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A Long Stay in a Distant Land
- Narrated by: James Yaegashi
- Length: 6 hrs and 41 mins
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Publisher's summary
The Lums are cursed. Ever since Grandpa Melvin was inspired to join the U.S. army after watching a Popeye movie and, as family lore has it, unleashed a "relentless rain of steel death" upon the Nazis, Lum after Lum has been doomed to an untimely demise, be it by tainted cheeseburger or speeding ice-cream truck. The most recent victim is Louis Lum's mother, struck down by a medical student asleep at the wheel. Now Louis, a 20-something fact checker at a hot-rod magazine, must move back home with his gangsta rap-obsessed father, Sonny, to prevent him from enacting the revenge he promises.
But soon Louis finds himself more concerned with another wayward family member, his uncle Bo Lum, who has disappeared in Hong Kong after many years of self-imposed exile. After the annual family meeting at Grandma Esther's house, Louis decides to leave his father to go to Hong Kong and find Bo, his grandmother's favorite son. As Louis's search progresses, the tragicomic story of three generations of Lums in America is revealed through the eyes of Louis, Sonny, and Grandma Esther.
A novel about the unexpected ways love and myth work to both sustain and threaten family ties, A Long Stay in a Distant Land introduces a wry and original new voice in American fiction.
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Story
When George Hodgman leaves Manhattan for his hometown of Paris, Missouri, he finds himself - an unlikely caretaker and near-lethal cook - in a head-on collision with his aging mother, Betty, a woman of wit and will. Will George lure her into assisted living? When hell freezes over. He can't bring himself to force her from the home both treasure - the place where his father's voice lingers, the scene of shared jokes, skirmishes, and, behind the dusty antiques, a rarely acknowledged conflict...
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Title Should Be Georgeville-It's All About George
- By Sara on 10-08-15
By: George Hodgman
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In the Country
- Stories
- By: Mia Alvar
- Narrated by: Nancy Wu, Don Castro
- Length: 13 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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These nine globe-trotting, unforgettable stories from Mia Alvar, a remarkable new literary talent, vividly give voice to the women and men of the Filipino diaspora. Here are exiles, emigrants, and wanderers uprooting their families from the Philippines to begin new lives in the Middle East, the United States, and elsewhere - and sometimes turning back again.
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My introduction to Filipino literature and culture
- By Amazon Customer on 03-28-16
By: Mia Alvar
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The UnAmericans
- Stories
- By: Molly Antopol
- Narrated by: Jennifer Van Dyck
- Length: 7 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Again and again, Molly Antopol’s deeply sympathetic characters struggle for footing in an uncertain world, hounded by forces beyond their control. Their voices are intimate and powerful and they resonate with searing beauty. Antopol is a superb young talent, and The UnAmericans will long be remembered for its wit, humanity, and heart.
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Sensational stories! Brilliant new author.
- By MidwestGeek on 05-04-14
By: Molly Antopol
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The Portable Veblen
- By: Elizabeth Mckenzie
- Narrated by: Julia Gibson
- Length: 12 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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An exuberant, one-of-a-kind novel about love and family, war and nature, new money and old values by a brilliant New Yorker contributor. The Portable Veblen is a dazzlingly original novel that's as big-hearted as it is laugh-out-loud funny. Set in and around Palo Alto amid the culture clash of new money and old (antiestablishment) values, and with the specter of our current wars looming across its words, The Portable Veblen is an unforgettable look at the way we live now.
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Not what it was cracked up to be
- By Linda on 02-03-16
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Saints for All Occasions
- A Novel
- By: J. Courtney Sullivan
- Narrated by: Susan Denaker
- Length: 15 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Nora and Theresa Flynn are 21 and 17 when they leave their small village in Ireland and journey to America. Nora is the responsible sister; she's shy and serious and engaged to a man she isn't sure that she loves. Theresa is gregarious; she is thrilled by their new life in Boston and besotted with the fashionable dresses and dance halls on Dudley Street. But when Theresa ends up pregnant, Nora is forced to come up with a plan - a decision with repercussions they are both far too young to understand.
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The narration ruined it
- By Janis Reynolds on 06-12-17
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Notes on a Banana
- A Memoir of Food, Love, and Manic Depression
- By: David Leite
- Narrated by: David Leite
- Length: 11 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Reminiscing about the people and events that shaped him, David looks back at the highs and lows of his life, from his rejection of being gay and his attempt to "turn straight" through Aesthetic Realism, a cult in downtown Manhattan, to becoming a writer, cookbook author, and web publisher, to his 23-year relationship with Alan, known to millions of David's readers and listeners as "The One", which began with (what else?) food.
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Finished it in a day!
- By Kathryn on 08-23-17
By: David Leite
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One Amazing Thing
- By: Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
- Narrated by: Purva Bedi, Soneela Nankani, Neil Shah
- Length: 7 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Winner of a Pushcart Prize for poetry and an American Book Award for her short stories, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni explores themes of women, immigration, and her vibrant Indian culture to great effect. Divakaruni expands on these ideas in One Amazing Thing, a project long in the making and full of electric prose.
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An ok way to kill some time
- By R.Reader on 11-07-12
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Coyote Dream
- By: Jessica Davis Stein
- Narrated by: Julie Dretzin
- Length: 10 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Sarah Friedman journeys to the Southwest to buy art for her family's New York gallery. Determined to put aside personal disappointments, she seeks new perspectives in the serenity of the desert landscape. Then her car breaks down on a Navajo reservation near the home of an aloof artist. And soon she will have to choose between love and duty, commitment and freedom - and learn to fight for what matters most.
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GREAT
- By Texasrodie on 06-20-10
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The Story Hour
- By: Thrity Umrigar
- Narrated by: Sneha Mathan
- Length: 11 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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An experienced psychologist, Maggie carefully maintains emotional distance from her patients. But when she meets a young Indian woman who tried to kill herself, her professional detachment disintegrates. Cut off from her family in India, Lakshmi is desperately lonely and trapped in a loveless marriage. Moved by her plight, Maggie treats Lakshmi in her home office for free, quickly realizing that the despondent woman doesn't need a shrink; she needs a friend.
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A stellar performance almost carried the book...
- By Daryl on 03-04-15
By: Thrity Umrigar
What listeners say about A Long Stay in a Distant Land
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Alan
- 01-28-06
Of Just a Little More Than Passing Interest
My reviews are usually based on time and dollar value. This was a book worth listening to but I hope it might have been better. I was glad it was a short listen, which is to say, right after listening to it I felt it was barely worth the one book credit it cost me. It didn't grab me in a way that I couldn't wait to get some quiet iPOD time so I could get to listening to it again. But I'm glad I waited a month or so to put down this review. My memories of it are good. The story was interesting, even poignant at times. I do remember having a problem trying to remember (figure out) which character was who and when, but now that time has evened out those puzzlements, I can say that the general mood the book left me with was a wholehearted one. The central "characters" all worked through what they needed to work through. They felt their life's resolutions were workable. Less angst and more understanding. Something we need more of in late 20th early 21st century fiction.
You may wish to try it. But give it a good, solid 10 minute sample reading first.
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3 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Terri
- 06-03-05
Hard To Follow
This is no doubt a much different story when read than listened to. For one, without a family tree chart or chapter headings to glance up at there was some trouble figuring out who was who and when was when, as the story jumped back and forth in time and across generations and from relative to relative. Confusing.
The narrator was not altogether unpleasant, although his elderly voices, either male OR female, did tend to sound similar, almost sterotypical.
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4 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Ming
- 04-03-08
It's just ok
It is probably one of the books that should be for reading, not listening. The reader is totally boring. I find the story 'too cute' as the author contrives to deliver the plot.
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Overall
- Eva Gannon
- 10-29-08
A Long Stay In a Boring Book
Only got about half way through this audiobook. The characters are unappealing. I couldn't stand Sonny and his love for cockroach-infested apartments. His wife was a wuss who allowed him to trample on her. His mother was stereotyped.
The plot (if there is one) is disjointed in addition to being convoluted. It's hard to keep track of the characters and what they're doing, and why.
After about 3.5 hours, I gave it up. I don't like to leave a book unfinished and don't often do so, so I may go back to this one day. In the meantime, I removed it from my iPod, it's not worthy of the space.
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1 person found this helpful