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Falling Man: A Novel Audiobook
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(3.00) - 5,953 listener ratings
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Publisher Description
Falling Man is a magnificent, essential novel about the event that defines turn-of-the-century America. It begins in the smoke and ash of the burning towers and tracks the aftermath of this global tremor in the intimate lives of a few people.
There is September 11 and then there are the days after, and finally the years.
Falling Man is a magnificent, essential novel about the event that defines turn-of-the-century America. It begins in the smoke and ash of the burning towers and tracks the aftermath of this global tremor in the intimate lives of a few people.
First there is Keith, walking out of the rubble into a life that he’d always imagined belonged to everyone but him. Then Lianne, his estranged wife, memory-haunted, trying to reconcile two versions of the same shadowy man. And their small son Justin, standing at the window, scanning the sky for more planes.
These are lives choreographed by loss, grief, and the enormous force of history.
Brave and brilliant, Falling Man traces the way the events of September 11 have reconfigured our emotional landscape, our memory and our perception of the world. It is cathartic, beautiful, heartbreaking.
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"Nothing like what I was expecting...I enjoyed the different perspectives of the characters. I know it's fiction, but it's honest, too. I've read a couple of books that mention Sept. 11 peripherally, but this is the first book I've read where the events are pivotal -- and reactions refreshingly unheroic. It brought back the emotional vertigo and clouds of unknowing that followed the attacks. It made me wonder, too, how much of what we do, at work, at leisure, is performance art."
— Marguerite (4 out of 5 stars)
Quotes
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“Falling Man brings at least a measure of memory, tenderness, and meaning to all that howling space.”
— New York Times Book Review -
“The clearest vision yet of what it felt like to live through that day.”
— Newsweek -
“Haunting...elegiac...masterful.”
— Boston Globe -
“DeLillo is at his best...a keen imaginer...[writing] with exactitude and lyrical originality.”
— New Republic
Awards
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A New York Times bestseller
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One of the 2007 New York Times Book Review 100 Notable Books for Fiction
Falling Man Listener Reviews
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" An absolutely devastating look at the effects (and details) of 9/11 from the perspective of one couple and the people that surround them. "
— Gina, 2/17/2014 -
" A book about the effect of 9/11 on a NY family. Very deep and somewhat emotionally devastating. "
— marsha, 2/17/2014 -
" vertigo & chaos. all after 9/11. "
— Timball, 2/14/2014 -
" The best part of this book is its length (very short). Perhaps if this book had come out early 2002, when the feelings were raw and the easy acceptance of all things 9/11y was ripe, but these days more substance is required. The problem with this book is that the characters lack interiors. They are nothing but incomplete vessels for a nothing-happens plot. There is also the problem that this book depends heavily on dialogue for authenticity, but the dialogue is self-importantly enigmatic and unrealistic. The chapters about the lives of the terrorists are just about totally a waste of paper. This whole book could and ought be reduced to a wikipedia article about the Falling Man performance art piece. "
— Eoin, 2/3/2014 -
" I really wanted to get something out of it. At the end of the day, I just wanted to finish it. "
— Jackie, 1/27/2014 -
" Delillo is an amazing writer. Really catches the psychology of 9/11... "
— Courtney, 1/25/2014 -
" I could have lived without it. "
— Nicole, 1/20/2014 -
" A slim, readable novel by DeLillo. Falls apart a bit at the end, but perhaps the best piece of fiction to date that gets at how 9/11 affected New Yorkers, and all of us, psychologically and emotionally. "
— Mark, 1/20/2014 -
" This one knocked me off my feet before I even thought about the possibility... very insightful. Made me think more about how 9/11 changed me and my family personally... as opposed to the national impact we all hide behind. "
— Tess, 1/18/2014 -
" I expected a lot more out of this book. DeLillo is a New York author, so I thought he would provide a powerful perspective to the Sept. 11 attacks. This novel felt lost at times. Maybe that's what he intended. "
— Dale, 1/12/2014 -
" Fiction. I need a category called "Started but Rejected!" I just couldn't work up the energy to care about the characters. Parts are so well written - I wanted to like this but it mostly sat on my bedside table. "
— Judi, 1/7/2014 -
" Good novel. If you're already a fan of DeLillo, you'll love it. But, the characters do being to all "sound" or seem similar. Check out the 9/11 documentary "Falling Man" on youtube.com. It's pretty interesting. "
— Sean, 1/2/2014 -
" I'm a huge fan but I was disappointed. "
— Bxdoc, 12/30/2013 -
" The language was truly, truly beautiful, and yet I just couldn't get into the story. A family recounts their reactions to 9/11. "
— Christina, 11/16/2013 -
" DeLillo takes on the aftermath of the WTC terrorist attack with a very personal story. Wonderful "
— Lost, 11/14/2013 -
" This is one of the only books I've actually put down in my life. It was just way too depressing. "
— Janean, 9/15/2013 -
" This is certainly the most uncomfortable work of fiction I've willed myself to read. Of course, nobody but Don DeLillo could or should have even tried to write "the" 9/11 book. I read the last 15 pages standing in the failing light of 7th and 22nd, very much paralyzed. "
— Daniel, 6/9/2013 -
" After reading Foer's _Extremely Loud etc_, (which I liked), it was nice to see that it's possible to write a 9/11 novel that's not really cute. "
— Raymond, 4/28/2013 -
" I tried twice to "get" DeLillo's work but it just doesn't resonate with me. Too often it's as though the writer is writing for his pleasure and doesn't care about the reader. Sometimes that makes for strong fiction, other times it doesn't work. This doesn't work. "
— Brafe, 6/12/2012 -
" The premise sounded promising but I lost interest after 40 pages and stopped reading. "
— Jessica, 1/3/2012 -
" This is my first DeLillo book. He's brilliant. "
— Peggy, 11/26/2011 -
" I haven't enjoyed the few Delilo books I've read; but I really liked this one alot. Maybe his tone suits the days of 9/11 well, or maybe I was in the right mood--but it's a beautiful book. "
— Lindsey, 10/23/2011 -
" Despite the fact that DeLillo is writing about intense, riveting subject matter, most of the book comes out mundane and hazy. He jumps from topic to topic, only giving the reader short insights into the psychologies of his characters. "
— Rebecca, 8/28/2011 -
" Decent book, just can't get into DeLillo's writing style. "
— Amy, 4/25/2011
About Don DeLillo
Don DeLillo is the author of seventeen novels which have won the National Book Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the PEN/Saul Bellow Award, the Jerusalem Prize for his complete body of work, and the William Dean Howells Medal from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In 2013 he was awarded the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction, and in 2015, the National Book Foundation awarded DeLillo its Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters.