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Madame Bovary of the Suburbs
By Sophie Divry. 2014
Braille (Contracted), Electronic braille (Contracted), DAISY Audio (CD), DAISY Audio (Direct to Player), DAISY Audio (Zip), DAISY text (Direct to player), DAISY text (Zip), Word (Zip), ePub (Zip)
Family stories, General fiction, Humourous fictionCustoms and cultures
Synthetic audio, Automated braille
The story of a woman's life, from childhood to death, somewhere in provincial France, from the 1950s to just shy…
of 2025. She has doting parents, does well at school, finds a loving husband after one abortive attempt at passion, buys a big house with a moonlit terrace, makes decent money, has children, changes jobs, retires, grows old and dies. All in the comfort that the middle-classes have grown accustomed to. But she's bored. She takes up all sorts of outlets to try to make something happen in her life: adultery, charity work, esotericism, manic house-cleaning, motherhood and various hobbies - each one abandoned faster than the last. But no matter what she does, her life remains unfocussed and unfulfilled. Nothing truly satisfies her, because deep down - just like the town where she lives - the landscape is non-descript, flat, horizontal.Sophie Divry dramatises the philosophical conflict between freedom and comfort that marks women's lives in a materialistic world. Our heroine is an endearing, contemporary Emma Bovary, and Divry's prose will remind readers of the best of Houellebecq, the cold, implacable historian who paints a precise portrait of an era and those who inhabit it and in doing so renders existence indelibly absurd.Translated from the French by Alison AndersonMadame Bovary of the Suburbs
By Sophie Divry. 2014
Braille (Contracted), Electronic braille (Contracted), DAISY Audio (CD), DAISY Audio (Direct to Player), DAISY Audio (Zip), DAISY text (Direct to player), DAISY text (Zip), ePub (Zip)
Family stories, General fiction, Humourous fictionCustoms and cultures
Synthetic audio, Automated braille
The story of a woman's life, from childhood to death, somewhere in provincial France, from the 1950s to just shy…
of 2025. She has doting parents, does well at school, finds a loving husband after one abortive attempt at passion, buys a big house with a moonlit terrace, makes decent money, has children, changes jobs, retires, grows old and dies. All in the comfort that the middle-classes have grown accustomed to. But she's bored. She takes up all sorts of outlets to try to make something happen in her life: adultery, charity work, esotericism, manic house-cleaning, motherhood and various hobbies - each one abandoned faster than the last. But no matter what she does, her life remains unfocussed and unfulfilled. Nothing truly satisfies her, because deep down - just like the town where she lives - the landscape is non-descript, flat, horizontal.Sophie Divry dramatises the philosophical conflict between freedom and comfort that marks women's lives in a materialistic world. Our heroine is an endearing, contemporary Emma Bovary, and Divry's prose will remind readers of the best of Houellebecq, the cold, implacable historian who paints a precise portrait of an era and those who inhabit it and in doing so renders existence indelibly absurd.Translated from the French by Alison AndersonThe Weekend: The international bestseller, shortlisted for the Stella Prize 2020
By Charlotte Wood. 2020
Braille (Contracted), Electronic braille (Contracted), DAISY Audio (CD), DAISY Audio (Direct to Player), DAISY Audio (Zip), DAISY text (Direct to player), DAISY text (Zip), Word (Zip), ePub (Zip)
General fiction, Family stories, Holiday fiction, Serious and literary fiction, Suspense and thrillersFamily and relationships, Death and bereavement, Aging (social issues), Medicine, Health and medicine, Home and garden, Humour, Arts and entertainment, Animals and wildlife, Customs and cultures, General non-fiction, Travel and geography
Synthetic audio, Automated braille
A #1 INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER One of The Times books of the year: 'Ripples with wit, insight and vitality' 'The Weekend…
is so great I am struggling to find the words to do it justice... Wood is an agonisingly gifted writer: I am now going to read all her other books!'Marian Keyes'It was refreshing to encounter a novel that so profoundly sympathises with women on the forbidding cusp of being classified as "elderly". Wood ably conveys that older women didn't used to be old, and that the experience of ageing is universally bewildering'Lionel Shriver (Observer, Books of the year) 'Riveting' Elizabeth Day 'A perfect, funny, insightful, novel about women, friendship, and ageing. I loved it'Nina Stibbe 'Authentic, funny, brutally well-observed... As with the novels of Elizabeth Strout or Anne Tyler, these are characters not written to please, but to feel true'The Sunday Times 'Glorious... Charlotte Wood joins the ranks of writers such as Nora Ephron, Penelope Lively and Elizabeth Strout' Guardian'The Weekend triumphantly brings to life the honest, inner lives of women' Independent'A lovely, lively, intelligent, funny book' Tessa Hadley 'One sharp, funny, heartbreaking and gorgeously-written package. I loved it' Paula Hawkins'One of those deceptively compact novels that continues to open doors in your mind long after the last page' Patrick GaleSylvie, Jude, Wendy and Adele have a lifelong friendship of the best kind: loving, practical, frank and steadfast. But when Sylvie dies, the ground shifts dangerously for the remaining three.These women couldn't be more different: Jude, a once-famous restaurateur with a spotless life and a long-standing affair with a married man; Wendy, an acclaimed feminist intellectual; Adele, a former star of the stage, now practically homeless. Struggling to recall exactly why they've remained close all these years, the grieving women gather for one last weekend at Sylvie's old beach house. But fraying tempers, an elderly dog, unwelcome guests and too much wine collide in a storm that brings long-buried hurts to the surface - a storm that will either remind them of the bond they share, or sweep away their friendship for good.Red at the Bone: Longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2020
By Jacqueline Woodson. 2019
Braille (Contracted), Electronic braille (Contracted), DAISY Audio (CD), DAISY Audio (Direct to Player), DAISY Audio (Zip), DAISY text (Direct to player), DAISY text (Zip), Word (Zip), ePub (Zip)
Multi-cultural fiction, Historical fiction, General fiction, Family stories, LGBTQ+ fiction, Serious and literary fictionGeneral non-fiction, Customs and cultures
Synthetic audio, Automated braille
THE TIMES '100 BEST SUMMER READS'NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BESTSELLERLONGLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE 2020'Sublime' Candice Carty-Williams'An epic in…
miniature' Tayari Jones 'A banger' Ta-Nehisi Coates'Generous and big-hearted' Brit Bennett 'A true spell of a book' Ocean Vuong 'A proclamation' R.O. Kwon'A little masterpiece' Paula Hawkins'I adored this book' Elizabeth MacNeal'Pure poetry' Observer'A sharply focused gem' Sunday Times'Will remind you why you love reading' Stylist'Haunting' Guardian'A wonderful, tragic, inspiring story' Metro'Prose that sings off the page... Gorgeous' Mail on Sunday'A nuanced portrait of shifting family relationships' Financial Times'As seductive as a Prince bop' O, The Oprah Magazine'Razor-sharp' Vanity Fair'Dazzling... With urgent, vital insights into questions of class, gender, race, history, queerness and sex' New York Times An unexpected teenage pregnancy brings together two families from different social classes, and exposes the private hopes, disappointments and longings that can bind or divide us. From the New York Times-bestselling and National Book Award-winning author of Another Brooklyn and Brown Girl Dreaming. Brooklyn, 2001. It is the evening of sixteen-year-old Melody's coming of age ceremony in her grandparents' brownstone. Watched lovingly by her relatives and friends, making her entrance to the music of Prince, she wears a special custom-made dress - the very same dress that was sewn for a different wearer, Melody's mother, for a celebration that ultimately never took place.Unfurling the history of Melody's family - from the 1921 Tulsa race massacre to post 9/11 New York - Red at the Bone explores sexual desire, identity, class, and the life-altering facts of parenthood, as it looks at the ways in which young people must so often make fateful decisions about their lives before they have even begun to figure out who they are and what they want to be. *** ONE OF THE BOOKS OF THE YEAR FOR: New York Times; Washington Post; Time; USA Today; O, The Oprah Magazine; Elle; Good Housekeeping; Esquire; NPR; New York Public Library; Library Journal; Kirkus; BookRiot; She Reads; The Undefeated ***