The Beguiling

By: Zsuzsi Gartner

Narrated by: Amanda Cordner

Length: 7 hrs and 38 mins

Publisher's summary

An electrifying debut from the Giller Prize-shortlisted author of Better Living Through Plastic Explosives that takes listeners for a wild ride with urban-Gothic flair and delectably wicked humor.

Lucy is a lapsed Catholic whose adolescent pretentions to sainthood are unexpectedly revived.

It all starts when her cousin Zoltan, in hospital following a bizarre incident at a party, offers her a disturbing deathbed confession. Lucy's grief takes an unusual turn: Zoltan's death appears to have turned her into a magnet for the unshriven. Lucy is transformed into a self-described "flesh-and-blood Wailing Wall" as strangers unburden themselves to her. She becomes addicted to the dark stories and finds herself jonesing for hit after hit.

As the confessions pile up, Lucy begins to wonder if Zoltan's death was as random and unscripted as it appeared. She clutches at alarming synchronicities, seeks meaning in the stories of strangers. Why do the stories seem connected to each other or eerily echo elements of her life? Could it be because Lucy has her own transgressions to acknowledge? And then there is that stubbornly resurfacing past, like a tell-tale ribbon of hair snagged on a fish hook.

With ruthless wit and dizzying energy, The Beguiling explores blessings and curses, sainthood and sin, mortality and guilt in all its guises. Weaving together tales of errant mothers, vengeful plants, canine wisdom, and murder, it lays bare the flesh and blood sacrifices people are willing to make to get what they think they desire.

©2020 Zsuzsi Gartner (P)2020 Penguin Random House Canada

Critic reviews

Finalist for the 2020 Writers' Trust Fiction Prize

A Globe and Mail Best Book of 2020

One of CBC’s Best Canadian Fiction of 2020

“A symphony of a novel - multi-voiced and kaleidoscopic. Gartner’s latest is a funny and darkly dazzling meditation on storytelling, the power of confession and its profound relationship to freedom, love and grief.” (Mona Awad, author of Bunny and 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl)

“Every sentence in Zsuzsi Gartner’s debut novel The Beguiling is a masterclass in the art of fiction.... It’s a series of bravura literary acts, and one could be impressed solely by the stylistic and structural elements. The Beguiling is a sucker punch of a book.... You have to experience it: it’s apt to be one of the finest books you read this year.” (Toronto Star)

“The writing is exquisite, with sentences that pack punches and are thick with references.... This is a story told nowhere near straight. It twists, it twirls, it arcs, it changes tack. It keeps you on your toes.” (The Globe and Mail)

I am so sorry for this, ladies

I recommended this book for this month’s book club and now I regret it! The book was very difficult to get through and very difficult to follow. Very strange. The voice actor gave a very good performance of very strange text. I applaud her for the work that she put into it.