She's Come Undone

De: Wally Lamb

Narrado por: Linda Stephens

"Mine is a story of craving: an unreliable account of lusts and troubles that began, somehow, in 1956 on the day our free television was delivered...."

Meet Dolores Price. She's 13, wise-mouthed but wounded, having bid her childhood goodbye. Beached like a whale in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips, and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies. When she finally rolls into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this time she's determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before really going belly-up.

In this extraordinary coming-of-age odyssey, Wally Lamb invites us to hitch a wild ride on a journey of love, pain, renewal with the most heartbreakingly comical heroine to come along in years. At once a fragile girl and a hard-edged cynic, so tough to love yet so inimitably lovable, Dolores is as poignantly real as our own imperfections. She's Come Undone includes a promise: you will never forget Dolores Price.

©2011 Wally Lamb (P)2011 Simon & Schuster

Reseñas de la Crítica

"A heroine to cheer for....This supremely touching journey to adulthood may remind you of The World According to Garp and other sagas of emotional liberation." ( Glamour)

"There are at least two surprises in store for readers of Lamb's memorable debut novel. One is the author's sex. This male writes so convincingly in the voice of a female, tracing her life from 4 to 40, that you have to keep looking back at the jacket picture just to make sure. The second surprise is how such a string of trials and tribulations can add up to such a touchingly funny book..." ( People)

"An ambitious, often stirring and hilarious book." ( The New York Times)

Well Done

Nearly 200 titles into my audiobook habit, I'm still trying to figure out what makes for a good listen vs. a traditional read, especially within my favorite genres. I've grown somewhat wary of audio editions of literary novels -- they are almost always character-driven and light on plot, and therefore difficult in some cases to follow in audio. But it's still my favorite style of fiction, so I keep trying.

At first, She's Come Undone was on track to disappoint me in that very way. The first few hours are pure character development, no forward momentum in the narrative at all. I could not imagine getting through another 15+ hours of that, could not imagine what could possibly fill another 15+ hours, short of tedium and repetition.

But there is one quality an audiobook may possess that you cannot get in print -- an actual voice reciting the inner monologue of your protagonist. If that voice is first person and at least sometimes comic (as is the case here on both counts), a narrator that captures that voice can make the listening experience far more effective than the voice inside your head when you read in print.

That's the case here, for me at least -- look at the other reviews and you will see contrary opinions on the effectiveness of Linda Stephens as narrator. Add in the decidedly mixed reviews on Goodreads provided by (presumably) a large percentage of print readers, and She's Come Undone is clearly a love-it or hate-it kind of book. There is little middle ground.

I come in on the love-it (or more accurately the like it well enough) side, and that is primarily because of Linda Stephens's narration. In addition, Dolores, battling her weight issues, depression, family dysfunction, bullying, bad relationships, and some serious tragedy, is similar in many ways to someone very close to me, so I found the story highly relatable. Some of the events and symbolism (the whale) are indeed as heavy handed as the harsher critics claim, but for me, no showstoppers there, just a four-star listen rather than five-star.

Narrator was occasionally distracting

Narrator had a distracting quality to her voice, especially when she sang or did impressions of other characters in the book. The book overall was pretty good, although I did not enjoy it as much as other Wally lamb books I have read.

Loved it

I love this book and the app I recommend anyone to read!! Thank you Audible

Weird sub stories

Good narration but the story took weird uncomfortable at times twists. I doubt I'll go back and listen again

She's Come Undone

loved it couldn't stop listening even went to bed with it and the narrator was excellant.

Something About This Book...

The good parts first: I love how uncomfortable Lamb makes the reader in the first section of the book, when Dolores is growing up. Even though we can see that she's had an extremely unfortunate childhood and we can clearly see how her upbringing has affected her negatively, it's still hard to muster up enough empathy to actually like her. To do so would be a charity and for some (like me), doing the "charitable thing" makes my teeth clench in rage. Did I feel like a meanie for not liking her? Sure. But well done to Wally Lamb for bringing that out in me!

Second, the dialogue is so real, so squirmingly accurate that I'd be listening and just want to bury my head in shame because I just couldn't believe a character actually used such a phrase. Perhaps because I'm from the same class of people in the same area of the country, I don't know, but I found the dialogue of Dolores, her family and grandmother deliciously uncomfortable!

Now for the not-so-good parts. After Dolores becomes an adult, things kind of take a turn for the annoying. Dante is portrayed as this utter a** and Dolores suddenly this sweet, fragile, hard working victim, but I think "Come on Wally, why are you being so black and white like this? You're capable of better!" We're now supposed to stick up for the female, oh no, nothing is her fault, HE'S the jerk, end of.

As for the narrator - I adored Linda Stephens in Gone With the Wind and thought no one could have done a better job in bringing a story and characters to life. Unfortunately I went from GWTW straight into She's Come Undone without realizing the narrator was the same. Ms Stephens is a wonderful reader...just not for this particular book. It was just weird hearing her voice.

All in all, I really enjoyed this book.

Drags a bit...

I really enjoyed the first half of this book- interesting to see how events can turn a girls life upside down. What I felt was the climax of the story, I feel should have been the end, or at least close to it. Not everything needs its happy ending.

love it

If you could sum up She's Come Undone in three words, what would they be?

Wally Lamb is masterful, Great language, insight , humor and story.

Have you listened to any of Linda Stephens’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

no i haven't

If you could take any character from She's Come Undone out to dinner, who would it be and why?

all of them

Any additional comments?

terrific book

No one can write about dysfunction better than Wally

This book made Wally lamb my favorite author. He can see right into the heart of a square peg in a round peg world.
He understands what it feels like to be a girl that just doesn't fit in. He gets the daily loathing, anger, loss, fear, loneliness, blame and ultimately hope that a girl feels when life has not been "fair".
He knows the scars of the discarded, and their attempts to hide them... what it feels like to not be "normal" in a societal view.
Delores, Wally's protagonist, wins in her own way; Maybe not the way she deserved, but she learns how to love who she is in spite of her life's circumstances.
Thank you Wally, I learned a lot about myself through Delores.
The only thing I would change would be the narrator.

A Captivating book

This is one of my favorite books of all time so it made me a little batty that the narrator routinely mispronounced Vita Marie and some other things. Otherwise I enjoyed the story as I always did.