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The Story of Beautiful Girl
- Narrated by: Kate Reading
- Length: 11 hrs and 50 mins
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The Story of Beautiful Girl
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Editorial reviews
The Story of Beautiful Girl has a strong start with a vivid scene. In 1968, an elderly widowed schoolteacher answers her door to find a deaf man and a woman with a mental disability. She discovers that the woman just gave birth to a baby and the couple escaped from the Pennsylvania State School for the Incurable and Feebleminded. As the man runs and the woman gets carted away by authorities, she manages to whisper to the widow, "Hide her." And thus begins this story of love and determination.
Award-winning narrator Kate Reading gives a compelling performance. Reading has narrated diverse books from science fiction to Jane Austen. Her range is evident in this performance. Reading deftly handles the alternating viewpoints and diverse characters, from an older repressed woman finding a new purpose in her life to a deaf African American male who has known more than his share of pain to a world-weary, compassionate nurse. She tempers some melodramatic writing and keeps the story grounded, allowing listeners to find the novel believable and relatable.
.Author Rachel Simon is best known for her memoir, Riding the Bus with My Sister. She gives a heartbreaking glimpse inside America's shameful history of institutions with The Story of Beautiful Girl. This is the novel's greatest strength, the revelation of how families and communities failed to care for its most vulnerable members. Listeners will want to stick with the novel to find out what happens to the characters and the school, but the novel does not quite live up to the promising introduction. The writing is overwrought at times and the frequent alternating viewpoints with time jumps become tiresome.
Despites its flaws, The Story of Beautiful Girl is still affecting and will appeal to fans of Kim Edwards' The Memory Keeper's Daughter and Simon's previous work, as well as those interested in the treatment of people with disabilities. Kate Reading's performance moderates weaker aspects and succeeds in making the novel an engaging listen. Julie MacDonald
Publisher's summary
It is 1968. Lynnie, a young white woman with a developmental disability, and Homan, an African American deaf man, are locked away in an institution: the School for the Incurable and Feebleminded, and have been left to languish, forgotten. Deeply in love, they escape, and find refuge in the farmhouse of Martha, a retired schoolteacher and widow. But the couple is not alone - Lynnie has just given birth to a baby girl. When the authorities catch up to them that same night, Homan escapes into the darkness, and Lynnie is caught. But before she is forced back into the institution, she whispers two words to Martha: "Hide her."
And so begins the 40-year epic journey of Lynnie, Homan, Martha, and baby Julia - lives divided by seemingly insurmountable obstacles, yet drawn together by a secret pact and extraordinary love.
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 550
For Julie Holt, travelling to the beautiful but ravaged coast of Biloxi, Mississippi, is a journey into a secret past, and a life she never expected.... Julie first knew loss at the age of 12, when her sister disappeared, never to be found. As her once close-knit family grew apart, Julie's mother obsessively searched for the girl, and when her mother died, Julie took up the search, never letting go of the hope. Then, at an art exhibition in New York, she meets Monica....
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4 out of 5 stars
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The ending was very weak
- By Missi Boyd on 10-31-16
By: Karen White
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Unconditional
- A Novel
- By: Eva Marie Everson
- Narrated by: Shannon McManus
- Length: 5 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 32
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 29
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 30
Samantha Crawford has a storybook life: she’s happily married, lives on a ranch where she keeps her beloved horse, and the stories she has written and illustrated since childhood have become popular books. When her husband Billy is killed in a senseless act of violence, Sam loses her faith and the will to live. But a sudden death-defying encounter with two children leads to a reunion with her old friend Papa Joe Bradford.
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5 out of 5 stars
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excelent
- By susan on 11-15-12
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The Last Ballad
- A Novel
- By: Wiley Cash
- Narrated by: Karen White, Elizabeth Wiley
- Length: 14 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 193
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 167
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 168
Twelve times a week, 28-year-old Ella May Wiggins makes the two-mile trek to and from her job on the night shift at American Mill No. Two in Bessemer City, North Carolina. The insular community considers the mill's owners - the newly arrived Goldberg brothers - white but not American and expects them to pay Ella May and other workers less because they toil alongside African Americans like Violet, Ella May's best friend. While the dirty, hazardous job at the mill earns Ella May a paltry nine dollars for 72 hours of work each week, it's the only opportunity she has.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Dryer than a popcorn fart
- By Scott Wilson on 02-11-18
By: Wiley Cash
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The Sound of Glass
- By: Karen White
- Narrated by: Therese Plummer, Susan Bennett
- Length: 14 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 6,409
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 5,864
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 5,839
It has been two years since the death of Merritt Heyward's husband, Cal, when she receives unexpected news - Cal's family home in Beaufort, South Carolina, bequeathed by Cal's reclusive grandmother, now belongs to Merritt. Charting the course of an uncertain life - and feeling guilt from her husband's tragic death - Merritt travels from her home in Maine to Beaufort, where the secrets of Cal's unspoken-of past reside among the pluff mud and jasmine of the ancestral Heyward home on the Bluff.
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5 out of 5 stars
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You'll LAUGH, LOVE, and maybe CRY a little
- By Jennifer on 08-08-15
By: Karen White
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Our Story Begins
- New and Selected Stories
- By: Tobias Wolff
- Narrated by: Anthony Heald
- Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 192
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 140
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 135
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.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great
- By chris on 04-11-08
By: Tobias Wolff
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Shadow Show
- All-New Stories in Celebration of Ray Bradbury
- By: Sam Weller - editor, Mort Castle - editor
- Narrated by: George Takei, Edward Herrmann, Kate Mulgrew, and others
- Length: 14 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 177
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 160
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Story4 out of 5 stars 160
Ray Bradbury - peerless storyteller, poet of the impossible, and one of America's most beloved authors - is a literary giant whose remarkable career spanned seven decades. Now 26 of today's most diverse and celebrated authors offer new short works in honor of the master; stories of heart, intelligence, and dark wonder from a remarkable range of creative artists.
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5 out of 5 stars
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THE MAN WHO FORGOT RAY BRADBURY
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 05-27-17
By: Sam Weller - editor, and others
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The Magic of Ordinary Days
- A Novel
- By: Ann Howard Creel
- Narrated by: Justine Eyre
- Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 269
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 235
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 234
Olivia Dunne, a studious minister's daughter who dreams of being an archaeologist, never thought that the drama of World War II would affect her quiet life in Denver. An exhilarating flirtation reshapes her life, though, and she finds herself banished to a rural Colorado outpost, married to a man she hardly knows. Overwhelmed by loneliness, Olivia tentatively tries to establish a new life, finding much-needed friendship and solace in two Japanese American sisters who are living at a nearby internment camp.
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1 out of 5 stars
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I purchased this audio book not 15 minutes ago...
- By Kim on 09-15-16
By: Ann Howard Creel
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Stories
- All-New Tales
- By: Neil Gaiman - author/editor, Al Sarrantonio - editor, Joe Hill, and others
- Narrated by: Anne Bobby, Jonathan Davis, Katherine Kellgren, and others
- Length: 18 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 880
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 687
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Story4 out of 5 stars 687
The best stories pull readers in and keep them turning the pages, eager to discover more—to find the answer to the question: "And then what happened?" The true hallmark of great literature is great imagination, and as Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio prove with this outstanding collection, when it comes to great fiction, all genres are equal.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Something for Everyone
- By Nicole on 05-24-17
By: Neil Gaiman - author/editor, and others
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Hum If You Don't Know the Words
- By: Bianca Marais
- Narrated by: Katharine Lee McEwan, Bahni Turpin
- Length: 14 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 427
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 378
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 378
Life under Apartheid has created a secure future for Robin Conrad, a 10-year-old white girl living with her parents in 1970s Johannesburg. In the same nation but worlds apart, Beauty Mbali, a Xhosa woman in a rural village in the Bantu homeland of the Transkei, struggles to raise her children alone after her husband's death. Both lives have been built upon the division of race, and their meeting should never have occurred...until the Soweto Uprising.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Completely wrong accents
- By Debbie on 02-12-22
By: Bianca Marais
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The Last House on the Street
- A Novel
- By: Diane Chamberlain
- Narrated by: Susan Bennett
- Length: 12 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,106
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 1,856
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,854
Architect Kayla Carter and her husband designed a beautiful house for themselves in Round Hill’s new development, Shadow Ridge Estates. It was supposed to be a home where they could raise their three-year-old daughter and grow old together. Instead, it’s the place where Kayla’s husband died in an accident - a fact known to a mysterious woman who warns Kayla against moving in. The woods and lake behind the property are reputed to be haunted, and the new home has been targeted by vandals leaving threatening notes.
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5 out of 5 stars
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✫✫ 5 Stars ✫✫
- By ❤️Cyndi Marie❤️🎧Audiobook Addicts🎧 on 01-12-22
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The Girl from the Train
- By: Irma Joubert
- Narrated by: Sarah Zimmerman
- Length: 11 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 972
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 884
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 886
Six-year-old Gretl Schmidt is on a train bound for Auschwitz. Jakób Kowalski is planting a bomb on the tracks. As World War II draws to a close, Jakób fights with the Polish resistance against the crushing forces of Germany and Russia. They mean to destroy a German troop transport, but Gretl's unscheduled train reaches the bomb first. Gretl is the only survivor.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Excellent story covering the middle of the 20th C.
- By john on 04-12-16
By: Irma Joubert
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Grand Central
- Original Stories of Postwar Love and Reunion
- By: Melanie Benjamin, Amanda Hodgkinson, Pam Jenoff, and others
- Narrated by: Carla Mercer-Meyer
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 69
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 60
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Story4 out of 5 stars 62
On any particular day, thousands upon thousands of people pass through New York City's Grand Central Terminal, through the whispering gallery, beneath the ceiling of stars, and past the information booth and its beckoning four-faced clock, to whatever destination is calling them. It is a place where people come to say hello and good-bye. And each person has a story to tell.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Grand Central: Memories
- By ZacharyKindle Customer on 05-03-17
By: Melanie Benjamin, and others
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Follow the Stars Home
- By: Luanne Rice
- Narrated by: Susie Breck
- Length: 12 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 56
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 44
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 44
Being a good mother is never simple: each day brings new choices and challenges. For Diane Robbins, being a devoted single mother has resulted in her greatest joy and darkest sorrow. Weeks before her daughter was born, she and her husband, Tim McIntosh, received the news that every parent fears. Tim had not reckoned on their child being anything less than perfect, and abruptly fled to a solitary existence on the sea. Diane was left with a newborn - almost alone.
By: Luanne Rice
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Lost Lake
- By: Sarah Addison Allen
- Narrated by: Janet Metzger
- Length: 8 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,480
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,299
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Story4 out of 5 stars 1,299
The first time Eby Pim saw Lost Lake, it was on a picture postcard. Just an old photo and a few words on a small square of heavy stock, but when she saw it, she knew she was seeing her future. That was half a lifetime ago. Now Lost Lake is about to slip into Eby’s past. Her husband, George, is long passed. Most of her demanding extended family are gone.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Pure Sarah Addison Allen
- By tooonce72 on 01-27-14
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Rush Home Road
- By: Lori Lansens
- Narrated by: Ruby Dee
- Length: 6 hrs and 27 mins
- Abridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 253
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 192
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Story4 out of 5 stars 191
When a 70-year-old woman finds a five-year-old girl abandoned on her doorstep, she is thrust into a sorrowful past that can only be conquered with the help of the girl who opened her memory - the very girl she is trying to save. This first novel, according to author Jacquelyn Mitchard, is one of "exquisite power, honesty, and conviction...quite nearly without flaws."
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1 out of 5 stars
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filthy language and violent content
- By Anna on 12-16-11
By: Lori Lansens
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The Lost Girls
- A Novel
- By: Heather Young
- Narrated by: Alice Rosengard, Laurel Schroeder
- Length: 12 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 713
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 648
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Story4 out of 5 stars 646
In 1935, six-year-old Emily Evans vanishes from her family's vacation home on a remote Minnesota lake. Her disappearance destroys the family - her father commits suicide, and her mother and two older sisters spend the rest of their lives at the lake house, keeping a decades-long vigil for the lost child. Sixty years later, Lucy, the quiet and watchful middle sister, lives in the lake house alone. Before her death, she writes the story of that devastating summer in a notebook that she leaves, along with the house, to the only person who might care: her grandniece, Justine.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Engaging story spanning three generations.
- By LilMissMolly on 09-23-16
By: Heather Young
What listeners say about The Story of Beautiful Girl
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Karren
- 01-31-13
Story stays with you
I couldn't listen to this book fast enough. While I feel like it was a bit rushed toward the end with trying to tie up loose ends and put things together nicely, I thought the story was great and made me think, long after I was done listening.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance2 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- FanB14
- 05-24-12
Beautiful Attempt
Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?
Yes, it was worth the listen. Not one of the best, but a solid "B" effort.
Would you be willing to try another book from Rachel Simon? Why or why not?
Yes, I think she is a credible author. The subject matter and overall premise was interesting, just had gaps and hokey at times. The ending was tied up too neatly and seemed a little far-fetched.
Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Kate Reading?
I did not care from the narrator. I would have cast someone with a younger sounding voice without the northern accent.
Do you think The Story of Beautiful Girl needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?
No, couldn't support it.
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31 people found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- undray
- 10-25-11
beautiful girl, beautiful story
it was awesome, kept me waiting for the next part, was so upset when it came to an end. i do hope they will consider a part two.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Darlene Matheson
- 05-23-18
Insightful tapestry of lives woven in love
I loved the journey of several lives being impacted by choosing love, letting go of what needs to be let go of, while never letting go of hope and hearts that bring light. It was a truly beautiful story.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Lea
- 12-21-12
Beautiful story
Where does The Story of Beautiful Girl rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?
Top ten
Who was your favorite character and why?
Linney and Kate and Martha I can't pick one. All the characters are lovely.
What about Kate Reading’s performance did you like?
Perfect
Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
Yes!
Any additional comments?
Made me laugh and cry! My sign of a good book!
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- June
- 02-09-13
Absolutely wonderful
Which scene was your favorite?
The vacation at the end
Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
Felt like crying with joy.
Any additional comments?
Very enlightening story about people with disabilities. Great story. Reminds me that there are many good loving people
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- Bobbie
- 02-05-13
Just not my thing
This book was really not my cup of tea. After reading the summary, I was excited about hearing this one. However, as the story unfolded, I thought it was unbelievable and boring. Most of the characters were dull, and the plot was ridiculous as well. It is surprising to me that so many people enjoyed this story. I'm truly stumped by this book's popularity.
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3 people found this helpful
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
- Pamela Harvey
- 05-13-11
Unrelatable and simplistic
This book reads like one of those dream/nightmare scenes - which I always fast-forward through by the way - lots of "and then she did this and then he did that, ran away, came to a weird place and then and then...etc." I prefer a more grounded approach, and more approachable subject matter.
Also, I am tired of books that happen in 1968, 1982, or any other time but the present. I am just not that interested in recent historical periods. What do could these periods possibly offer that "now" doesn't? This is simply my perspective but I find it difficult to care about recent history, from a fiction angle, anyway.
The narrator reads with a wavering voice and a drama and weight that created a negative, sad, depressing, lonely feeling. And she kept pronouncing the word "Nana" with a flat "a" so that it sounded like babyspeak.
Not my cup of tea.
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4 people found this helpful
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
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Performance1 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- S. Brown
- 06-26-16
Good story ruined by awful narration
Fantastic story idea. What goes wrong is partly the author and partly the narrator. Simon's pacing plots needlessly and the narrators sing - songy reading gets monotonous very quickly.
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Overallout of 5 stars
- Georganna Ahlfors
- 07-13-12
Beautiful is Pretty
A bit predictable but well told. The author tells the heart of 2 people who are unable to express it themselves.
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