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Rhubarb

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Rhubarb

By: Craig Silvey
Narrated by: Humphrey Bower
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About this listen

Eleanor is blind and lives with her reclusive mother. Ewan is a cello player with agoraphobia. She is drawn to him through his music but cannot understand the difficulty he faces in forming a friendship. He does not understand her past nor the impact his music has on her. Amidst the heat of a Fremantle summer they stumble towards each other.

Sad, funny and affecting, and peopled with characters that live and breathe, Rhubarb is the first novel from a young writer with an astonishing talent. With his sublime and playful use of language and his uncanny ability to reveal the human condition in all its vulnerability and fragility, Craig Silvey has created an extraordinary contemporary Australian story.

©2004 Craig Silvey (P)2007 Bolinda Publishing Contemporary Contemporary Romance Romance Tear-jerking

Editorial reviews

Through its two reclusive co-protagonists, Rhubarb delivers dueling portraits of solitude: listeners meet Eleanor Rigby (yes - like the Beatles’ song), a blind woman with an overweight guide dog, and Ewan Dempsey, an agoraphobic cello-maker. The lives of the two intertwine in the provincial climes of Fremantle, a wayward town in Western Australia, as Ewan and Eleanor try to help each other overcome the ghosts of their troubled pasts.

In homage to author Craig Silvey’s musical sensibilities, performer Humphrey Bower lends an absolutely singsong quality to this jilted lullaby of loneliness. Indeed, the Aussie actor’s Bob Dylan impression is remarkably convincing. Bower’s pensive pacing and melodious warbling play perfectly with the unusual blend of prose, verse, and stream-of-consciousness flashbacks that inform Silvey’s strikingly unique linguistic stylings.

Critic Reviews

"The novel has the charm of early work such as Gustave Flaubert's Novembre and Jack Kerouac's The Subterranean." (The Australian)
"The playful words and images in this book are a sheer joy. More please." (The Sydney Morning Herald)
"Craig Silvey's poetic debut novel is a first-rate fit for audio, thanks to the deep, shivery voice of Humphrey Bower. Bower becomes blind Eleanor Rigby and agoraphobic cello player Ewan, two people who find each other. In addition, Bower voices all the lonely people in the world the couple inhabits, including Eleanor's mother, a TV addict; Frank, a depressed widower; Bruno, the faux-Italian; and others. The setting of Western Australia and the deep, dense journey into the consciousness of each character provide a sense of place, photographically accurate or dreamscape surreal. The novel is breathy in its staccato-short sentences and florid in its convoluted, lush language. Even its sometimes confusing plot shifts are overcome by Bower, who rides the story like a surfer on a magnificent wave." (AudioFile Magazine)

What listeners say about Rhubarb

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Could not stop listening

Amazing writer this the three book I’ve listened too and haven’t been disappointed and amazing performance by Humphrey Bower top job with the voices made the audio even more enjoyable will definitely listen to this again

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Wonderful book set in Fremantle

What a beautiful book. It made me laugh, cry and sit on the edge of my seat. I was totally immersed in the characters from the start.

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My new favourite author and narrator

Love his abstract style. Narrated brilliantly. Simple plot put together well. Great listen, great author.

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Great story and narrative

As always this story is woven together with great characters and and wonderful humour. Loved every minute

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One of the best books I have ever heard.

From start to finish, this book is absolute joy. It is heartbreaking, hilarious, frustrating, innocent and yet so wisely written.

I absolutely adore the way that Silvey sees the world, and love absolutely everything he has written. And this is his best work. Amazing.

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I found this one hard going

I tried to get into this book several times but kept putting it down. Eventually the time was right and I decided I would read it with no distractions. Even with this commitment I really struggled to keep engaged with the thread of this book. It wandered around too much and kept telling me stories of people I wasn’t interested in. While the story telling was always beautifully done, I just wanted to know what was going on with Eleanor and Ewan.

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Emotionally sensitive.

Craig Silvey has a unique gift for a turn of phrase. I could read this book over and over just to savour once more his beautiful language and detailed description.

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I preferred Honeybee

I listened to Honeybee and loved it. This one was a bit of a struggle. I stopped for a bit, listened to something else, then finished it. Was disappointed.

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Slow start

I found this so hard to get into! Nothing like Honeybee or Jasper Jones, both which had me enthralled very early on.

There was lots of character development, lots. Some of the characters I didn’t even find that important, sure they tie into the book, but I don’t this it would have been less of a book without them.

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So disappointed

Jasper Jones and Honey Bee blew me away but I could not do this book, I grew bored and was lost with the characters/whos who and couldn’t be bothered to stick with it to find out. Sorry Craig 😕

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