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Title details for My Sister, My Love by Joyce Carol Oates - Available

My Sister, My Love

by Joyce Carol Oates
Mike Chamberlain
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
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1 of 1 copy available

New York Times bestselling author of The Falls, Blonde, and We Were the Mulvaneys, Joyce Carol Oates returns with a dark, wry, satirical tale--inspired by an unsolved American true-crime mystery.

"Dysfunctional families are all alike. Ditto 'survivors.'"

So begins the unexpurgated first-person narrative of nineteen-year-old Skyler Rampike, the only surviving child of an "infamous" American family. A decade ago the Rampikes were destroyed by the murder of Skyler's six-year-old ice-skating champion sister, Bliss, and the media scrutiny that followed. Part investigation into the unsolved murder; part elegy for the lost Bliss and for Skyler's own lost childhood; and part corrosively funny exposé of the pretensions of upper-middle-class American suburbia, this captivating novel explores with unexpected sympathy and subtlety the intimate lives of those who dwell in Tabloid Hell.

Likely to be Joyce Carol Oates's most controversial novel to date, as well as her most boldly satirical, this unconventional work of fiction is sure to be recognized as a classic exploration of the tragic interface between private life and the perilous life of "celebrity." In MY SISTER, MY LOVE the incomparable Oates once again mines the depths of the sinister yet comic malaise at the heart of our contemporary culture.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    July 15, 2008

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781415955314
      • File size: 647551 KB
      • Duration: 22:29:03

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      With its echoes of the JonBenet Ramsay case, Oates's new novel delves into the intimate lives of those affected by the murder of tot figure-skating champion Bliss Rampike. Boldly satirical, this cautionary tale exposes Mummy and Daddy's misguided ambitions and acts as an elegy for the murdered Bliss and her brother Skyler's lost childhood. Through Mike Chamberlain's expert narration, one can hear Skyler's bewilderment at his parents' flaws and transparently selfish motives. Chamberlain aptly delivers Mummy's plaintive pitch, Daddy's booming machismo, and Bliss's strain. Chamberlain's subtle vocalization conveys an urgency on behalf of the children as it portrays the sinister competition at the heart of contemporary American suburbia. As the story is told in the voice of 19-year old Skyler, one hears the leaden grief, guilt, and bitterness that have resulted from the unsolved tragedy ten years earlier. A.W. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from April 7, 2008
      Oates revisits in fantastic fashion the JonBenet Ramsay murder, replacing the famous family with the Rampikes—father Bix, a bully and compulsive philanderer; mother Betsey, obsessed with making her daughter, Bliss, into a prize-winning figure skater; and son Skyler, the narrator of this tale of ambition, greed and tragedy. Skyler's voice—leaden with grief and guilt—is sometimes that of the nine-year-old he was when his sister was killed, and sometimes the teen he is now, 10 years later, when a letter from his dying mother “solves†the mystery of Bliss's death. The emotionally wrecked Rampike children are collateral damage in a vicious marital battle; Sky is shunted aside, while Bliss is ruthlessly manipulated. Stylistic tricks (direct-address footnotes chief among them) lighten Oates's razor-sharp satire of a privileged enclave where social-climbing neighbors dwell in gargantuan houses; as Oates's readers will expect, the novel is long, propelled at breakneck speed and apt to indulge in verbal excess (as in the 55-page novella within the novel). Oates's psychological acuity, however, ranks this novel as one of the best from a dark observer of our lives and times.

    • Library Journal

      October 1, 2008
      National Book Award winner Oates crafts a scathing commentary on life's excesses in 21st-century America's social-climbing, money-driven, overmedicated suburbs. Narrator Mike Chamberlain (Spanking Shakespeare) captures the querulous, childish voices of 19-year-old Skyler Rampike and his sister, Bliss, an ice-skating prodigy murdered at the age of six. Chamberlain's portrayals of bluff, crass father Bix and the mother, bipolar religious nut Betsy, too, come alive; characters of minor importance to the story show less diversity. Of interest to public and academic libraries as well as to Oates fans. [Audio clip available through library.booksontape.comJoanna M. Burkhardt, Univ. of Rhode Island Lib., Providence

      Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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