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Title details for Fly Away Home by Jennifer Weiner - Available

Fly Away Home

A Novel

by Jennifer Weiner
Judith Light
Audiobook
1 of 2 copies available
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1 of 2 copies available
From one of the nation's most beloved writers, Fly Away Home is an unforgettable story of a mother and two daughters who seek refuge in an old Connecticut beach house.
When Sylvie Serfer met Richard Woodruff in law school, she had wild curls, wide hips, and lots of opinions. Decades later, Sylvie has remade herself as the ideal politician's wife—her hair dyed and straightened, her hippie-chick wardrobe replaced by tailored knit suits. At fifty-seven, she ruefully acknowledges that her job is staying twenty pounds thinner than she was in her twenties and tending to her husband, the senator.

Lizzie, the Woodruffs' younger daughter, is at twenty-four a recovering addict, whose mantra HALT (Hungry? Angry? Lonely? Tired?) helps her keep her life under control. Still, trouble always seems to find her. Her older sister, Diana, an emergency room physician, has everything Lizzie failed to achieve—a husband, a young son, the perfect home—and yet she's trapped in a loveless marriage. With temptation waiting in one of the ER's exam rooms, she finds herself craving more.

After Richard's extramarital affair makes headlines, the three women are drawn into the painful glare of the national spotlight. Once the press conference is over, each is forced to reconsider her life, who she is and who she is meant to be.

Written with an irresistible blend of heartbreak and hilarity, Fly Away Home is an unforgettable story of a mother and two daughters who after a lifetime of distance finally learn to find refuge in one another.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Awards

  • Release date

    July 13, 2010

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781442316874
      • File size: 381612 KB
      • Duration: 13:15:01

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      June 28, 2010
      Weiner (Best Friends Forever) weaves a forgettable family drama with three weakly connected storylines: mother Sylvie Woodruff long ago sacrificed herself to become the perfect politician's wife, but the revelation of her husband's infidelity sends her off to reconnect with her old self. Her daughters aren't faring any better: recovering addict Lizzie is pursuing an interest in photography, but a childhood incident continues to trouble her; and dutiful older daughter Diana, an ER doctor, is escaping her blandly offensive husband via her own affair. The three women's crises function in parallel, and Weiner is unable to keep the narrative tension going when she hops from one character to another, largely because their issues are so tidily resolved and the women are never in real emotional danger—Sylvie's husband's affair is a "one-day story," Lizzie's narcotic slip is to take a couple of Advil PM (and an apology resolves the unresolved past), and the breakdown of Diana's marriage is dispatched as easily as Diana making a resolution to change her life. The lack of conflict and strong characters, and the heavy dose of brand names and ripped-from-the-headlines references, make this disappointingly disposable.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Weiner brings domestic crises of infidelity and personal identity to the fore in her new novel. Judith Light narrates with soft, even tones, barely shifting intonation as the story moves among its three main characters: Sylvie Serfer, whose life spins out of control when the press discovers that her husband, a senator, is having an affair, and her two daughters, Lizzie, a recovering addict, and Diana, a capable emergency room physician. Light deftly portrays the three women as they learn to appreciate and support each other in the face of life's surprises, good and bad. Yet the evenness of Light's reading also suggests a lack of emotional engagement with the story, which distances the listener from Weiner's carefully crafted characters and intricate plot. M.B.K. (c) AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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