Disappearing Earth
A novel
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Disappearing Earth
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Narrated by:
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Ilyana Kadushin
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Written by:
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Julia Phillips
About this listen
One of The New York Times 10 Best Books of the Year
National Book Award Finalist
Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize
Longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize
Finalist for the New York Public Library's Young Lions Fiction Award
National Best Seller
"Splendidly imagined... Thrilling" (Simon Winchester)
"A genuine masterpiece" (Gary Shteyngart)
Spellbinding, moving - evoking a fascinating region on the other side of the world - this suspenseful and haunting story announces the debut of a profoundly gifted writer.
One August afternoon, on the shoreline of the Kamchatka peninsula at the northeastern edge of Russia, two girls - sisters, eight and 11 - go missing. In the ensuing weeks, then months, the police investigation turns up nothing. Echoes of the disappearance reverberate across a tightly woven community, with the fear and loss felt most deeply among its women.
Taking us through a year in Kamchatka, Disappearing Earth enters with astonishing emotional acuity the worlds of a cast of richly drawn characters, all connected by the crime: a witness, a neighbor, a detective, a mother. We are transported to vistas of rugged beauty - densely wooded forests, open expanses of tundra, soaring volcanoes, and the glassy seas that border Japan and Alaska - and into a region as complex as it is alluring, where social and ethnic tensions have long simmered, and where outsiders are often the first to be accused.
In a story as propulsive as it is emotionally engaging, and through a young writer's virtuosic feat of empathy and imagination, this powerful novel brings us to a new understanding of the intricate bonds of family and community, in a Russia unlike any we have seen before.
©2019 Julia Phillips (P)2019 Random House AudioWhat the critics say
“Mesmerizing.... The mystery of two sisters’ disappearance alternately ebbs and intensifies over the course of a year, [as] each chapter dips into the life of a different girl or woman [on] Kamchatka. The story reads as a page-turner without relying on any cheap narrative tricks to propel it forward, and the strength of Phillips’s writing - her careful attention to character and tone - will grip you right up until the final heart-stopping pages.” (Keziah Weir, Vanity Fair)
“Accomplished and gripping.... The volcano-spiked Kamchatka Peninsula in Far East Russia, where the tundra still supports herds of reindeer and the various Native groups who depend on them, is the evocative setting of Phillips’ novel. In fresh and unpredictable scenes depicting broken friendships and failed marriages, strained family gatherings, and rehearsals of a Native dance troupe, Phillips’ spellbinding prose is saturated with sensuous nuance and emotional intensity, as she subtly traces the shadows of Russia’s past and illuminates today’s daunting complexities of gender and identity, expectations and longing.” (Donna Seaman, Booklist, starred review)
“A superb debut - brilliant. Daring, nearly flawless. A crime jump-starts Disappearing Earth; the novel exposes the ways in which the women of Kamchatka are fragmented not only by [a] kidnapping, but by place [and] identity...Phillips describes the region with a cartographer’s precision and an ethnographer’s clarity, drawing an emblematic cast.... There will be those eager to designate Disappearing Earth a thriller by focusing on the whodunit rather than what the tragedy reveals about the women in and around it. Phillips’ deep examination of loss and longing is a testament to the novel’s power.” (Ivy Pochoda, The New York Times Book Review)
What listeners say about Disappearing Earth
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Sally
- 2020-02-29
Very well written
I liked that we were able to experience the lives of different people in this part of Russai and I have learned more about Russai I didn't know before. However, I do like it when books have a story that flows from one chapter to another rather than each chapter having a new story. Yes there was bits of the overarching story in each chapter but it wasnt significant enough.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance3 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- AnnaTee
- 2021-01-13
Mediocre
When I read the synopsis I was really looking forward to a mystery/thriller revolving around the investigation of the disappearance of the two girls. Instead I got an endless amount of stories by different women and especially on audio it’s been very challenging to keep track of all of them and their significance.
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
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Performance2 out of 5 stars
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Story1 out of 5 stars
- Carol Lundy
- 2020-08-05
Storyline is Confusing at best!
Each month introduces one or two characters however there is no connection among them. The final chapter brings the connection around to chapter one, however the reader is left in limbo as to the actual outcome.
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Overall1 out of 5 stars
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Performance3 out of 5 stars
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Story1 out of 5 stars
- Dr. Eyal Z. Goren
- 2021-04-06
Hugely disappointing
Although the main idea -- many people with their own lives, sorrows and triumphs -- joint by a mystery in ways they are not aware of, is a good idea, the book is hugely disappointing. The author fails to realize the dramatic landscape and the desolation of Kamchatka, she fails to bring out any of the unique things characterizing this remote part of the world, and she fails to take advantage of the potential of telling parts of the story from the victims or perpetrator point of view. Instead you are dragged through hour after hour of domestic dramas clinging to the hope that finally something interesting would eventually happen. It doesn't. Even the last part of the book, where things are picking up somewhat, is hugely disappointing, and the ending leaves you hanging. A total waste of time and money.
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