The Bonfire of the Vanities

By: Tom Wolfe

Narrated by: Joe Barrett

Length: 27 hrs and 29 mins

Publisher's summary

This bitingly hilarious American satire will forever define late twentieth-century New York style.

Tom Wolfe’s bestselling modern classic tells the story of Sherman McCoy, an elite Wall Street bond trader who has it all: wealth, power, prestige, a Park Avenue apartment, a beautiful wife, and an even more beautiful mistress, until one wrong turn sends Sherman spiraling downward in a humiliating fall from grace.

A car accident in the Bronx involving Sherman, his girlfriend, and two young lower-class Black men sets a match to the incendiary racial and social tensions of 1980s New York City. Suddenly, Sherman finds himself embroiled in the most brutal, high-profile case of the year, as prosecutors, politicians, the press, the police, the clergy, and assorted hustlers rush in to further their own political and social agendas. With so many egos at stake, the last priority on anyone’s mind is truth or justice.

©1987 Tom Wolfe (P)2009 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

"A big, bitter, funny, craftily plotted book that grabs you by the lapels and won't let go." ( New York Times Book Review)
"Sheer entertainment against a fabulous background....Often hilarious, and much, much more." ( Kirkus Reviews)
"Erupting from the first line with noise, color, tension and immediacy....brilliant." ( Publishers Weekly)

Narrator

Listening to Joe Barrett is like listening to a different person for each character. He’s my favorite narrator. This is probably my favorite audiobook so far! Going to look for another Joe Barrett book now!

Great reading of a great book

Loved the book. Loved the reading. Good use of voice and tone to set off characters. Well done!

Completely engrossing

The reader is the best i have experienced in ANY audiobook.

Highly recommend this to all.

Stop with the terrible voices

Great book and story but the narrator keeps trying to do imitations of all the characters and the imitations are bad and irritating.

Outstanding

As applicable now as it was when it first came out. Very highly recommended.

Great book - incredible narration.

Narrator elevated an already amazing novel. What a great way to experience a modern classic.

Great characters and story

Loved the story and characters. You realize nothing has changed in society when listening to the story. Seedy characters all looking out for their own self interests.

Excellent all the way around

Where does The Bonfire of the Vanities rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

I would rank it in the top ten, among Atlas Shrugged, Unbroken, East of Eden, Grapes of Wrath, Fall of Giants, Gone with the Wind, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.

Who was your favorite character and why?

It's hard to find a favorite character. There weren't many admirable people.

What about Joe Barrett’s performance did you like?

The way he changed his voice, evoking classes and prejudices.

If you could rename The Bonfire of the Vanities, what would you call it?

A Perfect Storm of Classes

Any additional comments?

It was interesting to see some of the characters recognize their own faults, only to be unable to do anything about them.

The Great American Novel of the 1980s

Wolfe's journalistic eye for detail is fully on display in this brilliant novel. While the writing is admittedly long-winded at times, the patient listener is led on a fascinating journey through high society and the American judicial system. All of the social interactions so deftly described provide illumination into the motivations of the major characters in the novel, which fully brings to life the blazing bonfire of vanities, of so many people's vanities, in the novel's stunning finale. While the novel is set in the New York of the early to mid-1980s, I'm afraid it could easily describe the New York of today. In fact, Wolfe's New York might be a bit tame and naive by today's standards. The reading is equally brilliant. I enjoyed every minute, and I'm looking forward to reading (or listening to) another Wolfe novel soon.

great drama

I really enjoyed this book. It was so tragically sad in the way it portrayed the utter worst of every group involved. I think the one line that really gripped me was "And Sherman's regal chin sunk to his chest." When a book has a line that grips my heart, it is an important book for me