Elegies for the Brokenhearted A Novel (Audible Audio Edition) Christie Hodgen Holly Fielding Audible Studios Books
Download As PDF : Elegies for the Brokenhearted A Novel (Audible Audio Edition) Christie Hodgen Holly Fielding Audible Studios Books
Who are the people you'll never forget? For Mary Murphy, there are five, eulogized here in an utterly unforgettable voice. Mary tells the story of her own life - her childhood spent trading one home and father figure for another, her efforts to track down her rebellious sister, and her winding search for purpose - through her experiences and encounters with the people who shaped her path. The result is an unconventional and moving story about identity, family, and belonging.
Elegies for the Brokenhearted A Novel (Audible Audio Edition) Christie Hodgen Holly Fielding Audible Studios Books
Beautiful book. One of the blurbs on the cover says that it was, "The literary equivalent of a hand-grenade," and I'd have to agree. Very moving, but almost a body-blow. This is the first of Christie Hodgen's books I've read and it's made me a fan. I intend to read her other two, "Hello, I Must Be Going" and "A Jeweler's Eye for Flaw". Refer to the synopsis of "Elegies for the Brokenhearted"; what follows are simply my own notes and impressions. The narrator's own story is told through her elegies for five people in her life. These characters are not only brokenhearted, they are broken, as is the narrator. It's one of those very sad but ultimately life-affirming stories. I admired the book's construction, both from a technical viewpoint and in how it moves the story forward. I also loved how Hodgen used imagery in a poetical way, almost like the drumbeat in a piece of music. Here's a simple example, "Elword Lepoer, your head was a brick, a block, a lollipop. You were dumb as a stick, a sock, a bag of rocks." She uses this word-play throughout the book, and it creates both tempo and lyric. I'm curious to see if this is the way she writes or if it's a device she used specifically for this book. Whichever, it was lovely.Product details
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Elegies for the Brokenhearted A Novel (Audible Audio Edition) Christie Hodgen Holly Fielding Audible Studios Books Reviews
I really felt compassion for most of these people who have come by unhappiness or reckless situations mostly by their own doing.an easy read, and definitely thought provoking. Excellent book club discussions.
This is a very unique book, entertaining, often funny and sad. It is a bright concept of the disfunction in the modern family. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Beautiful & poetic. The dialogue is right on--there's not too much of it, but it's crisp, lucid, funny, believable. Character development is strong and well done--and the characters build, grow, and spring from one another like entangled plants. The second person form works well and doesn't feel forced, but instead brings the characters closer to the reader. It was a surprisingly fast read--I'd read more work by her anytime.
I wasn't sure what to expect when I took a first look at this book - started out to read it only because it was my book club's selection for the month. I ended up getting pulled into each of the stories. The characters are so clearly defined that you can easily visualize them and - at least in my case - match them up to one of your own family members. Excellent read.
This story held my interest, with a dark quality about it that reminds us that life is not always easy. Love takes many forms, life takes many turns. This story is rich in truths. Looking forward to more by this author.
First two "elegies" were terrific, then it went downhill. By the end, I was skimming.
Every now and then, I chance upon a little gem, a novel that captivates me from the very first line and keeps me reading rabidly until the very last sentence. Elegies for the Brokenhearted is such a novel.
Not unlike Spoon River Anthology - the Edgar Lee Masters collection of short free-form poems that collectively describe the lives and losses of deceased members of a small town - Elegies focuses on five characters in a nameless postindustrial city located in New England and narrated by Mary Murphy.
It is organized into five elegies of those who have touched Mary's life her hapless young uncle ("every family had one and you were ours the chump, the slouch, the drunk, the bum, the forever-newly-employed...), an unfortunate neighbor ("Your lot in life, it seemed, was to go through it unawares, your folly a perpetual amusement to others"), her first-year college roommate ("Fat and black, fat and black, did I have any idea you asked, what it meant..."), a gay failed music prodigy ("You believed there would come a day, your turn would come at the head of the line"), and her five-time-married mother ("You were born beautiful in an ailing industrial city, and you learn soon enough that to be a thing of beauty in a place like this is to bear a burden...")
Ms. Hodgen seamlessly blends second person voice and first person voice - the dead are addressed as "you" and the book is narrated in the "I" voice. Each portrait is perfectly realized, poignantly rendered, sympathetically told, in prose that is nothing less than incantatory. All of these vignettes - particularly of Carson Washington, the narrator's memorable college roommate who bears a heavy burden and is deliberately flunking out of school as a result - are heartbreaking and incredibly portrayed.
At the end of the day, Ms. Hodgen implies, it is really all about connections "What impressed me most was how similar our lives were - yours, mine, and everyone we knew--and how little we'd noticed the connections. We had all known joy and then lost it had blindly sought after it again; we had taken up burdens and carried them for a time, then stumbled beneath them; we had made strides and then lapsed; we had taken strange paths that sometimes delivered us to safety and sometimes led us astray..."
This is a book about how family and friends can tear us down and build us up, how losses can diminish us and yet add to our realization of life, and how we find "purpose" in the most unlikely places. For those who crave character-driven novels with shades of gray, where answers are hard-won, and where every one has a chance at redemption, this is the book for you.
Beautiful book. One of the blurbs on the cover says that it was, "The literary equivalent of a hand-grenade," and I'd have to agree. Very moving, but almost a body-blow. This is the first of Christie Hodgen's books I've read and it's made me a fan. I intend to read her other two, "Hello, I Must Be Going" and "A Jeweler's Eye for Flaw". Refer to the synopsis of "Elegies for the Brokenhearted"; what follows are simply my own notes and impressions. The narrator's own story is told through her elegies for five people in her life. These characters are not only brokenhearted, they are broken, as is the narrator. It's one of those very sad but ultimately life-affirming stories. I admired the book's construction, both from a technical viewpoint and in how it moves the story forward. I also loved how Hodgen used imagery in a poetical way, almost like the drumbeat in a piece of music. Here's a simple example, "Elword Lepoer, your head was a brick, a block, a lollipop. You were dumb as a stick, a sock, a bag of rocks." She uses this word-play throughout the book, and it creates both tempo and lyric. I'm curious to see if this is the way she writes or if it's a device she used specifically for this book. Whichever, it was lovely.
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