The Maids Version, Daniel Woodrell
The Maids Version, Daniel Woodrell
64 Rating(s)
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The Maid's Version
A Novel

Author: Daniel Woodrell

Narrator: Brian Troxell

Unabridged: 4 hr 10 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 09/03/2013


Synopsis

The American master's first novel since Winter's Bone tells of a deadly dance hall fire and its impact over several generations.

Alma DeGeer Dunahew, the mother of three young boys, works as the maid for a prominent citizen and his family in West Table, Missouri. Her husband is mostly absent, and, in 1929, her scandalous, beloved younger sister is one of the 42 killed in an explosion at the local dance hall. Who is to blame? Mobsters from St. Louis? The embittered local gypsies? The preacher who railed against the loose morals of the waltzing couples? Or could it have been a colossal accident?

Alma thinks she knows the answer-and that its roots lie in a dangerous love affair. Her dogged pursuit of justice makes her an outcast and causes a long-standing rift with her own son. By telling her story to her grandson, she finally gains some solace-and peace for her sister. He is advised to "Tell it. Go on and tell it"-tell the story of his family's struggles, suspicions, secrets, and triumphs.

About Daniel Woodrell

Five of Daniel Woodrell's published novels were selected as New York Times Notable Books of the Year. Tomato Red won the PEN West Award for the Novel in 1999. Woodrell lives in the Ozarks near the Arkansas line with his wife, Katie Estill.


Reviews

Goodreads review by karen on May 05, 2019

"Have to read a whole goddam novel about baseball, only it's not really about baseball, see, it's about sad-assed stuff I already know all I need to know about, but there will be a test." and that's the foundation of it, right? woodrell's characters inhabit their world, and we are all just tourists,......more

Goodreads review by Kemper on January 16, 2014

The thing about small towns and secrets is that usually there aren’t really that many secrets; there are just unpleasant things that aren’t discussed openly. West Table, Missouri, has one of these uncomfortable topics after an explosion destroyed a dance hall and killed dozens of people in 1929. Ther......more

Goodreads review by Lawyer on December 03, 2013

The Maid's Version: Daniel Woodrell's Change of Direction Donald Woodrell, Off Square Books, Oxford, Ms., September 11, 2013 It has been seven years since Daniel Woodrell wrote his last novel, Winter's Bone. Only the small anthology of short stories, The Outlaw Album: Stories appeared after Woodre......more

Goodreads review by Bill on March 01, 2019

Woodrell has moved beyond the confines of hillbilly noir. His prose is so economical, his ability to delineate a character or describe an action so efficient, that The Maid's Version can contain all the vivid settings, complex characters, illuminating subplots and pleasant digressions of an old fash......more

Goodreads review by Cameran on October 03, 2013

It took some time for me to settle into the rhythm of this book. When I began to read I found the structure to be awkward and unsettled. This is one of those stories that requires concentration since the timeline of events jumps around rather than unfold in a linear structure -- so if you do not enj......more


Quotes

Praise for Winter's Bone:
"If William Faulkner lived in the Ozark Mountains today and wrote short, powerful novels set in that little understood, much-maligned swath of rural America, he might sound a lot like Daniel Woodrell."—Los Angeles Times Book Review

"In prose both taut and lyrical, Winter's Bone vividly evokes the spirit of one little woman warrior."—Edna O'Brien