Island City, Laura Adamczyk
Island City, Laura Adamczyk
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Island City

Author: Laura Adamczyk

Narrator: Hillary Huber

Unabridged: 7 hr 53 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 03/14/2023


Synopsis

In Island City, a wry and wistful woman, estranged from her family, sells her belongings and moves back to her hometown in the Midwest. To her, it’s the “perfect place to give up.” She wants to get rid of everything?her stuff, her ambitions. Before making a “messy exit,” she holes up in a dark bar and tells her stories to an audience of indifferent strangers. There’s the time the river dried up and you could walk across its bed, the day her sister got clobbered at the nursing home, the time her dad got cancer, then Alzheimer’s, then cancer again. Now she’s forgetting things the way he did, words slipping away, and that third drink isn’t helping. Laura Adamczyk, whose writing is “super weird” and “super unsettling” (Eugenia Williamson, The Boston Globe), creates a full portrait of a person, even as the image blurs and fades. Delivered as a booze-soaked monologue, Island City is a funny, devastating first novel, one that bristles and burns with true feeling.

About Laura Adamczyk

Laura Adamczyk is the author of the short-story collection Hardly Children. She has won awards from the Union League Civic & Arts Foundation of Chicago and the Dzanc/DISQUIET International Literary Program. Her work has appeared in the Chicago Reader, Guernica, McSweeney’s, Ninth Letter, Salt Hill, and more. She lives in Chicago.

About Hillary Huber

"Hillary has recorded close to 700 audiobooks spanning many genres.  She is a multiple Audie Award finalist, multiple Earphone Award winner, Voice Arts Awards winner and one of Audiofile Magazine's best voices.  Hillary has a BA in English Literature and is a voracious reader and listener.  Likes: yoga, hip hop dancing, baking sourdough, bourbon. Dislikes: liver. Raised in conservative Connecticut and hippy Hawaii, Hillary now splits her time between Santa Monica and New York.   Most of that time is in a 4x4 padded room. Er...booth. Her superpower is reciting the alphabet backwards. Created with WordToHTML.net trial."


Reviews

Goodreads review by Aaron

A solid debut. It is a very unique format, a first person narrative from a middle-aged woman telling her life story at the local pub. I don't know that I have seen anything quite like that. The tone and diction, consequently, is very conversational, familiar. The result is a mixed bag. Given the cho......more

Goodreads review by Lindsay

At a certain point this book shifts into a gear that I was not expecting, and it took me to a place filled with emotion and joy even as it was so damn sad. Also, what a great ending.......more

Goodreads review by Sara

not an enjoyable book, messy and badly paced. i also absolutely hate when characters in books or tv are named “sister” or “boyfriend” just come up with a name you already named other characters!!......more

Goodreads review by nathan

READING VLOG Major thanks to NetGalley and FSG Originals for this ARC in exchange for my honest review: 𝘖𝘧 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘨𝘪𝘯 𝘫𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘵𝘰𝘸𝘯𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘳𝘭𝘥, 𝘴𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘭𝘬𝘴 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘰 𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘦. She makes me the 𝘺𝘰𝘶 in the book, in the bar, near to the wild heart. I’m listening. To the past. To the decorative detai......more