The Late Americans
A Novel
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $18.00
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Kevin R. Free
-
By:
-
Brandon Taylor
About this listen
INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER
NAMED A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE YEAR BY VOGUE, ELLE, OPRAH DAILY, THE WASHINGTON POST, BUZZFEED AND VULTURE
“Erudite, intimate, hilarious, poignant . . . A gorgeously written novel of youth’s promise, of the quest to find one’s tribe and one’s calling.” —Leigh Haber, Oprah Daily
The Booker Prize finalist and widely acclaimed author of Real Life and Filthy Animals returns with a deeply involving new novel of young men and women at a crossroads
In the shared and private spaces of Iowa City, a loose circle of lovers and friends encounter, confront, and provoke one another in a volatile year of self-discovery. Among them are Seamus, a frustrated young poet; Ivan, a dancer turned aspiring banker who dabbles in amateur pornography; Fatima, whose independence and work ethic complicate her relationships with friends and a trusted mentor; and Noah, who “didn’t seek sex out so much as it came up to him like an anxious dog in need of affection.” These four are buffeted by a cast of artists, landlords, meatpacking workers, and mathematicians who populate the cafes, classrooms, and food-service kitchens of the city, sometimes to violent and electrifying consequence. Finally, as each prepares for an uncertain future, the group heads to a cabin to bid goodbye to their former lives—a moment of reckoning that leaves each of them irrevocably altered.
A novel of friendship and chosen family, The Late Americans asks fresh questions about love and sex, ambition and precarity, and about how human beings can bruise one another while trying to find themselves. It is Brandon Taylor’s richest and most involving work of fiction to date, confirming his position as one of our most perceptive chroniclers of contemporary life.
©2023 Brandon Taylor (P)2023 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...
-
Yellowface
- A Novel
- By: R. F. Kuang
- Narrated by: Helen Laser
- Length: 8 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars: same year at Yale, same debut year in publishing. But Athena’s a cross-genre literary darling, and June didn’t even get a paperback release. Nobody wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks. So when June witnesses Athena’s death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena’s just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers to the British and French war efforts during World War I.
-
-
I've never hated a character harder
- By ashelyn downs on 07-26-23
By: R. F. Kuang
-
Tom Lake
- A Novel
- By: Ann Patchett
- Narrated by: Meryl Streep
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.
-
-
So incredibly boring
- By Rhonda Morrison on 08-05-23
By: Ann Patchett
-
Real Life
- A Novel
- By: Brandon Taylor
- Narrated by: Kevin R. Free
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Almost everything about Wallace is at odds with the Midwestern university town where he is working uneasily toward a biochem degree. An introverted young man from Alabama, black and queer, he has left behind his family without escaping the long shadows of his childhood. For reasons of self-preservation, Wallace has enforced a wary distance even within his own circle of friends—some dating each other, some dating women, some feigning straightness.
-
-
Not My Gay Real Life
- By Haynes on 02-29-20
By: Brandon Taylor
-
Hope
- A Novel
- By: Andrew Ridker
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 13 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The year is 2013 and the Greenspans are the envy of Brookline, Massachusetts, an idyllic (and idealistic) suburb west of Boston. Scott Greenspan is a successful physician with his own cardiology practice. His wife, Deb, is a pillar of the community who spends her free time helping resettle refugees. Their daughter, Maya, works at a distinguished New York publishing house and their son, Gideon, is preparing to follow in his father’s footsteps. They are an exceptional family from an exceptional place, living in exceptional times.
-
-
Not long enough
- By Jess on 09-14-23
By: Andrew Ridker
-
The Vaster Wilds
- A Novel
- By: Lauren Groff
- Narrated by: January LaVoy
- Length: 7 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A servant girl escapes from a colonial settlement in the wilderness. She carries nothing with her but her wits, a few possessions, and the spark of god that burns hot within her. What she finds in this terra incognita is beyond the limits of her imagination and will bend her belief in everything that her own civilization has taught her.
-
-
Slow torture written too hastily
- By Jennifer on 09-23-23
By: Lauren Groff
-
The Librarianist
- A Novel
- By: Patrick deWitt
- Narrated by: Jim Meskimen
- Length: 10 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Bob Comet is a retired librarian passing his solitary days surrounded by books and small comforts in a mint-colored house in Portland, Oregon. One morning on his daily walk he encounters a confused elderly woman lost in a market and returns her to the senior center that is her home. Hoping to fill the void he’s known since retiring, he begins volunteering at the center. Here, as a community of strange peers gathers around Bob, and following a happenstance brush with a painful complication from his past, the events of his life and the details of his character are revealed.
-
-
An entertaining audio
- By Barbara S on 07-09-23
By: Patrick deWitt
-
Yellowface
- A Novel
- By: R. F. Kuang
- Narrated by: Helen Laser
- Length: 8 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars: same year at Yale, same debut year in publishing. But Athena’s a cross-genre literary darling, and June didn’t even get a paperback release. Nobody wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks. So when June witnesses Athena’s death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena’s just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers to the British and French war efforts during World War I.
-
-
I've never hated a character harder
- By ashelyn downs on 07-26-23
By: R. F. Kuang
-
Tom Lake
- A Novel
- By: Ann Patchett
- Narrated by: Meryl Streep
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.
-
-
So incredibly boring
- By Rhonda Morrison on 08-05-23
By: Ann Patchett
-
Real Life
- A Novel
- By: Brandon Taylor
- Narrated by: Kevin R. Free
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Almost everything about Wallace is at odds with the Midwestern university town where he is working uneasily toward a biochem degree. An introverted young man from Alabama, black and queer, he has left behind his family without escaping the long shadows of his childhood. For reasons of self-preservation, Wallace has enforced a wary distance even within his own circle of friends—some dating each other, some dating women, some feigning straightness.
-
-
Not My Gay Real Life
- By Haynes on 02-29-20
By: Brandon Taylor
-
Hope
- A Novel
- By: Andrew Ridker
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 13 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The year is 2013 and the Greenspans are the envy of Brookline, Massachusetts, an idyllic (and idealistic) suburb west of Boston. Scott Greenspan is a successful physician with his own cardiology practice. His wife, Deb, is a pillar of the community who spends her free time helping resettle refugees. Their daughter, Maya, works at a distinguished New York publishing house and their son, Gideon, is preparing to follow in his father’s footsteps. They are an exceptional family from an exceptional place, living in exceptional times.
-
-
Not long enough
- By Jess on 09-14-23
By: Andrew Ridker
-
The Vaster Wilds
- A Novel
- By: Lauren Groff
- Narrated by: January LaVoy
- Length: 7 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A servant girl escapes from a colonial settlement in the wilderness. She carries nothing with her but her wits, a few possessions, and the spark of god that burns hot within her. What she finds in this terra incognita is beyond the limits of her imagination and will bend her belief in everything that her own civilization has taught her.
-
-
Slow torture written too hastily
- By Jennifer on 09-23-23
By: Lauren Groff
-
The Librarianist
- A Novel
- By: Patrick deWitt
- Narrated by: Jim Meskimen
- Length: 10 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Bob Comet is a retired librarian passing his solitary days surrounded by books and small comforts in a mint-colored house in Portland, Oregon. One morning on his daily walk he encounters a confused elderly woman lost in a market and returns her to the senior center that is her home. Hoping to fill the void he’s known since retiring, he begins volunteering at the center. Here, as a community of strange peers gathers around Bob, and following a happenstance brush with a painful complication from his past, the events of his life and the details of his character are revealed.
-
-
An entertaining audio
- By Barbara S on 07-09-23
By: Patrick deWitt
-
Blackouts
- A Novel
- By: Justin Torres
- Narrated by: Ozzie Rodriguez, Torian Brackett
- Length: 6 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Out in the desert in a place called the Palace, a young man tends to a dying soul, someone he once knew briefly, but who has haunted the edges of his life. Juan Gay—playful raconteur, child lost and found and lost, guardian of the institutionalized—has a project to pass along. It is inspired by a true artifact of a book, Sex Variants: A Study in Homosexual Patterns, which contains stories collected in the early twentieth century from queer subjects by a queer researcher, Jan Gay, whose groundbreaking work was then co-opted by a committee, her name buried.
-
-
meh
- By Thomas E Flint on 10-28-24
By: Justin Torres
-
Let's Get Back to the Party
- By: Zak Salih
- Narrated by: Michael Crouch, Will Damron
- Length: 9 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is 2015, weeks after the Supreme Court marriage equality ruling. A high school art history teacher, Sebastian Mote envies his queer students and their freedom to live openly the youth he lost to fear and shame. When he runs into his childhood friend Oscar Burnham at a wedding in Washington, DC, he can’t help but see it as a second chance. Now thirty-five, the men haven’t seen each other in more than a decade. But Oscar has no interest in their shared history, nor in the sense of belonging Sebastian craves. Instead, he’s outraged by what he sees as the death of gay culture.
-
-
Bleh
- By Richard on 03-24-21
By: Zak Salih
-
In Memoriam
- A Novel
- By: Alice Winn
- Narrated by: Christian Coulson
- Length: 12 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It’s 1914, and World War I is ceaselessly churning through thousands of young men on both sides of the fight. The violence of the front feels far away to Henry Gaunt, Sidney Ellwood and the rest of their classmates, safely ensconced in their idyllic boarding school in the English countryside. News of the heroic deaths of their friends only makes the war more exciting. Gaunt, half German, is busy fighting his own private battle—an all-consuming infatuation with his best friend, the glamorous, charming Ellwood—without a clue that Ellwood is pining for him in return
-
-
Amazing
- By Henry on 03-21-23
By: Alice Winn
-
I Am Homeless If This Is Not My Home
- A Novel
- By: Lorrie Moore
- Narrated by: Sophie Amoss
- Length: 6 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lorrie Moore’s first novel since A Gate at the Stairs—a daring, meditative exploration of love and death, passion and grief, and what it means to be haunted by the past, both by history and the human heart. A teacher visiting his dying brother in the Bronx. A mysterious journal from the nineteenth century stolen from a boarding house. A therapy clown and an assassin, both presumed dead, but perhaps not dead at all...
-
-
Very Loorie Moore... and yet very not
- By Anonymous User on 06-23-23
By: Lorrie Moore
-
Is It Hot in Here
- (Or Am I Suffering for All Eternity for the Sins I Committed on Earth)?
- By: Zach Zimmerman
- Narrated by: Zach Zimmerman
- Length: 3 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this laugh-and-cry-out-loud, memoir-esque exploration of selfhood, Zach Zimmerman dives into the pros and cons of retiring a Bible-Belt-dwelling, meat-eating, God-fearing identity in exchange for a new lease on life—one of vegetarianism, atheism, queerness, and humor. Whether learning to absolve instilled religious guilt or reminiscing over Tinder dates gone wrong, this book is a candid and hysterical look at one person's journey toward making peace with the past and seeking hope in the future.
-
-
Disjointed
- By Alicia on 02-19-24
By: Zach Zimmerman
-
Ohio
- By: Stephen Markley
- Narrated by: Caitlin Davies, Jayme Mattler, Joy Osmanski, and others
- Length: 16 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Since the turn of the century, a generation has come of age knowing only war, recession, political gridlock, racial hostility, and a simmering fear of environmental calamity. In the country’s forgotten pockets, where industry long ago fled, where foreclosures, Walmarts, and opiates riddle the land, death rates for rural whites have skyrocketed, fueled by suicide, addiction, and a rampant sense of marginalization and disillusionment. This is the world the characters in Stephen Markley’s brilliant debut novel, Ohio, inherit. This is New Canaan.
-
-
Absolutely Moving and Deeply Haunting
- By Matthew Hall on 08-26-18
By: Stephen Markley
-
Our Country Friends
- A Novel
- By: Gary Shteyngart
- Narrated by: Rob Shapiro
- Length: 12 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the rolling hills of upstate New York, a group of friends and friends-of-friends gathers in a country house to wait out the pandemic. Over the next six months, new friendships and romances will take hold, while old betrayals will emerge, forcing each character to reevaluate whom they love and what matters most. The unlikely cast of characters includes a Russian-born novelist, his Russian-born psychiatrist wife, their precocious child obsessed with K-pop, a struggling Indian American writer, a wildly successful Korean American app developer, a global dandy with three passports.
-
-
Beautifully written, painful, but very, very moving
- By Jim on 11-08-21
By: Gary Shteyngart
-
Dinner at Fiorello's
- By: Rick R. Reed
- Narrated by: Joel Leslie
- Length: 7 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Henry Appleby has an appetite for life. As a recent high school graduate and the son of a wealthy family in one of Chicago's affluent North Shore suburbs, his life is laid out for him. Unfortunately, though, he's being forced to follow in the footsteps of his successful attorney father instead of living his dream of being a chef. When an opportunity comes his way to work in a real kitchen the summer after graduation, at a little Italian joint called Fiorello's, Henry jumps at the chance, putting his future in jeopardy.
-
-
Warm and Wonderful.
- By Harmony33 on 03-03-16
By: Rick R. Reed
-
Slonim Woods 9
- A Memoir
- By: Daniel Barban Levin
- Narrated by: Jay Myers
- Length: 11 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In September 2010, at the beginning of the academic year at Sarah Lawrence College, a sophomore named Talia Ray asked her roommates if her father could stay with them for a while. No one objected. Her father, Larry Ray, was just released from prison, having spent three years behind bars after a conviction during a bitter custody dispute.
-
-
Harrowing
- By Joshua on 09-19-21
-
The Prettiest Star
- By: Carter Sickels
- Narrated by: Tiffany Morgan, Charlie Thurston
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At 18, Brian, like so many other promising young gay men, arrived in New York City without much more than a love for the freedom and release from his past that it promised. But within six short years, AIDS would claim his lover, his friends, and his future. With nothing left in New York but memories of death, Brian decides to write his mother a letter asking to come back to the place, and family, he was once so desperate to escape.
-
-
important to remember
- By Mary M Dugan on 10-02-20
By: Carter Sickels
-
Sign Here
- By: Claudia Lux
- Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews, Brittany Pressley
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Peyote Trip has a pretty good gig in the deals department on the fifth floor of Hell. Sure, none of the pens work, the coffee machine has been out of order for a century, and the only drink on offer is Jägermeister, but Pey has a plan—and all he needs is one last member of the Harrison family to sell their soul.
-
-
Great book!
- By Kasie on 10-28-22
By: Claudia Lux
-
The Good Mother
- A Novel
- By: Sue Miller
- Narrated by: Marni Penning
- Length: 14 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After an amicable divorce, piano teacher Anna Dunlap has built an independent life in New England for herself and her four-year-old daughter, Molly. It's all Anna thinks she needs—until she meets Leo Cutter, an artist who makes her feel desired, unabashedly sexual, and filled with certitude and passion for the first time. All it takes is a single unguarded moment for Anna's perfect world to implode. Leveling shocking charges against Leo, Anna's ex-husband crashes back into Anna's life and takes Molly with him.
-
-
As meaningful as it was when it came out.
- By Minneapolis listener on 10-30-20
By: Sue Miller
Critic reviews
“The Late Americans is Brandon Taylor’s best book so far. . . . For all their disagreements and misunderstandings and incompatibilities, [his characters are] all attempting to make peace with the cosmic bêtise of existence, to figure out how to live without compromising everything they value. It’s beautiful and wrenching to watch them try.” —Charles Arrowsmith, Boston Globe
“Brandon Taylor's third book is the most dazzling example of his sharp pen and keen observations of human nature yet. . . . Taylor develops his characters so precisely, they feel like close friends: recognizable, sometimes infuriating, and always worth following to the book's last page.” —Harper's Bazaar
“One of the best contemporary writers on young queer creatives, Taylor continues the theme with this offering about a group of Iowa City friends. . . . Over a year of creative and personal revolution, they go through partnerships, daddy issues, and complicated friendships — all simultaneously chaotic, messy, and loving.” —Rolling Stone
Related to this topic
-
Sweet Sorrow
- The Long-Awaited New Novel from the Best-Selling Author of One Day
- By: David Nicholls
- Narrated by: Rory Kinnear
- Length: 12 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the best-selling author of One Day comes a bittersweet and brilliantly funny coming-of-age tale about the heart-stopping thrill of first love - and how just one summer can forever change a life.
-
-
A delight in every way!
- By Jennifer on 04-24-22
By: David Nicholls
-
Reprieve
- A Novel
- By: James Han Mattson
- Narrated by: JD Jackson
- Length: 12 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On April 27, 1997, four contestants make it to the final cell of the Quigley House, a full-contact haunted escape room in Lincoln, Nebraska, made famous for its monstrosities, booby-traps, and ghoulishly costumed actors. If the group can endure these horrors without shouting the safe word, “reprieve,” they’ll win a substantial cash prize - a startling feat accomplished only by one other group in the house’s long history. But before they can complete the challenge, a man breaks into the cell and kills one of the contestants.
-
-
creepy escape room story
- By Barbara S on 11-18-21
-
Three-Fifths
- By: John Vercher
- Narrated by: J. D. Jackson
- Length: 7 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Pittsburgh, 1995. The son of a black father he’s never known and a white mother he sometimes wishes he didn’t, 22-year-old Bobby Saraceno is passing for white. Raised by his bigoted maternal grandfather, Bobby has hidden his truth from everyone, even his best friend and fellow comic-book geek, Aaron, who has just returned home from prison a hardened racist.
-
-
Good BUT not as good as it sounded
- By jaymie thomas on 12-13-19
By: John Vercher
-
Lay Your Sleeping Head
- The Henry Rios Mysteries, Book 1
- By: Michael Nava
- Narrated by: Thom Rivera
- Length: 7 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A completely revised edition of the first Henry Rios mystery, The Little Death, Lay Your Sleeping Head introduces Michael Nava’s singular protagonist, gay Latino criminal defense lawyer Henry Rios. Rios, beset by personal and professional problems, begins a passionate affair with the black sheep heir to a great California fortune who tells Rios an improbable tale of murder and sexual predation in his wealthy family. When the young man is found dead of an apparent drug overdose, Rios begins an investigation that ultimately reveals much more than murder.
-
-
Loved It
- By Leah Brock on 06-20-20
By: Michael Nava
-
Face It
- By: Georgette Kaplan
- Narrated by: Anastasia Watley
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In college, Elizabeth Smile shared a magical tryst with her roommate, Michelle Harlow. She had no idea the night would leave Elizabeth pining after her for the next ten years. Now Michelle is back with a strange offer: Will she pretend to be Michelle's lesbian lover to beat Michelle's cheating husband?
-
-
Give it a chance—brilliant!
- By Meredith on 01-22-23
By: Georgette Kaplan
-
The Fourth Child
- A Novel
- By: Jessica Winter
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 12 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The author of Break in Case of Emergency follows up her the “extraordinary debut” (The Guardian) with a moving novel about motherhood and marriage, adolescence and bodily autonomy, family and love, religion and sexuality, and the delicate balance between the purity of faith and the messy reality of life.
-
-
Just OK - Considered Bailing
- By Madeleine Homan on 04-18-21
By: Jessica Winter
-
Sweet Sorrow
- The Long-Awaited New Novel from the Best-Selling Author of One Day
- By: David Nicholls
- Narrated by: Rory Kinnear
- Length: 12 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From the best-selling author of One Day comes a bittersweet and brilliantly funny coming-of-age tale about the heart-stopping thrill of first love - and how just one summer can forever change a life.
-
-
A delight in every way!
- By Jennifer on 04-24-22
By: David Nicholls
-
Reprieve
- A Novel
- By: James Han Mattson
- Narrated by: JD Jackson
- Length: 12 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On April 27, 1997, four contestants make it to the final cell of the Quigley House, a full-contact haunted escape room in Lincoln, Nebraska, made famous for its monstrosities, booby-traps, and ghoulishly costumed actors. If the group can endure these horrors without shouting the safe word, “reprieve,” they’ll win a substantial cash prize - a startling feat accomplished only by one other group in the house’s long history. But before they can complete the challenge, a man breaks into the cell and kills one of the contestants.
-
-
creepy escape room story
- By Barbara S on 11-18-21
-
Three-Fifths
- By: John Vercher
- Narrated by: J. D. Jackson
- Length: 7 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Pittsburgh, 1995. The son of a black father he’s never known and a white mother he sometimes wishes he didn’t, 22-year-old Bobby Saraceno is passing for white. Raised by his bigoted maternal grandfather, Bobby has hidden his truth from everyone, even his best friend and fellow comic-book geek, Aaron, who has just returned home from prison a hardened racist.
-
-
Good BUT not as good as it sounded
- By jaymie thomas on 12-13-19
By: John Vercher
-
Lay Your Sleeping Head
- The Henry Rios Mysteries, Book 1
- By: Michael Nava
- Narrated by: Thom Rivera
- Length: 7 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A completely revised edition of the first Henry Rios mystery, The Little Death, Lay Your Sleeping Head introduces Michael Nava’s singular protagonist, gay Latino criminal defense lawyer Henry Rios. Rios, beset by personal and professional problems, begins a passionate affair with the black sheep heir to a great California fortune who tells Rios an improbable tale of murder and sexual predation in his wealthy family. When the young man is found dead of an apparent drug overdose, Rios begins an investigation that ultimately reveals much more than murder.
-
-
Loved It
- By Leah Brock on 06-20-20
By: Michael Nava
-
Face It
- By: Georgette Kaplan
- Narrated by: Anastasia Watley
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In college, Elizabeth Smile shared a magical tryst with her roommate, Michelle Harlow. She had no idea the night would leave Elizabeth pining after her for the next ten years. Now Michelle is back with a strange offer: Will she pretend to be Michelle's lesbian lover to beat Michelle's cheating husband?
-
-
Give it a chance—brilliant!
- By Meredith on 01-22-23
By: Georgette Kaplan
-
The Fourth Child
- A Novel
- By: Jessica Winter
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 12 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The author of Break in Case of Emergency follows up her the “extraordinary debut” (The Guardian) with a moving novel about motherhood and marriage, adolescence and bodily autonomy, family and love, religion and sexuality, and the delicate balance between the purity of faith and the messy reality of life.
-
-
Just OK - Considered Bailing
- By Madeleine Homan on 04-18-21
By: Jessica Winter
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
Real Life
- A Novel
- By: Brandon Taylor
- Narrated by: Kevin R. Free
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Almost everything about Wallace is at odds with the Midwestern university town where he is working uneasily toward a biochem degree. An introverted young man from Alabama, black and queer, he has left behind his family without escaping the long shadows of his childhood. For reasons of self-preservation, Wallace has enforced a wary distance even within his own circle of friends—some dating each other, some dating women, some feigning straightness.
-
-
Not My Gay Real Life
- By Haynes on 02-29-20
By: Brandon Taylor
-
No Reservations
- A Novel of Friendship
- By: Sheryl Lister
- Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo
- Length: 10 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Best friends forever. That's the vow Joy, Diane, Rochelle and Yvette made when they were children, and even in their mid-thirties, the friends have always been there for each other--through the highs and lows of life and love. Until forever comes up against a terminal cancer diagnosis. Nothing could have prepared them for what life would look like when four became three.
-
-
True Friendship
- By Johneshia Kornegay on 02-21-24
By: Sheryl Lister
-
Homebodies
- A Novel
- By: Tembe Denton-Hurst
- Narrated by: Marcella Cox
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Mickey Hayward dreams of writing stories that matter, but, for now, her days are filled with listicles about lip gloss and click-bait articles about celebrity haircare. Still, the job is flashy and her girlfriend is steady and supportive. The path may be long, but Mickey’s well on her way, and it’s far from the messy life she left behind in Maryland. Everything finally seems to be falling into place—until she finds out she’s being replaced.
-
-
I feel seen 🫣
- By Makayla Davis on 10-01-24
-
The Shamshine Blind
- A Novel
- By: Paz Pardo
- Narrated by: Aida Reluzco
- Length: 11 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In an alternate 2009, the United States has been a second-rate power for a quarter of a century, ever since Argentina’s victory in the Falkland’s War thanks to their development of “psychopigments.” Created as weapons, these colorful chemicals can produce almost any human emotion upon contact, and they have been embraced in the US as both pharmaceutical cure-alls and popular recreational drugs. Black market traders illegally sell everything from Blackberry Purple (which causes terror) to Sunshine Yellow (which delivers happiness).
-
-
New and fresh
- By Krista on 03-25-24
By: Paz Pardo
-
The Guest
- A Novel
- By: Emma Cline
- Narrated by: Carlotta Brentan
- Length: 8 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Summer is coming to a close on the East End of Long Island, and Alex is no longer welcome. A misstep at a dinner party, and the older man she’s been staying with dismisses her with a ride to the train station and a ticket back to the city. With few resources and a waterlogged phone, but gifted with an ability to navigate the desires of others, Alex stays on Long Island and drifts like a ghost through the hedged lanes, gated driveways, and sun-blasted dunes of a rarefied world that is, at first, closed to her.
-
-
We’ve known an Alex
- By Will Cathcart on 06-20-23
By: Emma Cline
-
No Stone Unturned
- By: Brandon Massey
- Narrated by: William Wells
- Length: 6 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
No one is more shocked than Eric Newton when he discovers he has an adult daughter. Happily married, a successful business owner, and a dedicated father of two young children, Eric vows to make up for lost time with his newfound child, Destiny. He'll do whatever it takes to be the perfect dad and invites Destiny to move in with his family. But Destiny, 20 years old, has her own ideas about Eric's role in her life—and after a nasty argument one night, Eric wakes to find that she's vanished without a trace.
-
-
page turner
- By Athena Witherspoon on 11-03-22
By: Brandon Massey
-
Real Life
- A Novel
- By: Brandon Taylor
- Narrated by: Kevin R. Free
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Almost everything about Wallace is at odds with the Midwestern university town where he is working uneasily toward a biochem degree. An introverted young man from Alabama, black and queer, he has left behind his family without escaping the long shadows of his childhood. For reasons of self-preservation, Wallace has enforced a wary distance even within his own circle of friends—some dating each other, some dating women, some feigning straightness.
-
-
Not My Gay Real Life
- By Haynes on 02-29-20
By: Brandon Taylor
-
No Reservations
- A Novel of Friendship
- By: Sheryl Lister
- Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo
- Length: 10 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Best friends forever. That's the vow Joy, Diane, Rochelle and Yvette made when they were children, and even in their mid-thirties, the friends have always been there for each other--through the highs and lows of life and love. Until forever comes up against a terminal cancer diagnosis. Nothing could have prepared them for what life would look like when four became three.
-
-
True Friendship
- By Johneshia Kornegay on 02-21-24
By: Sheryl Lister
-
Homebodies
- A Novel
- By: Tembe Denton-Hurst
- Narrated by: Marcella Cox
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Mickey Hayward dreams of writing stories that matter, but, for now, her days are filled with listicles about lip gloss and click-bait articles about celebrity haircare. Still, the job is flashy and her girlfriend is steady and supportive. The path may be long, but Mickey’s well on her way, and it’s far from the messy life she left behind in Maryland. Everything finally seems to be falling into place—until she finds out she’s being replaced.
-
-
I feel seen 🫣
- By Makayla Davis on 10-01-24
-
The Shamshine Blind
- A Novel
- By: Paz Pardo
- Narrated by: Aida Reluzco
- Length: 11 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In an alternate 2009, the United States has been a second-rate power for a quarter of a century, ever since Argentina’s victory in the Falkland’s War thanks to their development of “psychopigments.” Created as weapons, these colorful chemicals can produce almost any human emotion upon contact, and they have been embraced in the US as both pharmaceutical cure-alls and popular recreational drugs. Black market traders illegally sell everything from Blackberry Purple (which causes terror) to Sunshine Yellow (which delivers happiness).
-
-
New and fresh
- By Krista on 03-25-24
By: Paz Pardo
-
The Guest
- A Novel
- By: Emma Cline
- Narrated by: Carlotta Brentan
- Length: 8 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Summer is coming to a close on the East End of Long Island, and Alex is no longer welcome. A misstep at a dinner party, and the older man she’s been staying with dismisses her with a ride to the train station and a ticket back to the city. With few resources and a waterlogged phone, but gifted with an ability to navigate the desires of others, Alex stays on Long Island and drifts like a ghost through the hedged lanes, gated driveways, and sun-blasted dunes of a rarefied world that is, at first, closed to her.
-
-
We’ve known an Alex
- By Will Cathcart on 06-20-23
By: Emma Cline
-
No Stone Unturned
- By: Brandon Massey
- Narrated by: William Wells
- Length: 6 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
No one is more shocked than Eric Newton when he discovers he has an adult daughter. Happily married, a successful business owner, and a dedicated father of two young children, Eric vows to make up for lost time with his newfound child, Destiny. He'll do whatever it takes to be the perfect dad and invites Destiny to move in with his family. But Destiny, 20 years old, has her own ideas about Eric's role in her life—and after a nasty argument one night, Eric wakes to find that she's vanished without a trace.
-
-
page turner
- By Athena Witherspoon on 11-03-22
By: Brandon Massey
-
The American Queen
- By: Vanessa Miller
- Narrated by: Angel Pean
- Length: 9 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Transformative and breathtakingly honest, The American Queen is based on actual events that occurred between 1865 - 1889 and shares the unsung history of a Black woman who built a kingdom in Appalachia as a refuge for the courageous people who dared to dream of a different way of life. Over the twenty-four years she was enslaved on the Montgomery Plantation, Louella learned to feel one thing: hate. Hate for the man who sold her mother. Hate for the overseer who left her daddy to hang from a noose. Hate so powerful there's no room in her heart for love.
-
-
The life of the Queen
- By R. Dameron on 03-26-24
By: Vanessa Miller
-
Someone Had to Do It
- By: Amber Brown, Danielle Brown
- Narrated by: Shayna Small, Brittany Pressley
- Length: 10 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Brandi Maxwell is living the dream as an intern at prestigious New York fashion house Simon Van Doren. Except “living the dream” looks more like scrubbing puke from couture dresses worn by hard-partying models and putting up with microaggressions from her white colleagues. Still, she can’t help but fangirl over Simon’s it-girl daughter, Taylor. Until one night, at a glamorous Van Doren party, when Brandi overhears something she shouldn’t have, and her fate becomes dangerously intertwined with Taylor’s.
-
-
Cringey
- By Danielle on 12-31-22
By: Amber Brown, and others
-
Everybody Knows
- A Novel
- By: Jordan Harper
- Narrated by: Megan Tusing, William DeMeritt
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Welcome to Mae Pruett’s Los Angeles, where “Nobody talks. But everybody whispers.” As a “black-bag” publicist tasked not with letting the good news out but keeping the bad news in, Mae works for one of LA’s most powerful and sought-after crisis PR firms, at the center of a sprawling web of lawyers, PR flaks, and private security firms she calls “The Beast.” They protect the rich and powerful and depraved by any means necessary.
-
-
Dreck!
- By cindy m on 06-09-23
By: Jordan Harper
-
Nightbloom
- By: Peace Adzo Medie
- Narrated by: Jessica Sarkodie, Ekua Ekumah, Sarah Dorgbadzi
- Length: 12 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Selasi and Akorfa were young girls in Ghana, they were more than just cousins; they were inseparable. Selasi was exuberant and funny, Akorfa quiet and studious. They would do anything for each other, imploring their parents to let them be together, sharing their secrets and desires and private jokes. Then Selasi begins to change, becoming hostile and quiet; her grades suffer; she builds a space around herself, shutting Akorfa out.
-
-
Unique but universal
- By Carly on 09-04-23
By: Peace Adzo Medie
-
The Fraud
- A Novel
- By: Zadie Smith
- Narrated by: Zadie Smith
- Length: 12 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is 1873. Mrs. Eliza Touchet is the Scottish housekeeper—and cousin by marriage—of a once-famous novelist, now in decline, William Ainsworth, with whom she has lived for thirty years. Mrs. Touchet is a woman of many interests: literature, justice, abolitionism, class, her cousin, his wives, this life and the next. But she is also sceptical. She suspects her cousin of having no talent; his successful friend, Mr. Charles Dickens, of being a bully and a moralist; and England of being a land of facades, in which nothing is quite what it seems.
-
-
Very disappointing
- By Happy purchaser on 09-10-23
By: Zadie Smith
-
Wade in the Water
- A Novel
- By: Nyani Nkrumah
- Narrated by: Eboni Flowers, Teri Schnaubelt
- Length: 10 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in 1982, in rural, racially divided Ricksville, Mississippi Wade in the Water tells the story of Ella, a Black, unloved, precocious eleven-year-old, and Ms. St. James, a mysterious white woman from Princeton who appears in Ella’s community to carry out some research. Soon, Ms. St. James befriends Ella, who is willing to risk everything to keep her new friend in a town that does not want her there.
-
-
What an absolutely beautiful story!
- By LK on 04-20-23
By: Nyani Nkrumah
-
Essex Dogs
- By: Dan Jones
- Narrated by: Ben Miles
- Length: 13 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
July 1346. The Hundred Years' War has begun, and King Edward and his lords are on the march through France. But this war belongs to the men on the ground. Swept up in the bloody chaos, a tight-knit company from Essex must stay alive long enough to see their home again. With sword, mace and longbow, the Essex Dogs will fight, from the landing beaches of Normandy to the bloodsoaked field of Crécy.
-
-
Great start to a series
- By D.Rockwood on 10-14-23
By: Dan Jones
-
Come and Get It
- By: Kiley Reid
- Narrated by: Nicole Lewis
- Length: 12 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's 2017 at the University of Arkansas. Millie Cousins, a senior resident assistant, wants to graduate, get a job, and buy a house. So when Agatha Paul, a visiting professor and writer, offers Millie an easy yet unusual opportunity, she jumps at the chance. But Millie's starry-eyed hustle becomes jeopardized by odd new friends, vengeful dorm pranks, and illicit intrigue.
-
-
LGBT Propaganda on Overdrive
- By Gretchen on 02-16-24
By: Kiley Reid
-
Lone Women
- A Novel
- By: Victor LaValle
- Narrated by: Joniece Abbott-Pratt
- Length: 9 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Adelaide Henry carries an enormous steamer trunk with her wherever she goes. It’s locked at all times. Because when the trunk opens, people around Adelaide start to disappear. The year is 1915, and Adelaide is in trouble. Her secret sin killed her parents, forcing her to flee California in a hellfire rush and make her way to Montana as a homesteader.
-
-
Amazing story, Phenomenal Narration
- By Frugalshopper on 04-02-23
By: Victor LaValle
-
Our Share of Night
- A Novel
- By: Mariana Enriquez, Megan McDowell
- Narrated by: Frankie Corzo
- Length: 27 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A young father and son set out on a road trip, devastated by the death of the wife and mother they both loved. United in grief, the pair travel to her ancestral home, where they must confront the terrifying legacy she has bequeathed: a family called the Order that commits unspeakable acts in search of immortality.
-
-
This Story Grew on Me
- By Nikki on 02-17-23
By: Mariana Enriquez, and others
-
Chain Gang All Stars
- A Novel
- By: Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
- Narrated by: Shayna Small, Aaron Goodson, Michael Crouch, and others
- Length: 13 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Loretta Thurwar and Hamara “Hurricane Staxxx” Stacker are the stars of Chain-Gang All-Stars, the cornerstone of CAPE, or Criminal Action Penal Entertainment, a highly-popular, highly-controversial, profit-raising program in America’s increasingly dominant private prison industry. It’s the return of the gladiators and prisoners are competing for the ultimate prize: their freedom.
-
-
Can’t wait for more from this author!
- By Brian Sheldon on 06-04-23
-
Let Us Descend
- A Novel
- By: Jesmyn Ward
- Narrated by: Jesmyn Ward
- Length: 8 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Let Us Descend describes a journey from the rice fields of the Carolinas to the slave markets of New Orleans and into the fearsome heart of a Louisiana sugar plantation. A journey that is as beautifully rendered as it is heart wrenching, the novel is “[t]he literary equivalent of an open wound from which poetry pours” (NPR). Annis, sold south by the white enslaver who fathered her, is the listener’s guide. As she struggles through the miles-long march, Annis turns inward, seeking comfort from memories of her mother and stories of her African warrior grandmother.
-
-
Usually I enjoy an author reading…
- By Patio on 11-04-23
By: Jesmyn Ward
What listeners say about The Late Americans
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- RCB
- 07-02-23
The beginning was promising...
The explorations of class feelings and cringe were my favorite parts.
Overall, this is a resentful, argumentative book full of resentful, argumentative characters.
I was left wondering what the point of all this was or if we were supposed to have some takeaway.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- JAH
- 06-25-23
Disjointed depressing stories of disaffected 20 something’s
This well reviewed novel is both tedious and boring. Nothing happens. Everyone whines about how tough their life is compared to their “friends”/college mates. It was a depressing listen that left me empty and disinterested.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Charlotte Allen
- 07-08-23
A bad boring pretentious novel
How this novel got so well reviewed I don’t know except that it must have positioned itself so precisely at the intersection of race, class, and sex with an artsy veneer and a spicy dash of anti-wokeness that everyone in the literary world was afraid to criticize it.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- D. Farkas
- 07-07-23
Truly a bad novel
If you enjoy graphic descriptions of gay sex, THE LATE AMERICANS has something for you. It has little or nothing else to recommend it.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- MLB
- 07-06-23
Characters Lacked Depth, No Plot
I was looking forward to this book, but it is not good. This is a scattered and unorganized piece of writing. I did not care about the characters because all I got to see were the surface levels of who they were and their shallow interactions with others. The sex scenes were overwritten and were mostly gratuitous. The scenes did nothing to propel the plot or provide a deeper understanding of the characters. The characters themselves were neither likable enough for me to cheer for them nor were they unlikable enough to be interesting.
The performance was good, but the material is bad. A disappointment after Taylor's previous novel.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- LDJ
- 05-26-23
Vivid and beautiful journey!
Beautiful journey into this group of friends and lovers. Life's complexities provide a wonderful ride of emotions and relatable happenings. Looking forward to more from the author.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Lucy Fischman
- 08-06-24
why did I continue to listen to this?
Each character was more grating than the next. Completely useless children in adult bodies wreak havoc in each other's lives for absolutely no discernable purpose.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!