Listen to a sample
Speedboat
- Author
- Renata Adler
- Narrator
- Regina Reagan
- Publisher
- Orion
- Publish Date
- 22 July 2021
- Run Time
- 6 hours 33 minutes
- Format
- Audiobook
Not available in your country
We don't have the rights to sell this audiobook where you are. If it's already in your library you can still listen to it in My Books.
What to expect
'Luminously exact' NEW YORK TIMES
'It was as though the novel had outstretched arms and I fell in' PARIS REVIEW
When Speedboat burst on the scene in the late '70s it was like nothing readers had encountered before.
It seemed to disregard the rules of the novel, but it wore its unconventionality with ease. Reading it was a pleasure of a new, unexpected kind.
Above all, there was its voice: ambivalent, curious, wry, the voice of Jen Fain, a journalist negotiating the fraught landscape of contemporary urban America. Party guests, taxi drivers, brownstone dwellers, professors, journalists, presidents and debutantes fill these dispatches from the world as Jen finds it.
A touchstone over the years for writers as different as David Foster Wallace and Elizabeth Hardwick, Speedboat returns to enthral a new generation of readers.
A W&N Essential with an introduction by Hilton Als
Critics Review
-
One of the more penetrating and oddly hypnotizing books I know; reading it is like being in a snowstorm. ...If all you get from SPEEDBOAT is a shudder of pleasure and self-recognition, you are probably not reading deeply enough. Welcome Back, Renata Adler
Meghan O'Rourke, THE NEW YORKER
-
I was in love and then I wasn't, and sometime during the drifting gray interim I was told by a bookseller friend to read SPEEDBOAT, a novel that had long been out of print but was absolutely, he insisted, worth the trouble of the search. ... My friend was correct, as booksellers usually are; it was as though the novel had outstretched arms and I fell in
Anna Weiner, PARIS REVIEW
-
Adler is page by page, line by line, and without interruption, brilliant
Miranda Popkey, NEW YORK OBSERVER
-
SPEEDBOAT is dazzling ...line for line and sentence for sentence, it seems to me thrilling. ... observant, funny, urban
Matthew Spektor, THE BELIEVER
See more reviews See fewer reviews
-
The kind of book you buy multiple copies of to push on friends, the kind you dog-ear and mark up until it could line a hamster cage. It will literally knock your socks off. Read it
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
-
I can't think of a living stylist I admire more than Renata Adler
Elif Batuman
-
A brilliant series of glimpses into the special oddities and new terrors of contemporary life-abrupt, painful, and altogether splendid
Donald Barthelme
User Reviews
No reviews yet.
Details
- Author
- Renata Adler
- Narrator
- Regina Reagan
- Duration
- 6 hours 33 minutes
- Release Date
- 22 July 2021
- ISBN
- 9781474618960
- Format
- Audiobook
- Publisher
- Orion
- Genre
- Classic fiction: literary and general, Publishing industry and journalism, Narrative theme: coming of age
Synopsis
'I can't think of a living stylist I admire more than Renata Adler' ELIF BATUMAN'Luminously exact' NEW YORK TIMES'It was as though the novel had outstretched arms and I fell in' PARIS REVIEWWhen Speedboat burst on the scene in the late '70s it was like nothing readers had encountered before.It seemed to disregard the rules of the novel, but it wore its unconventionality with ease. Reading it was a pleasure of a new, unexpected kind.Above all, there was its voice: ambivalent, curious, wry, the voice of Jen Fain, a journalist negotiating the fraught landscape of contemporary urban America. Party guests, taxi drivers, brownstone dwellers, professors, journalists, presidents and debutantes fill these dispatches from the world as Jen finds it.A touchstone over the years for writers as different as David Foster Wallace and Elizabeth Hardwick, Speedboat returns to enthral a new generation of readers.A W&N Essential with an introduction by Hilton Als
About xigxag
xigxag is an independent, UK-based audiobook platform and the UK's only B Corp certified audiobook company. We offer nearly 150,000 audiobooks, all with professional human narration. No AI-generated voices. xigxag is rated an Ethical Consumer Best Buy for audiobooks and a top-rated ethical bookshop.
There is no subscription. You buy the audiobooks you want, you own them permanently, and prices start at $13.95. The more you listen over the year, the less you pay per book, and there is always a selection in Listen for Less from $7.95. You can also send audiobooks as gifts using our audiobook gift cards or in-app gifting.
Every audiobook on xigxag has honest reviews covering both the book and the narration, and our community features make it easy to share what you are listening to, discover what others recommend, and find your next listen.
Download or stream on iOS, Android, or in your browser. Browse the full catalogue at xigxag.co.uk.