Brilliant story - terrible narrator

A truly original story - informative, observant and heartbreaking.
However, the narrator is terrible. She has a horribly robotic voice with a 'smug' undertone. I would advise READING it. The only reason I persevered with the audio version is because I needed something for the dog walk!
That said, the book itself is wonderful and I would highly recommend it.

12 people found this helpful

thought provoking

really enjoyed this book would definitrly revommend it. Perhaps initoally hard to get into but well worth hanging on. Good discussion at our book club about the like ability of characters, memory & early development in formative years effects later relationships. Split opionion aboit the ending amongst the group.

enjoy.

8 people found this helpful

Fab story beautifully told

Very thought provoking story I was sad to finish it as I enjoyed it so much I wanted to learn more! Highly recommend!

6 people found this helpful

A beautifully told , touching story.

I loved it. I could feel the pain of the story teller. My tears flowed and my heart was heavy.

6 people found this helpful

Disappointing

What would have made We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves better?

After an interesting start this story tailed off three quarters of the way through the book.

Has We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves put you off other books in this genre?

Not particularly

Would you be willing to try another one of Katharine Mangold’s performances?

probably not

What character would you cut from We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves?

Madame Defarge - I didn't get that bit!

6 people found this helpful

After teh wtist it leaves you cold

Would you try another book written by Karen Joy Fowler or narrated by Katharine Mangold?

Yes

Would you ever listen to anything by Karen Joy Fowler again?

Yes

What does Katharine Mangold bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you had only read the book?

She brings the characters to life. I have read the book, but she was better than the voice in my head.

Did We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves inspire you to do anything?

Not really, it was a bit too predicatble after the twist.

Any additional comments?

Not my favourite book, but one does feel for all in the book.

6 people found this helpful

Kept my attention

Where does We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

This probably ranks lower than some of the other books I have listened to. It held my attention and I am glad I chose it, however I finished the book not really caring about anybody in it.

What other book might you compare We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves to, and why?

I wouldn't compare this to another book. It came with a certain amount of hype attached to it which influenced my choice. If you are interested in sibling rivalry then this is for you.

Would you listen to another book narrated by Katharine Mangold?

Probably not. I found her voice slightly depressing but then that could have been the subject matter.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Yes, partly to get it over with.

Any additional comments?

Well written and thought provoking. I pride myself on usually being able to guess what is coming but I was surprised by the twist.

5 people found this helpful

My favourite quotation :

You learn as much from failure as from success, but no one admires you for it . How true is that!

5 people found this helpful

Listen to this now!

Couldn't put this down. Loved it so much. Sorry to have reached the end. Will try some more of her books soon.

4 people found this helpful

Terrible delivery, but reasonably worthwhile book

I was initially deeply dismayed by the narrator's voice and style. It's the worst flat nasal American, almost entirely devoid of inflection. She's reading, rather than bringing it to life. As a result, some of the writing - particularly where a story or characterisation nuance turns on an inflected word - gets flattened and lost. There's also no attempt to differentiate voices, occasionally leading to some confusion on my part over who was speaking.

But once you get past this (and you do tune it out after a while; maybe it's in keeping with the narrator's age) the book is worthwhile. Not hugely, though... I still don't get why it was Booker-longlisted - it's a sort of B-minus piece, rather than the A* I expect from the Booker longlist. It's inventive, reasonably imaginative, and it has a kind of American college-kid angst bordering on depression that calls to mind Douglas Coupland and J. D. Salinger. And the title is clever - I liked the way it changed its meaning as the story progressed. It begins with a reference to an early episode with the children playing in the snow, 'beside themselves' with delight, but later comes to indicate the way that they are all 'beside themselves' with more negative emotions - rage, in Lowell's case, numbness in Rosemary's.

It's an engaging idea - and for all my criticism, my heart bled for Rosemary, Lowell and Fern, the three central characters - but as a piece of writing, it could have been more thoughtfully delivered. Having Rosemary narrate it from a single temporal point of view - her college career - bypasses the opportunity to narrate earlier memories from an earlier point of view, making her more complex as a character and aligning her more with her 'sister', Fern. This is not a first novel, but it has a lot of first-novel feel about it. For instance, there's too much 'putting in a bit of past history' just immediately before she needs to refer to it in the present, making it seem as if she's not in control of her material - although it's not a complex plot.

17 people found this helpful