Islanders

By: Elinor Cook

Narrated by: Daisy Ridley

In an era of public versus private personas, a young woman decides to shake up her ordinary life by becoming a contestant on a reality television show. The manufactured paradise has no clocks, no way to contact the outside world, and nothing but time, a pool, and gorgeous people. As the days or weeks or months pass by, she discovers more about herself through the people around her and challenges her notions of identity and love. In a paradise where the only game is to fall in love, what will she do to win?

©2020 Elinor Cook (P)2020 AO Media LLC

Strong narration

This is an interesting take on reality dating shows. I’m not a huge fan of weird pronoun use, but it worked for this story, adding to the unsettling what’s really real vibe.

Daisy Ridley is EXCELLENT, ofcourse. I think I’d appreciate the story more if I’d watched Love Island, as it apparently references that reality dating series. There are some interesting thoughts on public versus private personas, how past experiences impact us and how changeable friendship and love can be, especially in the heightened reality of a media obsessed society.

I’m not sure how I felt about the end, but it was an intriguing listen.

buena narración, trama lenta

no es el tipo de libros que leo y quería salir un poco de la zona de confort. pero de verdad no me cautivó la trama. al menos no ahora. la narración estuvo adecuada, Daisy hace los enfoques en los momentos oportunos entiendo, eso me gustó

Don’t be tempted

Daisy Ridley was great. But the story and it’s confusing use of pronouns was terrible. Sorry I listened.

Horrible

Super cringeworthy. Right from the beginning. Don’t even bother trying to listen to this. It’s not often I hate an audiobook so quickly. The we, they used is so silly, trying way too hard.

Confusing?

Although I am all about respecting people’s pronouns, I found it confusing and even “flattening” of the story line that she used “we” as her pronoun for the majority of the story. I realized at the end it was probably more of a statement about the dehumanizing-ness of reality shows and possibly our society at large when she started using “I” and “She” after speaking to her mom. I suppose it woke her to her humanity. Generally speaking, I really don’t fully understand what this story was about.

Pronoun Game VS Siamese Twins

That’s my guess at this work- The distracting “we“ and “they” is attempt at avant-garde writing, or plot is about island reality show starring Siamese twins.

Underdeveloped on an interesting concept

A bit vapid at the end. It could have gone so many places. Too much left to the imagination; without direction and detail to guide said imagination, the story becomes rudderless.

Where is Reality, really...?

An excellent performance by Daisy Ridley, for a captivating short story, which I'm afraid may be lost on most Americans (I say this, only because I am an American who's spent over a decade married to a Briton... ). That's all I can say, without spoilers, but I would advise, anyone listening to this title, stop everything and give it your full attention. Keep your wits about you, and go in with an open heart and mind. I'll be listening again, to go back and capture some of the nuances I might have missed, but for now, I can say it was enjoyable and captivating. A seemingly simple story for our modern times, but complicated by so many layers of consciousness. Kudos to Elinor Cook for crafting SO much into such a short span of time!

It’s ok

It’s an easy listen. The pronouns are a little weird so sometimes it can get confusing when you are tuning back in. But it was a fun story.

“Fun” Game turns deadly

This little story was good! Much better (and darker) than I was expecting. Not so shallow as some may think. Great narration!