THE UNNAMED AUDIO BOOK: REVIEW AND GIVEAWAY

GIVEAWAY ENDED
THE UNNAMED
AN AUDIO BOOK
BY JOSHUA FERRIS
READ BY JOSHUA FERRIS

ABOUT THE BOOK:

Joshua Ferris' debut novel Then We Came to the End was both heralded by critics and a New York Times bestseller, and marked the arrival of a startlingly talented young writer. With THE UNNAMED, Ferris imagines the collision between one man's free will and the forces of nature that are bigger than any of us. Tim Farnsworth walks. He walks out of meetings and out of bed. He walks in sweltering heat and numbing cold. He will walk without stopping until he falls asleep, wherever he is. This curious affliction has baffled medical experts around the globe--and come perilously close to ruining what should be a happy life. Tim has a loving family, a successful law career and a beautiful suburban home, all of which he maintains spectacularly well until his feet start moving again. What drives a man to stay in a marriage, in a job? What forces him away? Is love or conscience enough to overcome the darker, stronger urges of the natural world? THE UNNAMED is a deeply felt, luminous novel about modern life, ancient yearnings, and the power of human understanding.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Joshua Ferris's first novel, Then We Came to the End, won the Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award, the Barnes and Noble Discover Award, and was a National Book Award finalist. His fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Granta, the Guardian, and Tin House, among other publications. He lives in New York.

REVIEW:

THE UNNAMED is the second book by Joshua Ferris but there is nothing second place about this one. I had not read the first one nor reviews and so entered with no idea of what I was getting into. Tim is the main character and is suffering, to put it mildly, from an unnamed disease. He is a lawyer in New York and so at least provides a comfortable life for his family. His wife, Jane, is loyal to the point almost of disbelief as she stays by his side throughout this strange illness. What happens is that at any moment with no reason, Tim takes off on long walks with nothing or no place in mind. He has been to all kinds of doctors but none of them can offer an explanation for the disease. Although Tim and Jane and their daughter, Becka, appear to be a normal family, as the book goes on, I began to question that initial idea. The couple love one another but I am not sure any love could stand up to this illness and its strange occurrences.

The writing and book at first drew me in as I assumed it would finally come up with some kind of prognosis. After a while, and after the long walks, I realized the author used the walks to somewhat explain Tim's inner emotions and thoughts. He also made the reader understand that even the money this family had was not enough to save him or to keep the family together. Becka, the daughter, was my favorite character. She stayed away from her father and she was also the one who I felt changed the most in the story as it progressed.

By the second half of the book, however, I began to find it hard to continue "walking" with Tim. His walking disease seemed so pointless to me as I felt surely more could have been done for him medically, even if it meant hospitalization and confinement to study and try different cures or remedies. The medication they give him did help somewhat but when Tim makes decisions that really are dangerous for his health, Jane allows it and that I found hard to believe. It was frustrating to me that she didn't insist on some kind of confinement but then again, not to sound trite, but I didn't "walk in their shoes" (thank goodness). Overall, I think the audio book is a much better way to "read" this book as it presents it with more feeling in the voices so it was easier to go along with. I am not sorry I read this book but am pretty sure that Joshua Ferris really has more depth and hidden meaning in this story if you analyze this book. However, I just didn't read it perhaps at a time when I felt I wanted to spend THAT much effort analyzing it. I wasn't in the mood to work that hard on a book. I think everyone will get a somewhat different take on this book and can't imagine it won't pull people in to begin with. I do think some people will totally devour this book while others, depending on their mood, may feel a little different about expending that much effort. I wonder how YOU will feel after you have read THE UNNAMED?

AN AUDIO BOOK GIVEAWAY

THANKS TO ANNA AND THE
HACHETTE BOOK GROUP FOR
SPONSORING THIS GIVEAWAY,
I HAVE 3 COPIES OF THIS AUDIO
BOOK TO GIVE AWAY TO YOU!

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