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“The debut novel of the season, The Other's Gold reads like an origin story for the women of Big Little Lies.” —Elle
An insightful and sparkling novel that opens on a college campus and follows the friendship of four women across life-defining turning points
Assigned to the same suite during their freshman year at Quincy-Hawthorn College, Lainey, Ji Sun, Alice, and Margaret quickly become inseparable. The leafy green campus they move through together, the idyllic window seat they share in their suite, and the passion and ferocity that school and independence awakens in them ignites an all-encompassing love with one another. But they soon find their bonds—forged in joy, and fused by fear—must weather threats that originate from beyond the dark forests of their childhoods, and come at them from institutions, from one another, and ultimately, from within themselves.
The Other's Gold follows the four friends as each makes a terrible mistake, moving from their wild college days to their more feral days as new parents. With one part devoted to each mistake—the Accident, the Accusation, the Kiss, and the Bite—this complex yet compulsively readable debut interrogates the way that growing up forces our friendships to evolve as the women discover what they and their loved ones are capable of, and capable of forgiving. A joyful, big-hearted book that perfectly evokes the bittersweet experience of falling in love with friendship, the experiences of Lainey, Ji Sun, Alice, and Margaret are at once achingly familiar and yet shine with a brilliance and depth all their own.
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Creators
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Publisher
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Release date
August 27, 2019 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9780593148662
- File size: 320284 KB
- Duration: 11:07:15
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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June 17, 2019
Four women form an intense bond as college freshmen and support one another through life-altering mistakes across a decade and a half in Ames’s unfocused debut. In 2002, sporty Alice, uber-rich Ji Sun, stunningly beautiful but academically struggling Margaret, and feisty, adopted Lainey arrive at Quincy-Hawthorne College. After immediate friendship, Alice divulges that years before she caused her brother’s intellectual disability by intentionally pushing him off a tractor. In their sophomore year, all four become entranced by a popular professor until Ji Sun fabricates a claim of sexual harassment against him. After college they all gravitate to New York City, where Lainey becomes a well-known voice of the Occupy Movement and Alice struggles with fertility problems. The foursome’s friendship cools when Margaret, now a popular blogger and wife to a wealthy scion, crosses a serious line, and drifts further apart when Lainey makes an even more shocking mistake. Ames rarely provides sufficient retribution for characters’ bad decisions, and the tangents about their lives become distracting. Though there are moments of powerful emotion, and the details and emotional crises are well drawn, most readers will feel frustrated by the meandering plot and the characters’ choices. Agent: Lisa Grubka, Fletcher & Company. -
Julia Whelan superbly narrates this story of four friends--South Korean Ji Sun, Southern Margaret, wealthy Alice, and biracial Lainey--who meet as freshmen at an elite New England college. Whelan is exceptionally skilled at conveying dialogue. She creates a distinctive and believable voice for every character, including secondary characters, male and female. Indeed, every character is well considered, with their range of emotions and underlying apprehensions projected in Whelan's varied and impressive portrayals. Her remarkably steady pacing guides listeners through frequent shifts in point of view and an array of scenes ranging from college life to marriages, careers, and illnesses. Listeners will be swept along by Whelan's performance of this engrossing audiobook. M.J. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine
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