Clara Callan Audiobook By Richard B. Wright cover art

Clara Callan

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Clara Callan

By: Richard B. Wright
Narrated by: Anne Twomey, Joanna P. Adler
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About this listen

Two sisters, small-town Ontario, 1934. Canadian author Richard Wright tells their story, from the ordinary to the extraordinary, with an eye for the commonplace and poignant sense of the larger undercurrents that change people's lives.

Letters and journal entries form a portal into the desires and passions of two very different women, underscoring the larger tableau of an era stirring with great events (the Depression, rumblings of another world war, and the infancy of radio and show business entertainment). Love and betrayal, friendship and family, hope and deception are the forces that temper the lives of Clara, the spinster schoolteacher, and her sister Nora, "whose entire life is a performance."

Wright, a master of revealing the drama of seemingly unremarkable lives, constructs a powerful, mesmerizing narrative. Clara Callan is a deeply moving portrait of two women and of an age heralding seismic changes that will alter the fabric of their inner lives and the world as they once knew it.

©2002 Richard B. Wright (P)2002 HighBridge Company
Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction Tearjerking

Critic reviews

  • Giller Prize Winner, 2001

"Mr. Wright writes with the apparent ease of breathing, and he is both touching and very, very funny." (New York Times)

What listeners say about Clara Callan

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

a fresh view of women in the 1930's

It seems in so many stories of women in the 1930's they are the downtrodden of the depression of America. This is a different view - for both Clara and her sister. Something new and different. I enjoyed the whole book

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

charming intimate refreshing

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. It alternates between one woman's life and situation in rural canada and her sister's in New York City. I found the interplay of the landscapes and environments invigorating; it allowed one to experience both worlds through the stories of the women. I found the juxtaposition of the two sisters' attitudes and personalities refreshing and came to care very much about both characters and what happened to them. The auther gives a good believable feel for the texture of these women's inner and outer lives. Not a "feelgood" book, but entertaining, and one that leaves one wiser and touched. Highly recommended. I'd like to hear more by this author. Very good narrator.