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Redhead by the Side of the Road

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Redhead by the Side of the Road

By: Anne Tyler
Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews
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About this listen

Brought to you by Penguin.

From the bestselling author of A Spool of Blue Thread: an offbeat love story about mis-steps, second chances and the elusive art of human connection

Micah Mortimer isn’t the most polished person you’ll ever meet. His numerous sisters and in-laws regard him oddly but very fondly, but he has his ways and means of navigating the world. He measures out his days running errands for work – his TECH HERMIT sign cheerily displayed on the roof of his car – maintaining an impeccable cleaning regime and going for runs (7:15, every morning). He is content with the steady balance of his life.

But then the order of things starts to tilt. His woman friend Cassia (he refuses to call anyone in her late thirties a ‘girlfriend’) tells him she’s facing eviction because of a cat. And when a teenager shows up at Micah’s door claiming to be his son, Micah is confronted with another surprise he seems poorly equipped to handle.

Redhead by the Side of the Road is an intimate look into the heart and mind of a man who sometimes finds those around him just out of reach – and a love story about the differences that make us all unique.

© Anne Tyler 2020 (P) Penguin Audio 2020

 Clean & Wholesome Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Romance Heartfelt

Critic Reviews

Bursting with vitality and variety, it's a tour de force . . . characters almost leap off the page with authenticity, speech and body language wonderfully caught
Tyler’s piercing omniscience is on full, enthralling display
A book this lovely feels practically heaven-sent…. Crisp and direct, yet full of subtle touches, it’s a big-hearted tale of roads not taken — a delight from start to finish
Anne Tyler really is the best. This reads as if she wrote it in one flawless seamless sitting. The sheer brilliance of making it all seem so effortless (Graham Norton)
Almost unbearably poignant . . . a moving and perceptive story about one man’s inability to connect with others and his gradual move towards greater self-fulfilment
Anne Tyler has the ability to take the minutiae of characters’ lives and say wise things about the human condition that other writers can only dream of
Tyler has every gift a great novelist needs: intent observation, empathy and language both direct and surprising. She has unembarrassed goodness as well. In this time of snark, preening, sub-tweeting and the showy torment of characters, we could use more Tyler (Amy Bloom)
As always, Tyler is a magician, able to conjure up, in a handful of sentences, such endlessly complicated things as the comical messiness of family life . . . You finish her novels feeling closer to life, and closer to other people (Craig Brown)
Tyler rarely disappoints, but this is her best novel in some time – slender, unassuming, almost cautious in places, yet so very finely and energetically tuned, so apparently relaxed, almost flippantly so, but actually supremely sophisticated . . . Tyler’s ability to make you care about her characters is amazing, and never more so than here . . . In Micah, she’s created a man to puzzle and worry about, to ache and to root for (Julie Myerson)
Tyler is a writer who compels not through the complexities of plot but by the precision of her observations, her perfect pitch in the music of unremarkable lives (Clare Clark)
All stars
Most relevant
Lovely little stor of self realisation. left my wanting to know more, but that is a strategy in itself

redhead by the side of the road.

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I have previously enjoyed Anne Tyler, and with this book on the longlist for 'The Booker' I thought it would be a winner. Tyler crafted some beautifully quirky and distinct moments, which I loved, but the weave holding them together was a bit flat for me. Overall OK, I don't think I'd listen again.

I wanted to like this more, but it was OK.

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I have always loved anne Tyler’s stories and haven’t read her for a while. What a gentle easy read. No fishy cuffs or gun fights. The protagonist is not a murderer nor a huge personality. He is a gentle loaner who gets it all wrong sad really.

Gentle

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