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Inland

A Novel

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Inland

Written by: Téa Obreht 
Narrated by: Anna Chlumsky, Edoardo Ballerini, Euan Morton
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About this listen

New York Times Best Seller

Named One of the Best Books of the Year by: Time The Washington PostEsquire Good Housekeeping Town & Country • The New York Public Library • The Dallas Morning NewsKirkus ReviewsLibrary JournalBookPage

The best-selling author of The Tiger’s Wife returns with “a bracingly epic and imaginatively mythic journey across the American West” (Entertainment Weekly).

In the lawless, drought-ridden lands of the Arizona Territory in 1893, two extraordinary lives unfold. Nora is an unflinching frontierswoman awaiting the return of the men in her life - her husband, who has gone in search of water for the parched household, and her elder sons, who have vanished after an explosive argument. Nora is biding her time with her youngest son, who is convinced that a mysterious beast is stalking the land around their home.

Meanwhile, Lurie is a former outlaw and a man haunted by ghosts. He sees lost souls who want something from him, and he finds reprieve from their longing in an unexpected relationship that inspires a momentous expedition across the West. The way in which Lurie’s death-defying trek at last intersects with Nora’s plight is the surprise and suspense of this brilliant novel.

Mythical, lyrical, and sweeping in scope, Inland is grounded in true but little-known history. It showcases all of Téa Obreht’s talents as a writer, as she subverts and reimagines the myths of the American West, making them entirely - and unforgettably - her own.

Praise for Inland

“As it should be, the landscape of the West itself is a character, thrillingly rendered throughout.... Here, Obreht’s simple but rich prose captures and luxuriates in the West’s beauty and sudden menace. Remarkable in a novel with such a sprawling cast, Obreht also has a poetic touch for writing intricate and precise character descriptions.” (The New York Times Book Review - Editors’ Choice)

“Beautifully wrought.” (Vanity Fair)

“Obreht is the kind of writer who can forever change the way you think about a thing, just through her powers of description.... Inland is an ambitious and beautiful work about many things: immigration, the afterlife, responsibility, guilt, marriage, parenthood, revenge, all the roads and waterways that led to America. Miraculously, it’s also a page-turner and a mystery, as well as a love letter to a camel, and, like a camel, improbable and splendid, something to happily puzzle over at first and take your breath away at the end.” (Elizabeth McCracken, O: The Oprah Magazine)

©2019 Téa Obreht (P)2019 Random House Audio
Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction Old West Wild West Marriage Haunted
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What the critics say

"A dynamic pair, Anna Chlumsky and Edoardo Ballerini, deliver an emotionally rich performance of this intricately woven story steeped in the Western frontier.... Anna Chlumsky is near perfect as Nora. Chlumsky employs a slight Western drawl and resists the urge to rush the story, naturally lingering on reflections and revelations. Chlumsky's impressive versatility with a variety characters - men, women, and especially children - further enlivens the performance, transporting listeners to this mythic time and place." (AudioFile magazine)

“Obreht brings her extraordinarily intricate worldview, psychological and social acuity, descriptive artistry, and shrewd, witty, and zestful storytelling to another provocative inquiry into the mysteries of place, nature, and human complexities.... Obreht inventively and scathingly dramatizes the delirium of the West - its myths, hardships, greed, racism, sexism, and violence - in a tornadic novel of stoicism, anguish, and wonder.” [Booklist (starred review)]

“A bracingly epic and imaginatively mythic journey across the American West in 1893, in which the lives of a former outlaw and a frontierswoman collide and intertwine. (Entertainment Weekly)

What listeners say about Inland

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So glad I listened to this

This was totally different and unexpected. Enjoyed it immensely and so glad I listened to it.

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    5 out of 5 stars
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Exquisitely written and highly original

Where to start? This counts easily among the best novels I have read in years. The author pays attention to the smallest details and crafts beautiful sentences while always moving the story forward. Obreht pays homage to the great tradition of the old west's faded romanticism while telling a singularly unique story whose content and style reflect a brilliantly original voice. The readers are fantastic, very compelling and down to earth, capturing both the formality and the vulgarity of the principal characters.

Moving, mesmerizing, and pulls no punches.

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I Tried

I really could not get into this book. Very flat. And boom out of nowhere appears camels?

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