The Book of Goose, Yiyun Li
The Book of Goose, Yiyun Li
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The Book of Goose
A Novel

Author: Yiyun Li

Narrator: Caroline Hewitt

Unabridged: 9 hr 2 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 09/20/2022

Synopsis

A magnificent, beguiling tale winding from the postwar rural provinces to Paris, from an English boarding school, to the quiet Pennsylvania home where a woman can live without her past, The Book of Goose is a story of disturbing intimacy and obsession, of exploitation and strength of will, by the celebrated author Yiyun Li.

Fabienne is dead. Her childhood best friend, Agnès, receives the news in America, far from the French countryside where the two girls were raised—the place that Fabienne helped Agnès escape ten years ago. Now, Agnès is free to tell her story.

As children in a war-ravaged, backwater town, they’d built a private world, invisible to everyone but themselves—until Fabienne hatched the plan that would change everything, launching Agnès on an epic trajectory through fame, fortune, and terrible loss.

A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

About Yiyun Li

Yiyun Li is the author of several works of fiction—Wednesday’s Child; The Book of Goose; Must I Go; Where Reasons End; Kinder Than Solitude; Gold Boy, Emerald Girl; The Vagrants; and A Thousand Years of Good Prayers—and the memoir Dear Friend, from My Life I Write to You in Your Life. She is the recipient of many awards, including a PEN/Faulkner Award, a PEN/Malamud Award, a PEN/Hemingway Award, a PEN/Jean Stein Book Award, a MacArthur Fellowship, and a Windham-Campbell Prize, and she was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, A Public Space, The Best American Short Stories, and The PEN/O. Henry Prize Stories, among other publications. She teaches at Princeton University and lives in Princeton, New Jersey.

Reviews

Goodreads review by emma on February 11, 2025

i can't wait to read about the titular Goose (review to come)......more

Goodreads review by Taufiq on March 24, 2025

Compared to Yiyun Li’s other novels, This 1 obviously is a much easier read - its language is a lot simpler. But even though it feels light on the surface, there are plenty of moments that really make you stop and think. I’ve always been into Li’s writing, and this book is no different. It’s not just......more

Goodreads review by Jill on June 12, 2022

Let us bow our heads and take a moment of silence to honor the colossal talent of Yiyun Li. Her latest novel is psychologically astute, insightful, and page-turning. That’s a hard feat to pay off. There are two girls at the center of the story, set in rural France: Agnes and her closest friend Fabie......more

Goodreads review by Marilyn (not getting notifications) on September 15, 2022

The Book of Goose was the first book that I had the pleasure of reading by Yiyun Li. I was very impressed by her beautiful writing and her unique gift for storytelling. The Book of Goose was most definitely a character driven, coming of age book with a captivating and compelling storyline. I listene......more

Goodreads review by Meike on June 23, 2023

This is a puzzling tale of obsession and self-obliteration: Starting with narrator Agnès being a married woman in the US, she receives a letter about the death of her childhood friend Fabienne - and we join her when she looks back at their relationship. Growing up in a small town in post-WW II Franc......more

Quotes

“Exquisite . . . Knives, minerals, oranges, and the game of Rock Paper Scissors sneak into Agnès’ narrative as she relates the trajectory of a once-unbreakable union. The relative hardness of those substances is a clue to understanding it all. Stunners: Li’s memorable duo, their lives, their losses.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“Bringing to mind Elena Ferrante’s My Brilliant Friend, by way of Anita Brookner’s quietly dramatic prose, [The Book of Goose] makes for a powerful Cinderella fable with memorable characters. It’s an accomplished new turn for Li.”
—Publishers Weekly

Awards

  • PEN/Faulkner Award - Winner
  • BookPage Best Books of the Year
  • New Yorker Best Books of the Year
  • Slate Best Books of the Year
  • Time Magazine Best Books of the Year
  • San Francisco Chronicle Best Book of the Year
  • Los Angeles Times Best Books of the Year
  • Powell's Best Books of the Year
  • Buzzfeed Best Books of the Year
  • Kirkus Reviews Best Books of the Year
  • Los Angeles Times Holiday Books Guide
  • Slate Book Review Best Books of the Year
  • PEN/Faulkner Award - Nominee
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