Bridge

A Novel of Suspense

By: Lauren Beukes

Narrated by: Lisa Cordileone

In this reality-bending thriller from the author of The Shining Girls, a grieving daughter’s search for her mother becomes a journey across alternate realities.

It was a game they played; the other worlds, the other lives. It was part of her mom’s grand delusions. It wasn’t real. Unless it was…

Bridget Kittinger has always been paralyzed by choices. It has a lot to do with growing up in the long shadow of her mother, Jo, a troubled neuroscientist. Jo’s obsession with one mythical object, the “dreamworm”—which she believed enabled travel to other worlds—led to their estrangement.

Now, suddenly, Jo is dead. And in packing up her home, Bridge finds a strange device buried deep in Jo’s freezer: the dreamworm. Against all odds, it actually can open the door—to all other realities, and to all other versions of herself, too. Could Bridge find who she should be in this world, by visiting the others? And could her Jo still be alive somewhere? But there’s a sinister cost to trading places, and others hunting the dreamworm who would kill to get their hands on it . . .

Across a thousand possible lives, from Portland to Haiti, from Argentina to the alligator-infested riverways of North Carolina, Bridge takes listeners on a highly original thrill ride, pushing the boundaries of what we know about mothers and daughters, hunters and seekers, and who we each choose to be.

©2023 Lauren Beukes (P)2023 Little, Brown & Company

Critic reviews

"Lauren Beukes takes a story filled with psychedelic drugs, parallel worlds, and neuroscience and makes it also about a complex mother-daughter relationship, full of darkness, light, and longing. This is fun and insane and very moving."—Mariana Enriquez, author of Our Share of Night

"Bridge spiders out into alternate universes, alternate selves, yet manages to be very much about us and our fractured now. It's a humane, thought-provoking puzzle box, and a wildly entertaining novel."—Paul Tremblay, bestselling author of The Cabin at the End of the World and The Pallbearers Club

“What if our dreams are twisted-up memories? What if the Mandela Effect isn’t an effect at all? Somewhere between The Lathe of Heaven and Everything Everywhere All at Once is Lauren Beukes' Bridge: it’s not just reality that’s multifold, it’s identity. Bridge challenges our sense of reality, chips away at our conception of the self, and shoves us down a slide of our own paranoia. But, it’s Lauren Beukes—this is what she does, isn’t it?”—Stephen Graham Jones, New York Times bestselling author of The Only Good Indians

A new twist on the multiverse

At times this listen seemed like a mashup of Everything Everywhere All at Once, Spiderman No Way Home, Dr Sleep and maybe others, which is not a bad company at all. It's definitely entertaining and an interesting take on the multiverse and its many ramifications. If you're into that topic it will certainly be worthwhile.

Fast Paced Mystery Through the Multiverse

I really liked the characters and their arcs throughout the story. Even the villains were fun to listen to.

Totally different than expected.

Loved the narrator. Her voices were spot on. She even nailed the Spanish. I will look up her books from now on.

Not So Bad

Creative: Well performed:

I would have gotten more out of it if I had read it. My fault.