Maggie Brown  Others, Peter Orner
Maggie Brown  Others, Peter Orner
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Maggie Brown & Others
Stories

Author: Peter Orner

Narrator: Peter Orner, Ari Fliakos, Brittany Pressley

Unabridged: 8 hr 58 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 07/28/2020


Synopsis

In this powerful and virtuosic collection of interlocking stories, each one "a marvel of concision and compassion" (Washington Post), Peter Orner, a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist and "master of his form" (New York Times), takes the short story to new heights.
 
Through forty-four compressed gems, Peter Orner, a writer who "doesn't simply bring his characters to life, he gives them souls" (NYT Book Review), chronicles people whose lives are at inflection points, gripping us with a series of defining moments.

Whether it's a first date that turns into a late-night road trip to a séance in an abandoned airplane hangar, or a family's memories of the painful mystery surrounding a forgotten uncle's demise, Orner reveals how our fleeting decisions between kindness and abandonment chase us across time. These stories are anchored by a poignant novella that delivers not only the joys and travails of a forty-year marriage, but an entire era in a working-class New England city. Bristling with the crackling energy of life itself, Maggie Brown & Others marks the most sustained achievement to date for "a master of his form" (New York Times).

- A New York Times Notable Book
- Longlisted for the Simpson/Joyce Carol Oates Prize
- An Oprah Magazine Best Book of 2019
- Kirkus "Best Short Fiction of 2019"

About The Author

Peter Orner, a two-time recipient of the Pushcart Prize, is the author of five previous books, including the novel Love and Shame and Love and the collection Esther Stories, a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award. His memoir Am I Alone Here? was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. His fiction has appeared in The AtlanticThe Paris ReviewTin House, and Granta, and has been anthologized in The Best American Short Stories. The recipient of the Rome Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Fullbright to Namibia, Orner holds the Darmouth Professorship of English and Creative Writing at Dartmouth College.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Violet

In one of his stories, the author has his narrator say this: "Horizons can't ever be reached no matter how many words you lard on a novel. The attempt at closure is inherently dishonest." That's true but the magic of every brilliant novel is that it creates the illusion in time that it isn't true.......more

Little gems, these stories (some very short) made from the stuff of life, the small moments that matter, the people that give life depth and color. They are full of laugh-out-loud dialogue, yet left me with a film of sorrow. The collection ends with a novella that’s broken up into stories like snaps......more

Goodreads review by Barbara

I have not read many short story collections and am just acquiring a taste for this abbreviated writing form. In my opinion, the following quote reflects Orner's thinking and what I am slowly realizing about short stories. "The last period of the last sentence of a story isn't a full stop; it's a ho......more