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A best-selling author of books for adults and children, Mark Childress pens his most outrageous work yet with Georgia Bottoms. The titular heroine is the epitome of the church-going Southern belle, except for one teeny-tiny aspect of her life. Georgia’s family inheritance has long since evaporated, and to maintain her genteel lifestyle, Miss Bottoms has taken six affluent lovers—the fly in the ointment being that one is a married preacher who’s about to reveal their infidelity to the whole congregation.
In 1944, 23-year-old Tess DeMello abruptly ends her engagement to the love of her life when she marries a mysterious stranger and moves to Hickory, North Carolina, a small town struggling with racial tension and the hardships imposed by World War II. Tess' new husband, Henry Kraft, is a secretive man who often stays out all night, hides money from his new wife, and shows no interest in making love. Tess quickly realizes she's trapped in a strange and loveless marriage with no way out.
When Angela met Jason Powell while catering a dinner party in East Hampton, she assumed their romance would be a short-lived fling, like so many relationships between locals and summer visitors. To her surprise, Jason, a brilliant economics professor at NYU, had other plans, and they married the following summer. For Angela, the marriage turned out to be a chance to reboot her life. She and her son were finally able to move out of her mother's home to Manhattan, where no one knew about her tragic past.
Bea has barely been scraping by since her husband died. After falling for a telephone scam, she loses everything and is forced to abandon her trailer. With only two-thirds of a tank in her old van, she heads toward the Pacific Ocean with her cat - on a mission to reclaim what's rightfully hers, even if it means making others pay for what she lost.
When the sound of sirens cuts through a cool fall night, the small town of Worthy, Georgia, hurtles from triumph to tragedy. Just hours before, they'd watched the Wildcats score a winning touchdown. Now, they're faced with the deaths of three cheerleaders - their promising lives cut short in a fatal crash. And the boy in the other car - the only one to survive - is believed to be at fault. As rumors begin to fly and accusations spin, allegiances form and long-kept secrets emerge.
Mark, Todd, and Zola came to law school to change the world, to make it a better place. But now, as third-year students, these close friends realize they have been duped. They all borrowed heavily to attend a third-tier, for-profit law school so mediocre that its graduates rarely pass the bar exam, let alone get good jobs. And when they learn that their school is one of a chain owned by a shady New York hedge-fund operator who also happens to own a bank specializing in student loans, the three know they have been caught up in The Great Law School Scam.
A best-selling author of books for adults and children, Mark Childress pens his most outrageous work yet with Georgia Bottoms. The titular heroine is the epitome of the church-going Southern belle, except for one teeny-tiny aspect of her life. Georgia’s family inheritance has long since evaporated, and to maintain her genteel lifestyle, Miss Bottoms has taken six affluent lovers—the fly in the ointment being that one is a married preacher who’s about to reveal their infidelity to the whole congregation.
In 1944, 23-year-old Tess DeMello abruptly ends her engagement to the love of her life when she marries a mysterious stranger and moves to Hickory, North Carolina, a small town struggling with racial tension and the hardships imposed by World War II. Tess' new husband, Henry Kraft, is a secretive man who often stays out all night, hides money from his new wife, and shows no interest in making love. Tess quickly realizes she's trapped in a strange and loveless marriage with no way out.
When Angela met Jason Powell while catering a dinner party in East Hampton, she assumed their romance would be a short-lived fling, like so many relationships between locals and summer visitors. To her surprise, Jason, a brilliant economics professor at NYU, had other plans, and they married the following summer. For Angela, the marriage turned out to be a chance to reboot her life. She and her son were finally able to move out of her mother's home to Manhattan, where no one knew about her tragic past.
Bea has barely been scraping by since her husband died. After falling for a telephone scam, she loses everything and is forced to abandon her trailer. With only two-thirds of a tank in her old van, she heads toward the Pacific Ocean with her cat - on a mission to reclaim what's rightfully hers, even if it means making others pay for what she lost.
When the sound of sirens cuts through a cool fall night, the small town of Worthy, Georgia, hurtles from triumph to tragedy. Just hours before, they'd watched the Wildcats score a winning touchdown. Now, they're faced with the deaths of three cheerleaders - their promising lives cut short in a fatal crash. And the boy in the other car - the only one to survive - is believed to be at fault. As rumors begin to fly and accusations spin, allegiances form and long-kept secrets emerge.
Mark, Todd, and Zola came to law school to change the world, to make it a better place. But now, as third-year students, these close friends realize they have been duped. They all borrowed heavily to attend a third-tier, for-profit law school so mediocre that its graduates rarely pass the bar exam, let alone get good jobs. And when they learn that their school is one of a chain owned by a shady New York hedge-fund operator who also happens to own a bank specializing in student loans, the three know they have been caught up in The Great Law School Scam.
Superheroes have always been Leia Birch Briggs' weakness. One tequila-soaked night at a comics convention, the usually level-headed graphic novelist is swept off her barstool by a handsome and anonymous Batman. It turns out the caped crusader has left her with more than just a nice, fuzzy memory. She's having a baby boy - an unexpected but not unhappy development in the 38-year-old's life.
After her mother's suicide, 15-year-old Lane Roanoke came to live with her grandparents and fireball cousin, Allegra, on their vast estate in rural Kansas. Lane knew little of her mother's mysterious family, but she quickly embraced life as one of the rich and beautiful Roanoke girls. But when she discovered the dark truth at the heart of the family, she ran...fast and far away. Eleven years later Lane is adrift in Los Angeles when her grandfather calls to tell her Allegra has gone missing. Did she run, too? Or something worse?
On paper, Chris Brennan looks perfect. He's applying for a job as a high school government teacher, he's ready to step in as an assistant baseball coach, and his references are impeccable. But everything about Chris Brennan is a lie. Susan Sematov is proud of her son, Raz, a high school pitcher so athletically talented that he's being recruited for a full-ride scholarship to a Division I college, with a future in major league baseball. But Raz’s father died only a few months ago, leaving her son in a vulnerable place where any new father figure might influence him for good - or evil.
Recently divorced, Merilee Talbot Dunlap moves with her two children to the Atlanta suburb of Sweet Apple, Georgia. It's not her first time starting over, but her efforts at a new beginning aren't helped by an anonymous local blog that dishes about the scandalous events that caused her marriage to fail.
When Cornelius Allen gives his daughter Clarissa’s hand in marriage, he presents her with a wedding gift: the young slave she grew up with, Sarah. Sarah is also Allen’s daughter and Clarissa’s sister, a product of his longtime relationship with his house slave, Emmeline. When Clarissa’s husband suspects that their newborn son is illegitimate, Clarissa and Sarah are sent back to her parents, Cornelius and Theodora, in shame, setting in motion a series of events that will destroy this once-powerful family.
Samantha Kingston has it all: the world's most crush-worthy boyfriend, three amazing best friends, and first pick of everything at Thomas Jefferson High—from the best table in the cafeteria to the choicest parking spot. Friday, February 12, should be just another day in her charmed life. Instead, it turns out to be her last. Then she gets a second chance. Seven chances, in fact.
Mark Childress has written one exceptional novel (Tender) and several good reads of varying quality. One Mississippi works well for me as a great listen, an almost ideal audiobook if you find appealing an easy-to-absorb, engaging, sometimes comic, sometimes tragic, often over-the-top coming of age story. It features a cast of lively characters, some rendered with depth and striking originality, and all aided by a narrator whose diverse voices become more winning and convincing as the story unfolds.
The story has some unusual and original conceits and flourishes, but overall I enjoyed the entertainment too much to question the unevenness and improbabilities that may bother other listeners. The climatic scene, I'm sure, will be rightly criticized as derivative, out of place in a story set in early 1970s Mississippi, unbelievable and maybe a cheap shot. I still did not want the story to end, and loved the parting image of a sky blue Pinto rocketing down the highway into the Mississippi night.
11 of 12 people found this review helpful
I purchased this because of the reviews, but I thought it dragged on and on. I finished it, but kept checking my iPod to see how much more time was left. I'm really surprised by all the great reviews. It was just an average story in which the author took way too much time discussing characters and their issues - all of which meant nothing in the end.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful
This book was one of the best books I have had the pleasure of listening to in a while. The narrator did an excellent job of the southern accent. There is nothing worse than a botched southern accent in an audiobook. It is easy to listen to and hard to turn off. I was sad when it was over. Like I lost a friend... :)
7 of 8 people found this review helpful
This book was quite interesting as I don't usually read books written for teens. Jeff Woodman is my favorite narrator and I find any book that he narrates wonderful. Once again he brought me into the story by making me able to visualize each character and watch their part of the book unfold
4 of 5 people found this review helpful
This was a good audible-- the narrator was wonderful. Started out very light and brought back memories as the era of the book was the same as my high school years. Well done characters. The end was not what I was expecting and the themes were different from what I expected but the book was very well done.
5 of 7 people found this review helpful
One Mississippi is for sure one of funniest books of all time, period. It is a fast moving book and very easy to listen to. The narrator Jeff Woodman really does a great job impersonating all the different characters of the story. I really felt in love with the drama of the principal character, Daniel Musgrove and had to keep listen to it many times after the first run because this is one of those books that we wish will never end. This is the ultimate teen tragic comedy of the seventies. Really worth listening at this one. As for me all I can say is that I can`t stop listen to it over and over.
5 of 8 people found this review helpful
I think I've found another favorite narrator. The narrator's voice makes this book go from really good to great!
The plot summary given can't really express what the book is about - there are too many twists and turns to fully describe it. I found myself surprised by some of the happenings and was pleased at not being able to predict the outcome.
3 of 5 people found this review helpful
"One Mississippi" is a very, very good story that's masterfully enacted by Jeff Woodman (my newest favorite narrator). I'm just warning prospective listeners that it's a story for adults, not "kids," though that's the way it's "introduced" at the beginning and ending of both parts 1 and 2. Here's what I mean ..... Imagine every life situation about which parents may wish to instruct their "kids" after they're, say, 15-16 years old--and it's in this book, including among others a step-by-step description of a 17-year-old losing his virginity. Then imagine a story in which characters you've come to care about are killed violently. Adults can appreciate the over-arching morals of the story cleverly told, but kids might be psychologically traumatized by the details. Anyway, I'm an adult and I enjoyed it very much.
4 of 7 people found this review helpful
The first 30 minutes I didn’t know if I could handle the accents, they were put on a bit thick. But then it settled in and then they weren’t so over the top. I was a Mississippi native so the accents used are very true to that region of the south and it did sound like ‘home’ .
The story was very good and included a lot of the way things were in that time in he South. It is told from the perspective of a ‘Yankee’ high schooler whose family is transferred to the area for the dads job. There is all the usual high school drama with bullies pressures of friends, and the like while also really developing all the little nuances of high school life with first love, jealousies, and even just the small details of where they are living that make you feel really connected to the whole story. Underneath is a real coming of age story building up to the heart wrenching conclusion. It is an excellent story that was extremely well executed by the narrator.
I thought I was reading something a little more YA. Definitely not 😳. If I'd known more about the subject matter, I never would have listened to this book. However, it was so intriguing once I was far enough in, that I had to finish it. Very well written and the narration was maybe the best yet!
Race is a dominant theme in this story but it is secondary to the theme of friendship and in the end love. it's difficult to say anything more without giving too much away. I found the by then inevitable denouement quite upsetting, but was glad to have read it and am glad to recommend it and this good performance.