The Five Wounds, Kirstin Valdez Quade
The Five Wounds, Kirstin Valdez Quade
2 Rating(s)
List: $24.99 | Sale: $17.50
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The Five Wounds
A Novel

Author: Kirstin Valdez Quade

Narrator: Gary Tiedemann

Unabridged: 15 hr 44 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 05/18/2021


Synopsis

It's Holy Week in the small town of Las Penas, New Mexico, and thirty-three-year-old unemployed Amadeo Padilla has been given the part of Jesus in the Good Friday procession. He is preparing feverishly for this role when his fifteen-year-old daughter Angel shows up pregnant on his doorstep and disrupts his plans for personal redemption. With weeks to go until her due date, tough, ebullient Angel has fled her mother's house, setting her life on a startling new path.

Vivid, tender, funny, and beautifully rendered, The Five Wounds spans the baby’s first year as five generations of the Padilla family converge: Amadeo's mother, Yolanda, reeling from a recent discovery; Angel's mother, Marissa, whom Angel isn't speaking to; and disapproving Tíve, Yolanda's uncle and keeper of the family's history. Each brings expectations that Amadeo doesn't think he can live up to.

The Five Wounds is a miraculous debut novel from a writer whose stories have been hailed as "legitimate masterpieces" (New York Times). Kirstin Valdez Quade conjures characters that will linger long after the book's conclusion, bringing to life their struggles to parent children they may not be equipped to save.

About Kirstin Valdez Quade

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Reviews

Goodreads review by Roxane on May 11, 2021

I first read the short story that grew into this novel in Kirstin's short story collection Night at the Fiestas and it stayed with me. I was thrilled when I learned of the novel and it did not disappoint. One of my favorite things about this novel is how the author allows her characters to be flawed......more

Goodreads review by Book Clubbed on July 22, 2021

A glorious book that is full-hearted, rich in emotion, and unflinching in the flaws it is willing to explore. I don't think my humdrum words in a review will do it much justice, so I'll keep this short. I will say, however, that it is not easy to fully investigate the failings of characters while st......more

Goodreads review by ally on May 06, 2022

one of those books that made me slow down because i couldn’t bear the thought of missing out on a single lyrically written sentence maybe my favorite character study - i cared about every page reminds us that all humans are flawed and none of us are able to put our best selves forward 100% of the time......more

Goodreads review by Jill on December 31, 2020

Anyone who has had the privilege of reading Kirstin Valdez Quade’s Night of the Fiestas -- one of my favorite short story collections– will instantly recognize the characters that populate her new novel. The Five Wounds – which refer to the five wounds of Christ – takes place during Holy Week in New......more

Goodreads review by luce (cry bebè's back from hiatus) on August 27, 2021

| | blog | tumblr | ko-fi | | 3 ½ stars “Is this what motherhood means? Being suddenly able to pity the adults in your life?” Set over the course of a year in Las Penas, New Mexico, The Five Wounds is a novel about failure and progress. Unsentimental yet moving The Five Woundsdetails the everyday......more