The Night Guest, Fiona McFarlane
The Night Guest, Fiona McFarlane
1 Rating(s)
List: $35.99 | Sale: $25.20
Club: $17.99

The Night Guest

Author: Fiona McFarlane

Narrator: Lisbeth Kennelly

Unabridged: 9 hr 15 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/01/2013

Synopsis

Ruth is widowed, her sons are grown, and she lives in an isolated beach house outside town. Her routines are few and small. One day a stranger arrives at her door, looking as if she has been blown in from the sea. This woman—Frida—claims to be a care worker sent by the government. Ruth lets her in.Now that Frida is in the house, is Ruth right to fear the tiger she hears on the prowl at night, far from its jungle habitat? Why do memories of her childhood in Fiji press upon her with increasing urgency? How far can she trust this mysterious woman, Frida, who seems to carry her own troubled past? And how far can Ruth trust herself?The Night Guest, Fiona McFarlane’s hypnotic first novel, is no simple tale of a crime committed and a mystery solved. This is a story that soars above its own suspense and tells us, with exceptional grace and beauty, about aging, love, trust, dependence, and fear; about processes of colonization; and about things (and people) in places they shouldn’t be. Here is a new writer who comes to us fully formed, creating wonders with language, renewing our faith in the power of fiction to describe the mysterious workings of our minds.

About Fiona McFarlane

Fiona McFarlane is the author of The Night Guest; The High Places, which won the International Dylan Thomas Prize; and The Sun Walks Down. Her short fiction has been published in The New Yorker and Zoetrope: All-Story. She teaches at the University of California, Berkeley.

Reviews

Goodreads review by karen on September 06, 2018

this book perfectly illustrates that whole frog-in-boiling-water scenario. it starts out in a fairly straightforward way, telling the story of ruth, an elderly, widowed woman living alone in a remote beach house in australia. she has two grown sons, with busy lives and children of their own, who phon......more

Goodreads review by Barbara on March 02, 2024

This is a very creepy novel about abuse and manipulation of the elderly. Ruth Field, a 75 year old widow, lives alone on the shore of a seaside town in Australia. At the beginning of the book, Ruth hears a tiger in her house. Although she rationally knows that it’s impossible for a tiger to be in Au......more

Goodreads review by Nancy on December 22, 2014

4.5 rounded up. Forgive the uber-long review, but I loved this book and really want to share. I don't know the last time I've ever been this unsettled by a novel. I started it, was intrigued, picked it up again the next day and read until just after 3 a.m. when I finished it. Then I couldn't sleep fo......more

Goodreads review by Ines on July 12, 2019

Oh my God!!! This book really left me shocked and confused, in italian we say "bocconi" and it is not the perfect translation for shocked!!, A twist so sudden and instantaneous I didn’t remember finding it in years and years of reading blooks... Ruth is an elderly woman who lives alone, let’s say lef......more

Goodreads review by Blair on July 09, 2015

An elderly widow, Ruth, lives alone - except for a couple of demanding cats - in a beach house somewhere in Australia. Here she is largely content with her solitary life, and spends a great deal of time reflecting on the past, particularly her youth in Fiji. This quiet existence is disturbed by two......more

Add to Cart
Add to Wish List