These Are Not the Words
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These Are Not the Words
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Narrated by:
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Amanda West Lewis
About this listen
New York City in the 1960s is the humming backdrop for this poignant, gritty story about a girl who sees her parents as flawed human beings for the first time, and finds the courage to make a fresh start.
Missy’s mother has gone back to school to pursue her dream of becoming an artist. Missy’s father works in advertising and takes Missy on secret midnight excursions to Harlem and the Village so she can share his love of jazz. The two write poems for each other—poems that gradually become an exchange of apologies as Missy’s father’s alcohol and drug addiction begins to take over their lives.
When Missy’s mother finally decides that she and her daughter must make a fresh start, Missy has to leave her old apartment, her school, her best friend and her cats and become a latchkey kid while her mother gets a job. But she won’t give up on trying to save her family, even though this will involve a hard journey from innocence to action, and finally acceptance.
Based on the events and people of her own childhood, Amanda Lewis’s gorgeous novel is driven by Missy’s irresistible, optimistic voice, buoyed by the undercurrents of poetry and music.
Key Features
poems
dialogue
literary references
epigraph
vignettes
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-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 7,845
The Bell Jar chronicles the crack-up of Esther Greenwood: brilliant, beautiful, enormously talented, and successful but slowly going under - maybe for the last time. Sylvia Plath masterfully draws the reader into Esther's breakdown with such intensity that Esther's insanity becomes completely real and even rational, as probable and accessible an experience as going to the movies. Such deep penetration into the dark and harrowing corners of the psyche is an extraordinary accomplishment and has made The Bell Jar a haunting American classic.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A must-read for every woman
- By Julie W. Capell on 05-06-16
By: Sylvia Plath
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Trading Dreams at Midnight
- By: Diane McKinney-Whetstone
- Narrated by: Shari Peele
- Length: 10 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 37
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 26
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 25
Diane McKinney-Whetstone, the award-winning and best-selling author of Tumbling, presents Trading Dreams at Midnight - - an Essence Book Club Recommended Read. Back in 1984, 15-year-old Neena's mother left and never came back. And now Neena is following in her footsteps.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Hard to follow
- By Nevada on 08-13-10
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Black & White
- By: Dani Shapiro
- Narrated by: Marguerite Gavin
- Length: 8 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 59
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 41
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 40
Clara Brodeur has spent her entire adult life pulling herself away from her famous mother, the renowned and controversial photographer Ruth Dunne, whose towering reputation rests on the unsettling nude portraits she took of her young daughter from the ages of three to 14. As Clara charts a path connecting her childhood with her adult life, Shapiro's novel weaves together past and present in images as stark and intense as the photographs that tore the Dunnes apart.
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3 out of 5 stars
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It was okay
- By Lucy7 on 02-13-19
By: Dani Shapiro
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Darling Days
- A Memoir
- By: iO Tillett Wright
- Narrated by: iO Tillett Wright
- Length: 10 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 409
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 377
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Story5 out of 5 stars 373
Born into the beautiful bedlam of downtown New York in the eighties, iO Tillett Wright came of age at the intersection of punk, poverty, heroin, and art. This was a world of self-invented characters, glamorous superstars, and strung-out sufferers, ground zero of drag and performance art. Still, no personality was more vibrant and formidable than iO's mother's. Rhonna, a showgirl and young widow, was a mercurial, erratic glamazon. She was iO's fiercest defender and only authority in a world with few boundaries and even fewer indicators of normal life.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Can’t wait for more from this Author!
- By Team Hobson on 07-24-19
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The Green Glass Sea
- By: Ellen Klages
- Narrated by: Julie Dretzin
- Length: 7 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 141
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 114
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 117
This first novel from Nebula Award-winning short story writer Ellen Klages was picked as a Junior Library Guild selection and named a Book Sense Number-One Children's Pick. It follows a young girl named Dewey, whose father is part of a super-secret project in 1943 Los Alamos. Dewey, a gifted scientist herself, slowly realizes the implications of "the gadget" her father is working on. She and Suze, another Los Alamos child, find comfort in each other's friendship.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Wonderful!
- By Rita on 12-08-08
By: Ellen Klages
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The Center of Everything
- By: Laura Moriarty
- Narrated by: Julie Dretzin
- Length: 13 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 118
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 103
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Story4 out of 5 stars 101
The Center of Everything is the fictional story of 10-year-old math prodigy Evelyn Bucknow. Living in Kansas with her single mother and deeply religious grandmother, Evelyn believes she is destined to marry Travis, the boy next door. But as she grows up, she experiences the heartbreak of a love not meant to be. Author Laura Moriarty was a recipient of the George Bennet Fellowship for Creative Writing at Phillips Exeter Academy.
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1 out of 5 stars
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not religious fiction
- By Theresa Jameson on 04-28-14
By: Laura Moriarty
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The Lost Family
- A Novel
- By: Jenna Blum
- Narrated by: Will Damron
- Length: 14 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 102
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 94
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Story4 out of 5 stars 93
In 1965 Manhattan, patrons flock to Masha’s to savor its brisket bourguignon and impeccable service and to admire its dashing owner and head chef Peter Rashkin, the most eligible bachelor in town. But Peter does not care for the parade of eligible women who come to the restaurant hoping to catch his eye. Running Masha’s consumes him, as does his terrible guilt over surviving the horrors of the Nazi death camp while his wife, Masha - the restaurant’s namesake - and two young daughters perished. Then exquisitely beautiful June Bouquet, an up-and-coming young model, appears at the restaurant, piercing Peter’s guard.
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5 out of 5 stars
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STIMULATES THE HEART, MIND AND IMAGINATION
- By Miss Manners on 07-01-18
By: Jenna Blum
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The Mad Scientist's Daughter
- By: Cassandra Rose Clarke
- Narrated by: Kate Rudd
- Length: 12 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 109
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 88
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Story4 out of 5 stars 87
Finn looks and acts human, though he has no desire to be. He was programmed to assist his owners, and performs his duties to perfection. A billion-dollar construct, his primary task now is to tutor Cat. As she grows into a beautiful young woman, Finn is her guardian, her constant companion…and more. But when the government grants rights to the ever-increasing robot population, however, Finn struggles to find his place in the world, and in Cat’s heart.
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5 out of 5 stars
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An Exquisite Tale of Transforming Love
- By JTF on 04-18-14
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Her Body and Other Parties
- Stories
- By: Carmen Maria Machado
- Narrated by: Amy Landon
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 633
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 544
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Story3.5 out of 5 stars 551
In Her Body and Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado blithely demolishes the arbitrary borders between psychological realism and science fiction, comedy and horror, fantasy and fabulism. While her work has earned her comparisons to Karen Russell and Kelly Link, she has a voice that is all her own. In this electric and provocative debut, Machado bends genre to shape startling narratives that map the realities of women's lives and the violence visited upon their bodies.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Beautiful
- By Anonymous User on 11-17-17
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Future Home of the Living God
- A Novel
- By: Louise Erdrich
- Narrated by: Louise Erdrich
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 863
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 784
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Story4 out of 5 stars 784
The world as we know it is ending. Evolution has reversed itself, affecting every living creature on earth. Science cannot stop the world from running backward, as woman after woman gives birth to infants that appear to be primitive species of humans. Thirty-two-year-old Cedar Hawk Songmaker, adopted daughter of a pair of big-hearted, open-minded Minneapolis liberals, is as disturbed and uncertain as the rest of America around her. But for Cedar, this change is profound and deeply personal. She is four months pregnant.
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3 out of 5 stars
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“Nolite te bastardes carborundorum”
- By Mel on 11-27-17
By: Louise Erdrich
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The Singing Bone
- By: Beth Hahn
- Narrated by: Hillary Huber
- Length: 13 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 77
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 73
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Story4 out of 5 stars 73
Alice and her three closest friends meet the enigmatic Jack Wyck. Enticed by his philosophy and the promise of a constant party, Alice and her friends join Mr. Wyck's small group of devoted followers. Their idyll takes an increasingly sinister turn. Mr. Wyck's grand scheme goes wrong, culminating in a night of horrific murders.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Mixed feelings - you may love it - or not!
- By C. Vincent on 04-19-16
By: Beth Hahn
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On the Blue Comet
- By: Rosemary Wells
- Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 6 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 25
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 22
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 22
Oscar Ogilvie is living with his dad in a house at the end of Lucifer Street, in Cairo, Illinois, when world events change his life forever. The great stock market crash has rippled across the country, and the bank takes over their home - along with all their cherished model trains. Oscar’s dad is forced to head west in search of work, and Oscar must move in with his no-nonsense aunt Carmen. Only a mysterious drifter helps alleviate Oscar’s loneliness.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great story to listen to with your kids!!
- By Aaron on 03-27-23
By: Rosemary Wells
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Homesick for Another World
- Stories
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan, Richard Poe
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 299
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 265
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Story4 out of 5 stars 265
There's something eerily unsettling about Ottessa Moshfegh's stories, something almost dangerous, while also being delightful and even laugh-out-loud funny. Her characters are all unsteady on their feet in one way or another; they all yearn for connection and betterment, though each in very different ways, but they are often tripped up by their own baser impulses and existential insecurities.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Funny, Dynamic Writing
- By Sofia Macht on 06-13-18
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
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The Good Goodbye
- By: Carla Buckley
- Narrated by: Ali Ahn, Suzy Jackson, Eva Kaminsky
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,310
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 2,093
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,087
Two cousins, Rory and Arden, lie unconscious in a hospital burn unit. The fire, which broke out in their shared college dorm room, killed another student, and the police want answers. Tension between Rory and Arden's parents was already at an all-time high before the fire, owing to a recent financial crisis and the decline of the family business. As the parents huddle anxiously in the waiting room, carefully avoiding the subject of their own unraveling relationships, disturbing truths come to light.
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5 out of 5 stars
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I could not stop listening.
- By Amy Davis on 05-29-16
By: Carla Buckley
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Tell the Wolves I’m Home
- A Novel
- By: Carol Rifka Brunt
- Narrated by: Amy Rubinate
- Length: 11 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 2,193
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 1,960
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Story4 out of 5 stars 1,959
1987. There’s only one person who has ever truly understood fourteen-year-old June Elbus, and that’s her uncle, the renowned painter Finn Weiss. Shy at school and distant from her older sister, June can only be herself in Finn’s company; he is her godfather, confidant, and best friend. So when he dies, far too young, of a mysterious illness her mother can barely speak about, June’s world is turned upside down. But Finn’s death brings a surprise acquaintance into June’s life - someone who will help her to heal....
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3 out of 5 stars
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worst protagonist ever
- By Danica on 12-19-14