Aftermath, Rachel Cusk
Aftermath, Rachel Cusk
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Aftermath
On Marriage and Separation

Author: Rachel Cusk

Narrator: Antonia Beamish

Unabridged: 4 hr 56 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/05/2021

Synopsis

A masterly work of divorce and its consequences, Aftermath is a ruthless, rigorous record of the largely unwritten journey back to order from the chaos of separation.In the winter of 2009, Rachel Cusk’s marriage of ten years came to an end. Candid and revelatory, Aftermath chronicles the perilous journey as the author redefines herself and creates a new version of family life for her daughters. She discovers previously unknown strengths and freedoms but also finds herself suddenly vulnerable to outsiders, unwelcome advice, social displacement, and the absence of a clear authority. The pressure to reconstruct a “normal” life for her daughters competes with the sense that nothing feels normal at all.Aftermath is a classic: a masterly work in which the author, at her most ruthless and rigorous, charts the largely unwritten journey back to order from the chaos that is left when a family breaks apart.

About Rachel Cusk

Rachel Cusk is the author of Second Place; the trilogy Outline, Transit, Kudos; the essay collection Coventry; the memoirs A Life’s Work, The Last Supper, and Aftermath; and several other novels: Saving Agnes (winner of the Whitbread Award), The Temporary, The Country Life (winner of the Somerset Maugham Award), The Lucky Ones, In the Fold, Arlington Park, and The Bradshaw Variations.

About Antonia Beamish

Antonia Beamish is an award-winning narrator and professional actress best known for her performances in films such as The Last Horror Movie, Dead Creatures, and Chemical Wedding.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Trish

It used to be rare for me to read through a writer’s oeuvre at once. I was afraid I would show an author I admired to disadvantage. With Rachel Cusk, each book is another, deeper aspect of the same theme so one may move from one to another, gorging intemperately on the ideas there and stagger out li......more

Goodreads review by julieta

Loved this, the first book I read by Rachel Cusk. I will definitely be reading more of her. More than a description of a break up, it is what happens inside her, which is much better than the anecdote of break up itself. A meditation on relationships taken to another level.......more

Quotes

“Brilliant…As slim and revealing as a microscope slide…Over eight echo-laden chapters, Cusk moves through her period of aftermath, from agitation to recrimination, to numbness, to new stirrings.” Elle

“This book is a solace to anybody who has dwelt in post-familial wastes.”  San Francisco Chronicle

“Thrilling…There are riches buried like gold in the bitter picture Cusk describes…An enormously talented writer.” Boston Globe

“Bold, gripping, original and occasionally darkly funny.”  Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“Beautiful…Compelling…[Cusk is] an extraordinary writer of the female experience.” Financial Times

“Engaging [and] full of feeling…Cusk is a great observer of the roles people—and especially women—play, studying not only the garbs they put on for tradition and ideology, but also how this action affects their understanding of themselves.” Washington Post

“Compelling…Strikingly beautiful…Meticulously crafted…[Cusk] is a keen, even brilliant, observer of her own behavior.” Christian Science Monitor

“Interspersed within the narrative are stories within stories, vivid scenes, and piercing observations.” Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Cusk can nail a simile like Gabby Douglas can execute a backflip. [She] is not afraid to take herself seriously—which is a tendency that George Eliot, among others, understood the value of.” New Yorker

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