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Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty Audiobook
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Publisher Description
From the award–winning author of No One Is Here Except All of Us comes an imaginative novel about a wealthy New England family in the 1960s and ’70s that suddenly loses its fortune—and its bearings.
Labor Day 1976, Martha’s Vineyard. Summering at the family beach house along this moneyed coast of New England, Fern and Edgar—married with three children—are happily preparing for a family birthday celebration when they learn that the unimaginable has occurred: there is no more money. More specifically, there’s no more money in the estate of Fern’s recently deceased parents, which, as the sole source of Fern and Edgar’s income, had allowed them to live this beautiful, comfortable life despite their professed anti-money ideals. Quickly, the once-charmed family unravels. In distress and confusion, Fern and Edgar are each tempted away on separate adventures: she on a road trip with a stranger, he on an ill-advised sailing voyage with another woman. The three children are left for days with no guardian whatsoever in an improvised Neverland helmed by the tender, witty, and resourceful Cricket, age nine.
Brimming with humanity and wisdom, humor and bite, and imbued with both the whimsical and the profound, Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty is a story of American wealth, class, family, and mobility approached by award–winner Ramona Ausubel with a breadth of imagination and understanding that is fresh, surprising, and exciting.
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“Ausubel offers an incisive look at these schismatic years in American history and how they affect this couple and their friends and family members…There is true wit in the author’s depiction of these tumultuous decades, and with characters this memorable, the pages almost turn themselves.”
— Publishers Weekly
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“A book brimming with life by an author bursting with talent.”
— Maggie Shipstead, New York Times bestselling author -
“Ausubel charts the unfolding crisis with tenderness, wit, and a sly understanding of wealth and its limitations.”
— People -
“Devilishly imaginative”
— Vanity Fair -
“Ausubel’s often whimsical prose is in top form yet again as she imbues the story with her signature touch of magic.”
— Elle -
“Ausubel’s timely, sophisticated tale explores what happens when a charmed life loses its luster.”
— O, The Oprah Magazine -
“An imaginative read with a dash of drama and some deep insight on wealth and class in America.”
— USA Today -
“Weird and wonderful…Ausubel’s writing, melancholy and fine, shines in illuminating everyday scenes of life.”
— New York Times Book Review -
“Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty is a charming summer tale of wealth and its loss…Fern and Cricket especially endear through their apt, universal observations on motherhood and childhood.”
— Los Angeles Times -
“A terrific exuberance and tenderness drives the telling, as it wings back and forth in time: full-blooded, sorrowing, funny, lush with backstories and images so acute you read them twice, three times.”
— San Francisco Chronicle -
“Ausubel’s characters steer her bold and absorbing novel and keep us emotionally invested in their foibles, ideals, and desires.”
— Minneapolis Star Tribune -
“Full of wisdom and wonderfully meditative insights on wealth and class in America.”
— Refinery29 -
“Fortunes and hearts are lost and found in a modern fairy tale set in the 1960s and ‘70s…[a] magical, engrossing story.”
— Kirkus Reviews (starred review) -
“As the narrative moves between 1966, 1967, and 1976, Ausubel considers the historical plight of Native Americans and the legacy of slavery on wealth…Ausubel offers a piercing view of the subtleties of class and privilege and what happens when things go awry.”
— Booklist -
“Elisabeth Rodgers is a skilled narrator who is able to give some semblance of emotion to these spoiled, basically unlikable, characters.”
— AudioFile
Awards
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A Millions.com Pick for Most Anticipated Books of 2016
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A BuzzFeed Books Pick for Summer 2016
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A Library Journal Editor’s Pick
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An Elle Magazine Pick for Best Summer Books
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A Huffington Post Pick of 22 Summer 2016 Books You Won't Want to Miss
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A Harper’s Bazaar Pick of Summer Books That Everyone Will Be Talking About
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A Refinery29 Pick of Books Perfect for Your Summer Vacation
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A HelloGiggles Pick of New Books You Need to Read This Summer
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An InStyle Pick of June Titles You Should Bring to the Beach
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A People Pick of the Week
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A Pop Sugar Pick of 31 Books You Must Put in Your Beach Bag This Summer
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A Kirkus Reviews Pick of 11 Excellent Summer Reads for Your Book Club
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A Chicago Tribune Pick of 30 Books You Should Read This Summer
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A Travel+Leisure Magazine Pick for the Best Books to Read on Vacation This Summer
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A Newsday Pick of Best Summer Books, 2016
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A 2016 Amazon Best Books of the Year So Far Selection for Literature
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A NPR Best Book of 2016 for Book Clubs
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An Oprah Book of the Summer Selection
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A Literary Hub Pick of Perfect Summer Reads
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About Ramona Ausubel
Ramona Ausubel is the author of the novels Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty and No One Is Here Except All of Us, winner of the PEN Center USA Fiction Award and the VCU Cabell First Novel Award and a finalist for the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Fiction Award. She is also the author of the story collection A Guide to Being Born, and her work has been published in the New Yorker, One Story, Paris Review Daily, and Best American Fantasy.
About Elisabeth Rodgers
Elisabeth Rodgers is an actress and AudioFile Earphones Award–winning narrator. After graduating from Princeton University, she completed a two-year program at William Esper Studio, where she studied with Maggie Flanigan. Her audiobook narration training came from Robin Miles, who has also directed her in several productions. She has recorded dozens of books for a multitude of publishers.