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The Great Passage
- Narrated by: Brian Nishii
- Length: 7 hrs and 31 mins
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Publisher's summary
A charmingly warm and hopeful story of love, friendship, and the power of human connection. Award-winning Japanese author Shion Miura's novel is a reminder that a life dedicated to passion is a life well lived.
Inspired as a boy by the multiple meanings to be found for a single word in the dictionary, Kohei Araki is devoted to the notion that a dictionary is a boat to carry us across the sea of words. But after thirty-seven years creating them at Gembu Books, it's time for him to retire and find his replacement.
He discovers a kindred spirit in Mitsuya Majime - a young, disheveled square peg with a penchant for collecting antiquarian books and a background in linguistics - whom he swipes from his company's sales department.
Led by his new mentor and joined by an energetic, if reluctant, new recruit and an elder linguistics scholar, Majime is tasked with a career-defining accomplishment: completing The Great Passage, a comprehensive 2,900-page tome of the Japanese language. On his journey, Majime discovers friendship, romance, and an incredible dedication to his work, inspired by the bond that connects us all: words.
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When Maggie Banks arrives to run her best friend's struggling bookstore, she expects to sell bestsellers to the small-town clientele. But with the town on the map as a top literary destination and the tourist society bent on keeping businesses historic, Maggie is banned from selling anything written this century. So, when a series of mishaps suddenly tip the bookstore toward ruin, Maggie will have to get creative to keep the shop afloat. And in Maggie's world, bookish rules are made to be broken.
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Fast read great narrator great storyline
- By Julianne P McGuirk on 03-17-24
By: Shauna Robinson
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Three Daughters of Eve
- By: Elif Shafak
- Narrated by: Alix Dunmore
- Length: 10 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Set across Istanbul and Oxford, from the 1980s to the present day, Three Daughters of Eve is a sweeping tale of faith and friendship, tradition and modernity, love and an unexpected betrayal. Peri, a wealthy Turkish housewife and mother, is on her way to a dinner party at a seaside mansion in Istanbul when a beggar snatches her handbag. As she wrestles to get it back, a photograph falls to the ground - an old polaroid of three young women and their university professor.
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Review 3 daughters of Eve
- By CA on 04-28-18
By: Elif Shafak
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The Sunday Philosophy Club
- An Isabel Dalhousie Mystery
- By: Alexander McCall Smith
- Narrated by: Davina Porter
- Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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New York Times best-selling author Alexander McCall Smith, winner of the first-ever Saga Award for Wit, has entertained millions with his beloved No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency mysteries. Now this phenomenally popular author introduces a fresh series, brimming with the charm and humor his stable of dedicated fans can't get enough of.
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Advice For Prospective Listeners
- By DCinMI on 02-18-13
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My Salinger Year
- By: Joanna Rakoff
- Narrated by: Joanna Rakoff
- Length: 8 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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At 23, after leaving graduate school to pursue her dreams of becoming a poet, Joanna Rakoff moves to New York City and takes a job as assistant to the storied literary agent for J. D. Salinger. Rakoff is tasked with answering Salinger’s voluminous fan mail. But as she reads the candid, heart-wrenching letters from his readers around the world, she finds herself unable to type out the agency’s decades-old form response. Instead, drawn inexorably into the emotional world of Salinger’s devotees, she abandons the template and begins writing back.
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Good story great performance
- By Marla on 05-22-15
By: Joanna Rakoff
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Mr. Fox
- A Novel
- By: Helen Oyeyemi
- Narrated by: Carol Boyd
- Length: 8 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Fairy-tale romances end with a wedding and the fairy tales don't get complicated. In this book, celebrated writer Mr. Fox can't stop himself from killing off the heroines of his novels, and neither can his wife, Daphne. It's not until Mary, his muse, comes to life and transforms him from author into subject that his story begins to unfold differently....
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A Great Novel, just Poor for Audio
- By James A. Dittes on 08-13-16
By: Helen Oyeyemi
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Winter Collection
- Six Historical Short Stories (A Timeless Romance Anthology, Book 1)
- By: Sarah M. Eden, Heidi Ashworth, Annette Lyon, and others
- Narrated by: Karen Peakes
- Length: 8 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Six award-winning authors have contributed brand new stories to A Timeless Romance Anthology: Winter Collection. A collection unlike any other, listeners will love this compilation of six sweet historical romance novellas, set in varying eras, yet all with one thing in common: Romance.
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Winter
- By Manila J. Dobbs on 08-12-23
By: Sarah M. Eden, and others
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The Housekeeper and the Professor
- By: Yoko Ogawa
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 5 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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He is a brilliant math professor with a peculiar problem - ever since a traumatic head injury, he has lived with only 80 minutes of short-term memory. She is an astute young housekeeper - with a 10-year-old son-who is hired to care for the professor. And every morning, as the professor and the housekeeper are introduced to each other anew, a strange and beautiful relationship blossoms between them.
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The Wonder Of Kindness & Connection
- By Sara on 06-16-16
By: Yoko Ogawa
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How It All Began
- By: Penelope Lively
- Narrated by: Katherine Kellgren
- Length: 7 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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When Charlotte Rainsford, a retired schoolteacher, is accosted by a petty thief on a London street, the consequences ripple across the lives of acquaintances and strangers alike. A marriage unravels after an illicit love affair is revealed through an errant cell phone message; a posh yet financially strapped interior designer meets a business partner who might prove too good to be true.
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Wonderful and beautifully written
- By Molly-o on 02-15-12
By: Penelope Lively
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By the Book
- A Novel
- By: Julia Sonneborn
- Narrated by: Amy McFadden
- Length: 9 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Story
Anne Corey is about to get schooled. An English professor in California, she's determined to score a position on the coveted tenure track at her college. All she's got to do is get a book deal, snag a promotion, and boom! She's in. But then Adam Martinez - her first love and ex-fiancé - shows up as the college's new president. Funny, smart, and full of heart, this modern ode to Jane Austen's classic Persuasion explores what happens when we run into the demons of our past...and when they turn out not to be so bad, after all.
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Disappointing
- By Dr. DonnaJeanne on 03-07-18
By: Julia Sonneborn
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Russian Winter
- A Novel
- By: Daphne Kalotay
- Narrated by: Kathleen Gati
- Length: 14 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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In Russian Winter, the beautiful debut novel by critically acclaimed writer Daphne Kalotay, a famed ballerina’s jewelry auction in Boston reveals long-held secrets of love and family, friendship and rivalry, harkening back to Stalinist Russia. Called “tender, passionate, and moving” by Jenna Blum, the New York Times bestselling author of Those Who Save Us, Russian Winter is a perfect choice for fans of the novels of Debra Dean (The Madonnas of Leningrad), Ann Patchett (Bel Canto), and Ian McEwan (Atonement).
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Read this review; Sophisticated and wonderful!
- By Cookie on 01-15-12
By: Daphne Kalotay
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Enchanted Islands
- A Novel
- By: Allison Amend
- Narrated by: Dina Pearlman
- Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Story
Born in Duluth, Minnesota, in 1882 to immigrant parents, Frances Frankowski covets the life of her best friend, Rosalie Mendel, who has everything Fanny could wish for - money, parents who value education, and an effervescent and winning personality. When, at age 15, Rosalie decides they should run away to Chicago, Fanny jumps at the chance to escape her unexceptional life. But within a year, Rosalie commits an unforgivable betrayal, inciting Frances to strike out on her own.
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I wonder what Aunt Frances would think
- By Rebekah on 06-10-16
By: Allison Amend
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Worth reading; the previous two books were better
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Awful! And I don't mean the book . . .
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So many stories, so much time
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Bookish high school student Rintaro Natsuki is about to close the secondhand bookstore he inherited from his beloved bookworm grandfather. Then, a talking cat appears with an unusual request. The feline asks for — or rather, demands — the teenager’s help in saving books with him. The world is full of lonely books left unread and unloved, and the cat and Rintaro must liberate them from their neglectful owners.
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Enjoyable, Some Audible issues.
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Lonely Castle in the Mirror
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Bullied to the point of dropping out of school, Kokoro's days blur together as she hides in her bedroom, unable to face her family or friends. As she spirals into despair, her mirror begins to shine; with a touch, Kokoro is pulled from her lonely life into a resplendent, bizarre fairytale castle guarded by a strange girl in a wolf mask. Six other students have been brought to the castle, and soon this marvelous refuge becomes their playground.
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I am so glad this book was recommended to me
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Pure Invention
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Performance
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Story
Japan is the forge of the world’s fantasies: karaoke and the Walkman, manga and anime, Pac-Man and Pokémon, online imageboards and emojis. But as Japan media veteran Matt Alt proves in this brilliant investigation, these novelties did more than entertain. They paved the way for our perplexing modern lives.
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great book ruined by ending
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Days at the Morisaki Bookshop
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Twenty-five-year-old Takako has enjoyed a relatively easy existence—until the day her boyfriend Hideaki, the man she expected to wed, casually announces he’s been cheating on her and is marrying the other woman. Suddenly, Takako’s life is in freefall. She loses her job, her friends, and her acquaintances, and spirals into a deep depression. In the depths of her despair, she receives a call from her distant uncle Satoru.
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Improtance of standing still
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How Do You Live
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Overall
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Performance
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How Do You Live? is narrated in two voices. The first belongs to Copper, 15, who after the death of his father must confront inevitable and enormous change, including his own betrayal of his best friend.
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pure joy
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Around the World in 80 Books
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Overall
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Inspired by Jules Verne’s hero Phileas Fogg, David Damrosch, chair of Harvard University’s department of comparative literature and founder of Harvard’s Institute for World Literature, set out to counter a pandemic’s restrictions on travel by exploring 80 exceptional books from around the globe.
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What listeners say about The Great Passage
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- LGLH
- 02-11-18
Engaging, unusual, fun
Engaging performance of a topic of importance to all bibliophiles. Fascinating cast of characters. Also, a nice depiction of productive obsession. This makes it sound stuffy, but it isn't - it's fun!
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8 people found this helpful
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- Jay Quintana
- 06-10-17
A Fun, Light Novel
It's not going to change the world. The characters are pretty much stock characters -- the nerd, the guy who thinks he's much cooler than he is, the beauty who sees beyond beauty (and thus, hope this isn't a SPOILER, falls for the nerd).
The goal isn't that important. Creating a physical dictionary in the internet age? And yet, if you love words and reading, this is a worthwhile, but not a profound, listen. Think of this as dessert, rather than a meal with all major food groups represented.
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7 people found this helpful
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Performance
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Story
- Elisabeth Carey
- 06-24-18
For those who share the love of words
Kohei Araki falls in love with words and dictionaries as a boy. When a university education makes it clear to him that he's a good but not academic-level lexicographer, he goes to work for Gembu Books, and makes dictionaries.
More than thirty years later, he's nearing retirement. His greatest work, The Great Passage, a top-level dictionary of the Japanese language, is well under way, but not yet complete, and he needs to recruit a successor.
He finds Mitsuya Majimi, a disheveled, seemingly unpromising, young man, who nevertheless proves to share his love of words and their power.
They each find other people along the way, wildly different from each other, and each bringing something different to the dictionary project, and to the other, lesser, dictionaries they make along the way. Those lesser dictionaries, including dictionaries for fictional worlds, help make the dictionary department pay, to keep the company happy while they work on their other, great project.
The plot here is overcoming the challenges of publishing--getting the contributions they need from scholars who don't necessarily share their priorities, getting the specialized paper they need, and other seemingly mundane concerns. The real story is the people--Araki, Majimi, their coworkers, friends, and wives, all centering around the love of words, and what they learn from the words, past dictionaries, and each other.
This doesn't sound like much to describe, but I truly enjoyed this book and the people that populate it. Recommended.
I bought this audiobook.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Watergartener
- 11-04-18
Absolutely Delightful!
I will never again pick up a dictionary or look up a word without remembering this wonderful story! The dedication of the main characters to portray the accurate meaning of words, and how that mission defines them, is amazing. I also enjoyed learning a bit about Japanese culture. If you have a love for words, and enjoy how people interact, this story is a win/win!
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4 people found this helpful
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- B.A. Wilson
- 08-06-18
Awkward at a Whole New Level
If you've read one socially awkward book about the many different meanings of Japanese words and language, and the efforts of an unusual cast of characters that forms an unlikely team to create the world's greatest dictionary despite endless obstacles and setbacks, then you've read them all. ;)
This was heartfelt and charming, even though it often reads like a rough week at quiz bowl camp. There's something so uneasy about some of the characters themselves, that you almost feel awkward and uncomfortable just reading about them. . . and I mean that as a compliment, as I think this group of complete misfits was fascinating. I'd like to be friends with all of them. Honestly, I probably am, since I'm also a word nerd and tend to collect unusual people.
When I picked this up, I expected it would suck, and yet I was very close to bumping this up to 5 stars. I think it fell just shy in that I wanted a bit more, especially from some of the side characters. In fact, this is a book that could have benefited from 50 more pages, even though the story is interesting and complete as it is.
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4 people found this helpful
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- careful reader
- 09-12-17
Interesting read about another culture
What did you like best about The Great Passage? What did you like least?
Cultural study bestIt seemed long and drawn out.
What was the most interesting aspect of this story? The least interesting?
The descriptions of how the characters thought. Nice people to know about.
What did you like about the performance? What did you dislike?
He did a good job with interpreting a foreign thinking.
Was The Great Passage worth the listening time?
Only because I was doing something else.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Nitenurse
- 05-19-19
So enjoyable
Who knew all the work that went into publishing a dictionary? Miura's interesting, delightful and poignant novel takes us into the center of a book company as a team works together to publish a new Japanese dictionary, the "Great Passage." Miura captures the precision of the Japanese, along with their dedication to their work. He also gives us a poignant glimpse into the personal lives of those who are involved in this massive project. This is a measured novel - there is no "action" so to speak but in the quietness of the book, Miura allows the reader to experience the tension as well as the joy and respect that the characters bring to launching the dictionary. The love letter from Majime-san to his wife in itself is a work of art.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Sharon
- 03-12-19
"Knitting the Boat"
I didn't really care much for the beginning of the book, especially not the love story between Majime & Kaguya. (I found Nishioka's love story more interesting.) I do find the relationships between Majime and the rest of the characters, and the relationships among the rest of them, very interesting. I like the details on dictionary making and found parts of the 2nd half moving. I could do without the last 30 minutes or so, though.
I found through wikipedia that the original title of the book is "Knitting the Boat". Keeping that title would have helped readers better understand the book. The great passage is a process. It couldn't have been accomplished without each character's efforts in knitting the boat.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Liz Bird
- 03-07-19
If you're a word nerd, you'll like this book.
I listened to this because I was interested in it from both a topic and a cultural perspective. If writing dictionaries is anywhere near as complex as this novel presents it to be, it's completely amazing. And the thoughtful aesthetics and cultural details in the book (especially the paper selection) are fascinating. The characters and story weren't surprising, but they were really lovely. This nerdy little book about dictionaries made me smile.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Ruth
- 02-08-19
I want to be a lexicographer!
Wonderful descriptions of endearing characters, a book full of passion for words and work, and different kinds of love. I so enjoyed my time with these characters! I want to work in the Dictionary Editorial Department of Gembu Books! Very beautifully narrated, with clear distinctions in tone for different characters. Highly recommend!
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2 people found this helpful