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The Life of the Mind
- A Novel
- Narrated by: Allyson Ryan
- Length: 7 hrs and 4 mins
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Publisher's summary
One of the Best Books of the Year: Time, NPR, The Atlantic, Electric Lit, Thrillist, LitHub, Kirkus Reviews
A witty, intelligent novel of an American woman on the edge, by a brilliant new voice in fiction - “the glorious love child of Ottessa Moshfegh and Sally Rooney” (Publishers Weekly, starred review)
“[A] jewel of a debut...abundantly satisfying.” (Jia Tolentino, The New Yorker)
As an adjunct professor of English in New York City with little hope of finding a permanent position, Dorothy feels “like a janitor in the temple who continued to sweep because she had nowhere else to be but who had lost her belief in the essential sanctity of the enterprise”. No one but her boyfriend knows that she’s just had a miscarriage - not her mother, her best friend, or her therapists (Dorothy has two of them). She wasn’t even sure she wanted to be a mother. So why does Dorothy feel like a failure?
The Life of the Mind is a book about endings - of youth, of ambition, of possibility, but also of the meaning that an inquiring mind can find in the mess of daily experience. Mordant and remorselessly wise, this jewel of a debut cuts incisively into life as we live it, and how we think of it.
Critic reviews
“One of the wittiest, most deliciously farcical novels I’ve read in a long time.” (Maureen Corrigan, NPR, Fresh Air)
“Smallwood is...a delightfully stylish rambler; a conjurer of a heightened, carefully choreographed version of consciousness. Reading her is like watching an accomplished figure skater doing a freestyle routine.” (John Williams, The New York Times)
“Hilarious, recognizable, and helplessly wise - a perfect foil for its namesake.” (Rivka Galchen, author of Little Labors)
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What listeners say about The Life of the Mind
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall1 out of 5 stars
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Performance2 out of 5 stars
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Story1 out of 5 stars
- Antiquarian Photographer
- 03-24-21
False promo on Fresh Air provoked me to waste my money on this book.
Try not to think of those bodily functions or misfunctions that we keep to ourselves; think discusting. Not so much a life of the mind as it is a life of the id. The things that you would say yucky aboyt, then interweave some poorly played sex fantasies or Holden Caulfield adolescent dirty words brought up to date. If this is your cup of tea; go for it! If you’re expecting to dive into the reality of a young hopeful college teacher and the dramas of an English Department politics as promoted; forget it! Even the lackadaisical moderator seemed bored.
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4 people found this helpful
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Overall1 out of 5 stars
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Performance1 out of 5 stars
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Story1 out of 5 stars
- Kate
- 01-19-23
Don’t waste your mind
Perhaps reading would have been better than listening, but I found the narrator cold and unlikeable and her stream of consciousness boring and pretentious.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall1 out of 5 stars
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Performance1 out of 5 stars
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Story1 out of 5 stars
- Chris
- 07-09-23
Gross
Listened to 30 min about toilet activities, secretions, expulsions, what an aborted fetus looks like. Don’t wast your time or money.
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A portrait of the artist as a young woman. A novel about not just discovering but inventing oneself. The year is 1995, and email is new. Selin, the daughter of Turkish immigrants, arrives for her freshman year at Harvard. She signs up for classes in subjects she has never heard of, befriends her charismatic and worldly Serbian classmate, Svetlana, and, almost by accident, begins corresponding with Ivan, an older mathematics student from Hungary.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Fascinating point of view
- By Amazon Customer on 04-21-17
By: Elif Batuman
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Supper Club
- By: Lara Williams
- Narrated by: Stefanie Martini
- Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 34
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 32
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Story3 out of 5 stars 32
Roberta spends her life trying not to take up space. At almost 30, she is adrift and alienated from life. Stuck in a mindless job and reluctant to pursue her passion for food, she suppresses her appetite and recedes to the corners of rooms. But when she meets Stevie, a spirited and effervescent artist, their intense friendship sparks a change in Roberta, a shift in her desire for more.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Left Hungry
- By Rachel on 07-28-23
By: Lara Williams
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The Museum of Other People
- From Colonial Acquisitions to Cosmopolitan Exhibitions
- By: Adam Kuper
- Length: 12 hrs
- Unabridged
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Overall0 out of 5 stars 0
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Performance0 out of 5 stars 0
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Story0 out of 5 stars 0
In this deeply researched, immersive history, Adam Kuper tells the story of how foreign and prehistoric peoples and cultures were represented in Western museums of anthropology. Originally created as colonial enterprises, their halls were populated by displays of plundered art, artifacts, dioramas, bones, and relics.
By: Adam Kuper
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Post-Traumatic
- By: Chantal V. Johnson
- Narrated by: Tiffany Smith
- Length: 8 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 52
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 43
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Story4 out of 5 stars 43
To the outside observer, Vivian is a success story—a dedicated lawyer who advocates for mentally ill patients at a New York City psychiatric hospital. Privately, Vivian contends with the memories and aftereffects of her bad childhood—compounded by the everyday stresses of being a Black Latinx woman in America. She lives in a constant state of hypervigilant awareness that makes even a simple subway ride into a heart-pounding drama.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Not sure why I listened to this story.
- By Ron Plummer on 07-15-22
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Biography of X
- A Novel
- By: Catherine Lacey
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 14 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3 out of 5 stars 28
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Performance3.5 out of 5 stars 19
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Story3 out of 5 stars 19
When X—an iconoclastic artist and shape-shifter—falls dead in her office, her widow CM, wild with grief, hurls herself into writing X's biography. Though X was recognized as a crucial creative force of her era, she kept a tight grip on her life story. In CM's quest to unravel it, she opens a Pandora’s box of secrets and destruction. All the while, she immerses herself in the history of the Southern Territory, a fascist theocracy that split from the rest of the country after World War II, as it is finally, in the present day, forced into an uneasy reunification.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Worst book I’ve ever read
- By Rebecca on 11-09-23
By: Catherine Lacey
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Writers & Lovers
- A Novel
- By: Lily King
- Narrated by: Stacey Glemboski
- Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,922
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,647
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Story4 out of 5 stars 1,639
Blindsided by her mother’s sudden death and wrecked by a recent love affair, Casey Peabody has arrived in Massachusetts in the summer of 1997 without a plan. Her mail consists of wedding invitations and final notices from debt collectors. A former child golf prodigy, she now waits tables in Harvard Square and rents a tiny, moldy room at the side of a garage where she works on the novel she has been writing for six years. At 31, Casey is still clutching onto something nearly all her old friends have let go of: the determination to live a creative life.
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4 out of 5 stars
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An absorbing listen
- By Barbara S on 03-08-20
By: Lily King
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The Idiot
- By: Elif Batuman
- Narrated by: Elif Batuman
- Length: 13 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 644
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Performance3.5 out of 5 stars 570
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Story3.5 out of 5 stars 573
A portrait of the artist as a young woman. A novel about not just discovering but inventing oneself. The year is 1995, and email is new. Selin, the daughter of Turkish immigrants, arrives for her freshman year at Harvard. She signs up for classes in subjects she has never heard of, befriends her charismatic and worldly Serbian classmate, Svetlana, and, almost by accident, begins corresponding with Ivan, an older mathematics student from Hungary.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Fascinating point of view
- By Amazon Customer on 04-21-17
By: Elif Batuman
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Cleopatra and Frankenstein
- By: Coco Mellors
- Narrated by: Kit Griffiths
- Length: 14 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 237
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 203
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Story4 out of 5 stars 202
Twenty-four-year-old British painter Cleo has escaped from England to New York and is still finding her place in the sleepless city when, a few months before her student visa ends, she meets Frank. Twenty years older and a self-made success, Frank’s life is full of all the excesses Cleo’s lacks. He offers her the chance to be happy, the freedom to paint and the opportunity to apply for a green card. But their impulsive marriage irreversibly changes both their lives and the lives of those close to them, in ways they never could’ve predicted.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Refreshing
- By Sadz on 11-22-22
By: Coco Mellors
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Boy Parts
- By: Eliza Clark
- Narrated by: Eliza Clark
- Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 389
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 320
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Story4 out of 5 stars 319
Irina obsessively takes explicit photographs of the average-looking men she persuades to model for her, scouted from the streets of Newcastle. Placed on sabbatical from her dead-end bar job, she is offered an exhibition at a fashionable London gallery, promising to revive her career in the art world and offering an escape from her rut of drugs, alcohol and extreme cinema. The news triggers a self-destructive tailspin, centred around Irina's relationship with her obsessive best friend and a shy young man from her local supermarket who has attracted her attention....
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5 out of 5 stars
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A modern American psycho but British
- By sofia on 09-23-21
By: Eliza Clark
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Lapvona
- A Novel
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 547
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 463
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Story4 out of 5 stars 463
Little Marek, the abused and delusional son of the village shepherd, never knew his mother; his father told him she died in childbirth. One of life’s few consolations for Marek is his enduring bond with the blind village midwife, Ina, who suckled him when he was a baby, as she did so many of the village’s children. Ina’s gifts extend beyond childcare: she possesses a unique ability to communicate with the natural world. Her gift often brings her the transmission of sacred knowledge on levels far beyond those available to other villagers, however religious they might be.
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3 out of 5 stars
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uncomfortable
- By Stetson on 07-04-22
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
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Bad Summer People
- A Novel
- By: Emma Rosenblum
- Narrated by: January LaVoy
- Length: 9 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 260
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 236
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Story4 out of 5 stars 236
Jen Weinstein and Lauren Parker rule the town of Salcombe, Fire Island every summer. They hold sway on the beach and the tennis court, and are adept at manipulating people to get what they want. Their husbands, Sam and Jason, have summered together on the island since childhood, despite lifelong grudges and numerous secrets. Their one single friend, Rachel Woolf, is looking to meet her match, whether he’s the tennis pro. But even with plenty to gossip about, this season starts out as quietly as any other. Until a body is discovered, face down, off the side of the boardwalk.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Not a thriller, not a mystery
- By Anonymous User on 05-25-23
By: Emma Rosenblum
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My Year of Rest and Relaxation
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 7 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 4,364
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 3,807
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Story4 out of 5 stars 3,802
Our narrator should be happy, shouldn't she? She's young, thin, pretty, a recent Columbia graduate; she works an easy job at a hip art gallery and lives in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan paid for, like the rest of her needs, by her inheritance. But there is a dark and vacuous hole in her heart, and it isn't just the loss of her parents, or the way her Wall Street boyfriend treats her, or her sadomasochistic relationship with her best friend, Reva. It's the year 2000 in a city aglitter with wealth and possibility; what could be so terribly wrong?
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5 out of 5 stars
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I love it...
- By Claudia Gallegos on 07-12-18
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
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Big Swiss
- A Novel
- By: Jen Beagin
- Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman, Carlotta Brentan, Stephen Graybill, and others
- Length: 11 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 219
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 189
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Story4 out of 5 stars 189
Greta lives with her friend Sabine in an ancient Dutch farmhouse in Hudson, New York. The house is unrenovated, uninsulated, and full of bees. Greta spends her days transcribing therapy sessions for a sex coach who calls himself Om. She becomes infatuated with his newest client, a repressed married woman she affectionately refers to as Big Swiss.
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5 out of 5 stars
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12/10
- By Leah Fesi on 04-23-23
By: Jen Beagin
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Pages for You
- The Pages for You Series, Book 1
- By: Sylvia Brownrigg
- Narrated by: Abby Craden
- Length: 6 hrs
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 49
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 45
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 45
In a steam-filled diner in a college town, Flannery Jansen catches sight of something more beautiful than she's ever seen: a graduate student, reading. The 17-year-old, new to everything around her - college, the East Coast, bodies of literature, and the sexual flurries of student life - is shocked by her desire to follow this wherever it will take her.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A gorgeous listen
- By MissLynn on 03-09-20
By: Sylvia Brownrigg
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Bad Habits
- By: Amy Gentry
- Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman
- Length: 10 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 113
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 105
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Story4 out of 5 stars 106
Claire "Mac" Woods—a professor enjoying her newfound hotshot status at an academic conference—finally has the acceptance and admiration she has long craved. But at the conference's hotel bar, Mac is surprised to run into a face from a past she'd rather forget: the moneyed, effortlessly perfect Gwendolyn Whitney, Mac's foil, rival, and former best friend.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Outstanding!
- By SLuzaz on 02-15-21
By: Amy Gentry
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My Body
- By: Emily Ratajkowski
- Narrated by: Emily Ratajkowski
- Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,270
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,083
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,078
Emily Ratajkowski is an acclaimed model and actress, an engaged political progressive, a formidable entrepreneur, a global social media phenomenon, and now, a writer. Rocketing to world fame at age 21, Ratajkowski sparked both praise and furor with the provocative display of her body as an unapologetic statement of feminist empowerment. The subsequent evolution in her thinking about our culture’s commodification of women is the subject of this book.
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1 out of 5 stars
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so vain..
- By Emily Valdez on 01-10-22
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10:04
- By: Ben Lerner
- Narrated by: Eric Michael Summerer
- Length: 7 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 213
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 182
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Story4 out of 5 stars 181
In the last year, the narrator of 10:04 has enjoyed unexpected literary success, has been diagnosed with a potentially fatal heart condition, and has been asked by his best friend to help her conceive a child, despite his dating a rising star in the visual arts. In a New York of increasingly frequent super storms and political unrest, he must reckon with his biological mortality, the possibility of a literary afterlife, and the prospect of (unconventional) fatherhood in a city that might soon be under water.
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3 out of 5 stars
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A novel worth reading
- By Bradley Paul Valentine on 01-29-15
By: Ben Lerner
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With or Without You
- By: Caroline Leavitt
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 9 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 57
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 51
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Story4 out of 5 stars 51
After almost 20 years together, Stella and Simon are starting to run into problems. An up-and-coming rock musician when they first met, Simon has been clinging to dreams of fame even as the possibility of it has grown dimmer, and now that his band might finally be on the brink again, he wants to go on the road, leaving Stella behind.
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4 out of 5 stars
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not my cup of tea
- By Grekis on 12-23-20
By: Caroline Leavitt
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Before You Knew My Name
- A Novel
- By: Jacqueline Bublitz
- Narrated by: Penelope Rawlins
- Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 61
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 57
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Story4 out of 5 stars 56
When she arrived in New York on her 18th birthday carrying nothing but $600 cash and a stolen camera, Alice Lee was looking for a fresh start. Now, just one month later, she is the city’s latest Jane Doe. She may be dead, but that doesn’t mean her story is over. Meanwhile, Ruby Jones is also trying to reinvent herself. After travelling halfway around the world, she’s lonelier than ever in the Big Apple. Until she stumbles upon a woman’s body by the Hudson River and suddenly finds herself unbreakably tied to the unknown dead woman.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Excellent
- By cristina on 11-11-22
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Pages for You
- The Pages for You Series, Book 1
- By: Sylvia Brownrigg
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