Pretend I'm Dead

A Novel

By: Jen Beagin

Narrated by: Candace Thaxton

NAMED A BEST BOOK of the YEAR by O, THE OPRAH MAGAZINE, REFINERY 29, and KIRKUS REVIEWS
SHORTLISTED FOR THE CENTER FOR FICTION FIRST NOVEL PRIZE

The “wondrous” (O, The Oprah Magazine), “scathingly funny” (Entertainment Weekly) debut from Whiting Award winner and author of Big Swiss Jen Beagin about a cleaning lady named Mona and her quest for self-acceptance.

Jen Beagin’s funny, moving, fearless debut novel introduces an unforgettable character, Mona—almost twenty-four, emotionally adrift, and cleaning houses to get by. She falls for a man she calls Mr. Disgusting, who proceeds to break her heart in unimaginable ways.

In search of healing, she decamps to Taos, New Mexico, for a fresh start, where she finds a community of cast-offs, all of whom have something to teach her—the pajama-wearing, blissed-out New Agers, the slightly creepy client with peculiar tastes in controlled substances, the psychic who might really be psychic. But always lurking just beneath the surface are her memories of growing up in a chaotic, destructive family from which she’s trying to disentangle herself, and the larger legacy of the past.

The story of Mona’s quest for belonging in this world is at once hilarious and wonderfully strange, true to life and boldly human, and introduces a stunning, one-of-a-kind new voice in American fiction.

A lightened taste of reality

Corky, dark humor. A addicting storyline and can’t wait to read the sequel. One of my favorite audiobooks ever.

I Thought I Was Just in for Some Cheeky Narrative...but there is so much more

I enjoyed the humor of this book and I was assuming that their was not much of the typical plot. I believe that the ending tied things together very well. This is worth the journey.

Enjoyable but not a home run for me.

I love Jen Beagin and I liked this book. It was an easy listening but didn’t knock it out of the park like Big Swiss, for me. Still worth a lesson. Didn’t totally love the narrator either. Some of the time female narrators doing male voices just makes the characters sound as if they are dumb or at least unbelievable. Just a personal preference.

Love love love

Loved this book & the audio book narrator, if you like to laugh, and can handle difficult subject matter & a complicated protagonist I can’t recommend it enough. I don’t think I don’t think I could t
hang out w anyone who doesn’t love this book.

story makes up for bad narration

I don't normally review, but I think it's worth mentioning that in my opinion the narrator doesn't do the story justice. The tone was completely off and she would often go for long stretches without taking a breath which was distracting. The character voices were decent but the narration almost ruined it. Awesome, complex, dark, comedic story saved the day. Would like to read the book myself now.