Mouthful of Birds

Stories

By: Samanta Schweblin, Megan McDowell

Narrated by: full cast

Length: 5 hrs and 57 mins

Publisher's Summary

A powerful, eerily unsettling story collection from a major international literary star.

Unearthly and unexpected, the stories in Mouthful of Birds burrow their way into your psyche and don't let go. Samanta Schweblin haunts and mesmerizes in this extraordinary, masterful collection.

Schweblin's stories have the feel of a sleepless night, where every shadow and bump in the dark take on huge implications, leaving your pulse racing, and the line between the real and the strange blur.

Audiobook table of contents:

• "Headlights", read by Erin Bennett
• "Preserves", read by Allyson Ryan
• "Butterflies", read by Mark Bramhall
• "Mouthful of Birds", read by Kaleo Griffith
• "Santa Claus Sleeps at Our House", read by Kirby Heyborne
• "The Digger", read by Rob Shapiro
• "Irman", read by Mark Deakins
• "The Test", read by Fred Sanders
• "Toward Happy Civilization", read by Mark Bramhall
• "Olingiris", read by Erin Bennett
• "My Brother Walter", read by Arthur Morey
• "The Merman", read by Hillary Huber
• "Rage of Pestilence", read by Paul Boehmer
• "Heads Against Concrete", read by Robbie Daymond
• "The Size of Things", read by Fred Sanders
• "Underground", read by Ray Porter
• "Slowing Down", read by Danny Campbell 
• "On the Steppe", read by Cassandra Campbell
• "A Great Effort", read by John H. Mayer
• "The Heavy Suitcase of Benavides", read by Josh Horowitz

©2019 Samanta Schweblin (P)2019 Penguin Audio

Critic Reviews

"Schweblin is among the most acclaimed Spanish-language writers of her generation.... [H]er true ancestor could only be David Lynch; her tales are woven out of dread, doubles and confident loose ends.... What makes Schweblin so startling as a writer, however, what makes her rare and important, is that she is impelled not by mere talent or ambition but by vision, and that vision emerges from intense concern with the world, with the hidden cruelties in our relationships with all that is vulnerable - children, rivers, language, one another." (New York Times)

"The author’s flair for intertwining surrealism with delicate emotionality is again on full display in Mouthful of Birds, a collection of short stories that sit somewhere between miniature mysteries and fairy tales. In this slim and superb book, Schweblin takes on the desire to love, to parent, and to care for one’s own body - hardly extraordinary themes - and invests them with a fresh poignancy." (Vogue)

"Admirers of Schweblin's work will be delighted to learn that she hasn't lost any of the atmospheric creepiness that made Fever Dream such an unsettling ride. Mouthful of Birds, is just as ethereal and bizarre as its predecessor, and it proves that Schweblin is a master of elegant and uncanny fiction.... Schweblin is gifted at treating the otherworldly with a matter-of-fact attitude, writing about the surreal as if it were unremarkable.... And her writing, beautifully translated by Megan McDowell, is consistently perfect; she can evoke more feelings in one sentence than many writers can in a whole story. Fans of literature that looks at the world from a skewed point of view will find much to love in Schweblin's book, and so will anyone who appreciates originality and bold risk-taking. Mouthful of Birds is a stunning achievement from a writer whose potential is beginning to seem limitless." (NPR)

“[T]he stories cumulatively summon a world in which the civilized is constantly receding and to be a human is to live in a state of desperation.” (The New Yorker)

hmmm...

While enjoyed the book, i had a hard time staying engaged with it at times. Some of the stories were amazing, other not so much. I found the style to be lightly disjointed as they quite often are beautiful snippets taken from their context and displayed as glimpses through a peephole. I like that. but it was hard listen to in longer sessions as I found I needed to pause and absorb what I'd heard or lose it as background clutter to my day. And these stories deserved remembering.