Temporary

Name: Temporary
Brand: Brilliance Audio
Availability: InStock
Rating: 4 (1 reviews)
Author: Hilary Leichter
ISBN: 9781799751670

Author: Hilary Leichter

Narrator: Carly Robins

Unabridged: 5 hr

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Brilliance Audio

Published: 03/03/2020

Categories: Fiction, Fantasy, Literary Fiction

Synopsis

In Temporary, a young woman’s workplace is the size of the world. She fills increasingly bizarre placements in search of steadiness, connection, and something, at last, to call her own. Whether it’s shining an endless closet of shoes, swabbing the deck of a pirate ship, assisting an assassin, or filling in for the Chairman of the Board, for the mythical Temporary, “there is nothing more personal than doing your job.” This riveting quest, at once hilarious and profound, will resonate with anyone who has ever done their best at work, even when the work is only temporary.

About Hilary Leichter

Hilary Leichter's writing has appeared in n+1, the New Yorker, the Cut, the Southern Review, and elsewhere. She has taught fiction at Columbia University and has been awarded fellowships from the Folger Shakespeare Library and the New York Foundation for the Arts. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Reviews

Goodreads review by s.penkevich

‘No one is ever exactly who they claim to be, but some people are closer than others.’ Finding yourself in the hustle and bustle of the world can be a challenge. This is exacerbated in a society where a sense of self as mirrored by the world seems inextricable from your job. Hilary Leichter’s debut n......more

Goodreads review by Adam

Fun, funky, quick book - the unnamed lead, a Temporary, fills in for a series of jobs in a kinetic, never-ending sequence of absurdist invention. Like a more humorous The STORY OF MY TEETH, the chained scenes have a dream logic all their own. I particularly loved a long sequence in the center of the......more

Goodreads review by Emily

4.5 rounded up This was such as an odd read but I sort of loved it! It was extremely quirky and highly original but not in a tedious way. The length was just about right, anymore and I might have got tired of it.......more

Goodreads review by Kemunto

Lighthearted but with an underlying sadness and feeling of emptiness. Leaning on the dystopia. Explores work themes in a world where a job is your only important identity. Temporary jobs but always in search of the one that'll stick. Whimsy, childlike/innocent narration, funny, heartbreaking. One of......more

Quotes

“Leichter’s funny, absurdist debut cleverly explores a capitalist society taken to a dreamlike extreme…. Her cutting, hilarious critique of the American dream will appeal to fans of Italo Calvino.”
—Publishers Weekly, starred review“A young temp searches for permanence in Leichter’s whimsically surreal fable of late-stage capitalism…. Clever and strange and, in the end, unexpectedly hopeful, less a biting gig-economy satire than a wistful 21st-century myth. A dreamy meditation on how we construct who we are.”
—Kirkus"[Carly] Robins's inflections evoke the perky perfection of a woman who is making incredible connections between the nature of work and life, all amid the story's magical realism. Robins's narration makes this audiobook a delightful experience worthy of multiple listens."
—AudioFile Magazine