? To write about?
This was/is a strictly "read while you're doing something else" kind of book.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
12 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Suzn F
- 03-15-14
OH WOW, LOVESONGS
This is a terrific book! Since other reviewers have outlined the plot, instead I'll just review the high points, and there are many. It was very clear early on that this book was written by a man. Each character has a clear voice and although there are women characters in this book, this story just exudes testosterone. And I mean this in a very good way. At times I thought I could smell Henry's sweat or taste Leland's tears. The prose is rich and it gives to the listener.
I knew the characters and felt for them. This story about marriage, friendship, loyalty and unrequited love is a winner. Hooray to this author! I had no problem differentiating characters, there were several narrators and each voice / character is introduced in the beginning of each chapter. Enjoy this book..... it's a good one!!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
10 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- T
- 03-22-14
Wow, so much hype for so little substance...
I purchased on the strength of New Yorker review and was excited at the prospect of a good story. At about 1/3 of the way in, I thought, this is a good book and I was excited to keep listening. Sadly, the story quickly ran out of substance. All the characters sound the same note, repeating the same thoughts and actions. No one is very likable and that is fine but beyond this fact, they are generally boring and immature to the extreme
Add to this the fact that nothing happens yet the character(s) acts like his actions have the gravitas of State Department decisions. Too, I don't mind that nothing much happens if the prose in new and interesting but sadly no, the prose is tired and unremarkable. In fairness Butler can turn a good metaphor; is an observant man. This would have been a good short story, but stretched into a novel it is just unremarkable and repetitive.
Resist the urge...
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
6 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Ryan
- 03-19-14
Middlin’ “OMG, adulthood” novel
The setup is a pretty familiar one: a tale of five friends who come from the same American small town, go in different directions in life, and then come together again as 30-something adults, finding that they still have some growing up to do.
The writing isn't really anything ground-breaking, but it's not bad either, and I thought that there was a basic honesty to Nickolas Butler's sense of people and places. Two of the five main characters resonated with me. First, there’s Lee, the brooding alt-rock superstar who keeps returning to the town in which he had recorded his first hit album during a depressive phase and -- probably relatedly -- been in love (ah, hipster nostalgia). Then, there’s Ronnie, the former rodeo stud, now living with the after-effects of a brain hemorrhage connected to the alcoholism of his younger days, looked after by neighbors. Both of their restless, slightly-unhinged narrative voices are well done, and are brought to life by the audiobook readers.
The novel's central dramas, though, weren't very dramatic to me. Henry and Beth are both solid, decent midwesterners, but a bit dull as characters (however capable Maggie Hoffman is at reading Beth’s parts), and I couldn't get excited about Beth's one act of “infidelity”, which never seemed to have much emotional conviction on her side. As for Kip, the high-powered broker, he felt tacked-on to the story, never really graduating from a trope to a convincing character. As another user review noted, cutting a protagonist might have forced Butler to add more layers to the others.
Still, just as a cup of microwave soup is sometimes comforting, a well-worn story format is sometimes just fine for my listening needs during a Sunday trip to the grocery story. There are a few moments of familiar poignancy in this tale of people realizing that their youth is over and they must deal with their baggage and make choices about the rest of their lives. What a serious time our thirties are! Some readers may find the (literally) painful male bonding in the last chapter silly, but I liked that Butler finally upped the level of chaos and didn’t go for the easy happy ending.
Shotgun Lovesongs would probably work well as the kind of movie my parents like to stream, if given some charismatic actors, good midwestern panorama shots, and a stirring soundtrack. As a novel, it was a pleasant if not hugely memorable time-passer.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
5 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- RueRue
- 08-05-14
Small Town Life
What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?
There was no story. The characters were well developed but just sort of drifted through the narrative. Was the author trying to make the point that life is as aimless as this story ?
What was most disappointing about Nickolas Butler’s story?
The lack of a plot to drive the narrative.
What about the narrators’s performance did you like?
There were (5) narrators. The best was Henry.
You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?
This would be a good choice for someone who longs for the sense of community in a small town.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
4 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Taryn
- 03-17-14
Charming story and Great listen
I found this book to be entertaining and enjoyable. I loved the different readers and the way they captured the voice of each character. I disagree with reviews that said each character was too similar and all male dominated which didn't provide balance. FIrst of all, it was about mostly male characters who grew up together which gives them a similar base and a common voice despite their different lives and experiences. Second, there didnt have to be balance with the one female character - the story was primarily about male friendship throughout 30+ yrs. The end did get a bit contrived and it was kind of abrupt so I took off one star for that. However, I think the book captured the essence of small town life and the ebb and flow of long lasting friendships. I enjoyed this audio and I recommend it for a pleasant easy listen!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Alison B. Patterson
- 12-31-14
Wonderful road trip story
My husband and I listened to this together on a holiday road trip at the recommendation of a friend. It was the perfect mix of friendship and love story and small town for me with mostly male characters to keep him interested.
We liked the characters. They were well developed and complex, believable. We loved the narration!
There was a lot of profanity and one steamy scene we had to shut down so our 7 year old wouldn't hear it worse repeat. But other than that we loved it.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
2 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Jan
- 03-30-14
Expect to Hear Great Things About This Novel
My favorite contemporary fiction selection so far for 2014. This novel focuses on the comings and goings of lives that were once tightly connected in a small Wisconsin town. This is not a sentimental memoir.. it is solid and reeks of truth. Although the novel spans across a couple of decades, it focuses on the present day effects that friendships from the past have on our lives. Narrators are consistant and likable. Nickolas Butler has written a novel of which almost any reader can relate.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
2 people found this helpful