Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You
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Narrated by:
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Lincoln Hoppe
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By:
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Peter Cameron
About this listen
James Sveck, 18-year-old New Yorker, charming, precocious, confused, doesn't quite fit in (doesn't really want to)....
If his future (i.e., college) seems completely meaningless, not to mention terrifying....
Then: he'll start anew (move to the Midwest?).
James Sveck is misunderstood by a capricious mother, a self-absorbed father, a mordant older sister, his Teutonic therapist, his D-list celebrity grandmother, his unnervingly attractive art gallery colleague....
If: What one wants is enigmatic....
Then: Life can be hell.
But: as the summer gets hotter, James comes to recognize the wrenching truth of his emotions.
James' archly comic bravado fuels this sharply observed novel of a teen adrift in an adult world, struggling to make sense of the problems of love and of lack. The engaging voice of our idiosyncratic antihero is deftly captured by the adroit prose of Peter Cameron. Often hilarious, deeply compassionate, smart, and lyrical, Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You is every bit as sui generis as James Sveck himself.
©2008 Peter Cameron (P)2008 Listening LibraryListeners also enjoyed...
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Sensational stories! Brilliant new author.
- By MidwestGeek on 05-04-14
By: Molly Antopol
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God-Shaped Hole
- A Novel
- By: Tiffanie DeBartolo
- Narrated by: Rachael Warren
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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When Beatrice Trixie Jordan replies to a personal ad, she meets Jacob Grace, a charming, effervescent 30-something free-spirit writer passionately seeking life. He possesses his own turns of phrase and ways of thinking and feeling that dissonantly harmonize with Trixie's off-center vision. As they rollercoaster through the joys and furies of their wrenching romance, they try to come to terms with the hurt brought about by both of their distant fathers who, in different ways, forsook them.
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To see a fortune teller or not to see one...
- By Renee on 08-08-18
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Bright Lights, Big City
- By: Jay McInerney
- Narrated by: Daniel Passer
- Length: 5 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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The tragicomedy of a young man in New York City, a writer, never named, who works as a fact-checker for a prestigious magazine. He struggles with the reality of his mother's death, alienation, and the seductive pull of drugs and a vibrant nightlife.
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Curiously, mundanely real
- By Amber on 01-07-12
By: Jay McInerney
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Tapestry of Fortunes
- By: Elizabeth Berg
- Narrated by: Barbara Caruso
- Length: 7 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Cecilia Ross is looking for a change. She has decided to take time off from her job as a successful motivational speaker and sell her home. She moves in to a beautiful old house in St. Paul, Minnesota, complete with a big front porch, a wild garden, a chef's kitchen - and three roommates. The four women are different ages, but all are feeling restless, and want to take a roadtrip to find the people and things they miss.
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Mellow story
- By Amazon Customer on 04-24-17
By: Elizabeth Berg
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Never Change
- By: Elizabeth Berg
- Narrated by: Elizabeth Berg
- Length: 7 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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A self-anointed spinster at 51, Myra Lipinski is reasonably content with her quiet life, her dog, Frank, and her career as a visiting nurse. But everything changes when Chip Reardon, the golden boy she adored in high school, is assigned as her new patient. Choosing to forgo treatment for an incurable illness, Chip has returned to his New England hometown to spend what time he has left. Now, Myra and Chip find themselves engaged in a poignant redefinition of roles, and a complicated dance of memory, ambivalence, and longing.
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sweet story and lovely writing
- By LVG on 07-21-22
By: Elizabeth Berg
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The Good Friday Murder
- A Christine Bennett Mystery, Book 1
- By: Lee Harris
- Narrated by: Dee Macaluso
- Length: 6 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Christine Bennett has left the cloistered world of nuns for the profane world of New York State, where murder and madness are often linked. At a town meeting, Christine volunteers to investigate a 40-year-old murder case long since closed. Now she'll move heaven and earth to exonerate a pair of retarded savant twins, now senior citizens, of their mother's murder on Good Friday in 1950.
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Polite procedural cozy
- By connie on 12-29-12
By: Lee Harris
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To See the Moon Again
- By: Jamie Langston Turner
- Narrated by: Eva Kaminsky
- Length: 13 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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The first step to letting go of the past is forgiving it …Every day of her life Julia Rich lives with the memory of a horrible accident she caused long ago. In the years since, she has tried to hide her guilt in the quiet routine of teaching at a small South Carolina college, avoiding close relationships with family and would-be friends. But one day a phone call from Carmen, a niece she has never met, disrupts her carefully controlled world.
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Beautiful Story of Forgiveness and Selfless Love
- By sharon on 09-20-14
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An Available Man
- A Novel
- By: Hilma Wolitzer
- Narrated by: Fred Sullivan
- Length: 7 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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When Edward Schuyler - a modest and bookish 62-year-old science teacher - is widowed, he finds himself ambushed by female attention. There are plenty of unattached women around, but a healthy, handsome, available man is a rare and desirable creature. Edward receives phone calls from widows seeking love, or at least lunch, while well-meaning friends try to set him up at dinner parties. The problem is that Edward doesn’t feel available. He’s still mourning his beloved wife, Bee, and prefers solitude and the familiar routine of work, gardening, and bird-watching.
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Lovely book, easy read, wonderful characters
- By Molly-o on 02-17-12
By: Hilma Wolitzer
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The Wife
- A Novel
- By: Meg Wolitzer
- Narrated by: Dawn Harvey
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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The moment Joan Castleman decides to leave her husband, they are 35,000 feet above the ocean on a flight to Helsinki. Joan's husband, Joseph, is one of America's preeminent novelists, about to receive a prestigious international award, and Joan, who has spent 40 years subjugating her own literary talents to fan the flames of his career, has finally decided to stop.
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A bit of a downer
- By Jody Cox on 08-01-18
By: Meg Wolitzer
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If It's Not One Thing, It's Your Mother
- By: Julia Sweeney
- Narrated by: Julia Sweeney
- Length: 6 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Since her time on Saturday Night Live, where she created the infamous androgynous character "Pat", Julia Sweeney has gone on to establish herself as a witty, captivating performer of one-woman shows, like God Said Ha!, In the Family Way, and Letting Go of God. She gave a TED talk sharing how she explained the birds and the bees to her eight-year-old daughter, Mulan, which ignited an incredible response. Now, when it comes to talking about motherhood, people want to hear what Julia has to say.
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I Love Julia Sweeney
- By Lisa on 04-05-13
By: Julia Sweeney
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Mother Daughter Me
- A Memoir
- By: Katie Hafner
- Narrated by: Katie Hafner
- Length: 9 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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The complex, deeply binding relationship between mothers and daughters is brought vividly to life in Katie Hafner's remarkable memoir, an exploration of the year she and her mother, Helen, spent working through, and triumphing over, a lifetime of unresolved emotions. Dreaming of a "year in Provence" with her mother, Katie urges Helen to move to San Francisco to live with her and Zoe, Katie's teenage daughter. Katie and Zoe had become a mother-daughter team, strong enough, Katie thought, to absorb the arrival of a 77-year-old woman set in her ways....
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Listen and be swept away!
- By Barbara Quick on 06-02-22
By: Katie Hafner
What listeners say about Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Taco Beans
- 09-22-20
Loved it!!
Superb writing and excellent narration. I enjoyed the characters so much. The story of James's disillusionment and growth was darkly hilarious and hard for me to put down.
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- Jimmy
- 07-09-23
Great read
Really great read and I can see the Salinger comparison in the thoughts of the protagonist.
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- David
- 02-18-11
Melancholy prat blathers for 7 hours
This book is well written and is marked with occasional humor (especially for those of us who've lived in NY), but I couldn't get past the overwhelming desire to strangle the know-it-all, ungrateful punk of a main character. Listening to him drone on about everything he "hates" and the asinine reason behind it made me want to open a vein. Highly frustrating if you can't stand negative teenagers.
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5 people found this helpful
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- ClinD2002
- 01-15-21
Please end it now!!
The most BORING irrelevant story I think I’ve ever heard, the main character is absolutely asinine, and SOOOO full of himself and to be honest, hot air, “let me buy a house and screw college which is paid for and work at McDonald’s’ can you say entitled, vapid useless stuck up little queen, I found nothing redeeming in this story....character is NOT a dark anti hero.....he’s annoying, turned book in for a credit, 4 hours in and absolutely nothing has happened :-P
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2 people found this helpful