Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

By: Jeanette Winterson

Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson

Length: 6 hrs and 2 mins

Publisher's summary

The New York Times best-selling author’s Whitbread Prize-winning debut - “Winterson has mastered both comedy and tragedy in this rich little novel” (The Washington Post Book World).

When it first appeared, Jeanette Winterson’s extraordinary debut novel received unanimous international praise, including the prestigious Whitbread Prize for best first fiction. Winterson went on to fulfill that promise, producing some of the most dazzling fiction and nonfiction of the past decade, including her celebrated memoir Why Be Happy When You Can Be Normal?

Now required reading in contemporary literature, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a funny, poignant exploration of a young girl’s adolescence.

Jeanette is a bright and rebellious orphan who is adopted into an evangelical household in the dour, industrial North of England and finds herself embroidering grim religious mottoes and shaking her little tambourine for Jesus. But as this budding missionary comes of age, and comes to terms with her unorthodox sexuality, the peculiar balance of her God-fearing household dissolves. Jeanette’s insistence on listening to truths of her own heart and mind - and on reporting them with wit and passion - makes for an unforgettable chronicle of an eccentric, moving passage into adulthood.

“If Flannery O’Connor and Rita Mae Brown had collaborated on the coming-out story of a young British girl in the 1960s, maybe they would have approached the quirky and subtle hilarity of Jeanette Winterson’s autobiographical first novel.... Winterson’s voice, with its idiosyncratic wit and sensitivity, is one you’ve never heard before.” (Ms. magazine)

©1985 Jeanette Winterson (P)2019 Audible, Inc.

Great performance of a great book

Jeanette Winterson has always been a favorite—but having her perform it is a real treat.

Love the story and the way is told

Love the story and they way is told, story touched me deeply. Author does a fantastic job narrating it.

Great Story!

I really enjoyed listening to her experiences as a young woman navigating family expectations, religion, and sexuality! Jeanette’s narration of her story was absolutely amazing!

Great narrator

Usually the authors are rarely good narrators of their own work. I’d read this decades ago but it was pleasure hearing her read her own work. It was wonderful hearing the dialect.

Disappointing

I am a huge fan of Jeanette Wintersonne, but this story failed to engage me. Not up to her own high standard.

Liked this much more than I expected to

I chose this book because I was looking for Sapphic book for a Reading Challenge. I didn't much think about it, and expected it to be okay, but instead it was fabulous. It was funny where it should be and heart-wrenching where it needed to be, and not too short or too long. It felt timeless and anachronistic and I didn't really know when it was supposed to take place. I thought that fit well.

I'm not sure where reality is divided from fiction. Jeanette is the adopted child of a very Christian mother and a less devout father. It is a coming of age novel. As she grows she realizes that she likes girls. This doesn't sit well with her mother. There are no explicit sex scenes.

The author reads her own book which is very fitting. I give the book and narration 5 stars.

I Learned Important Concepts

This is a five star book based not on the story or the quality of the writing but on the lessons it taught me about being a better human being and a better husband.

Beyond being a story.

I felt like I was being personally confided to as Jeanette Winterson spoke. The delivery was wide open…it always seemed to be allowing for people’s goodness.
Until ….she couldn’t understand being shunned for love. I loved every bit of it. I felt her aghast and her struggles and valor.
Even if you have read the book, Please listen to this performance…it is a one woman play deeply felt.
Thank you!

just plain great

it was really great to hear Jeanette winterson read her own book. What a boys, what a story!

Great insight of being, becoming & benefittng love

Transitional tragedy and triumph of self & spirit. you always benefit from all Jeanette Winters on writes.
Thank you Jeanette!! 💞