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The Largesse of the Sea Maiden

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The Largesse of the Sea Maiden

By: Denis Johnson
Narrated by: Nick Offerman, Michael Shannon, Dermot Mulroney, Will Patton, Liev Schreiber
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Random House presents the audiobook edition of The Largesse of the Sea Maiden by Denis Johnson, read by Nick Offerman, Michael Shannon, Dermot Mulroney, Will Patton, and Liev Schreiber.

The Largesse of the Sea Maiden is the long-awaited new story collection from Denis Johnson, author of the groundbreaking, highly acclaimed Jesus’ Son. Written in the same luminous prose, this collection finds Johnson in new territory, contemplating mortality, the ghosts of the past, and the elusive and unexpected ways the mysteries of the universe assert themselves.

Finished shortly before Johnson’s death, this collection is the last word from a writer whose work will live on for many years to come.

 Anthologies Anthologies & Short Stories Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Short Stories
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Critic reviews

In his lifetime Denis Johnson was far more highly regarded in America than in Britain… This stunning book – bleak, funny tender, despairing and ecstatic (sometimes all at the same time) – decisively proves that the Americans were right. (James Walton)
This posthumously published book of short stories is the long-awaited follow-up to Johnson’s Jesus’ Son (1992), perhaps the most influential and beloved volume of American short stories of the past three decades... One can say about this book what one narrator says about a collection of poems he loves: “They were the real thing, line after line of the real thing.” (Dwight Garner)
[W]ith his untimely death, Johnson’s canonisation as an American seer seems inevitable... The five longish pieces comprising this posthumous collection are all, to my mind, quite wonderful. (James Lasdun)
Now Johnson is dead... we should be sorry to have lost such a wise and compassionate guide to life's darkness, but thankful to have his magnificent books. Here is another of them. (Chris Power)
The prose remains as deliriously alive as ever. In one story there is a rueful, lyrical, lovely paragraph that I hope is more than fictionally true because it suggests that Johnson enjoyed himself producing some of the greatest literary works of our age. (Adam Foulds)
Ranging from hard-edged to thoughtful, the engaging tales in this posthumous collection offer one voice crying out from rehab and another parsing the bonds of prison life. (Jeffrey Burke)
He worked at a level different from the rest of us – a true master. (Zadie Smith)
The God I want to believe in has a voice and sense of humor like Denis Johnson’s. (Jonathan Franzen)
Our most poetic short story writer since Hemingway. (George Saunders)
The great energy of his imagination was a fusion of honesty and seriousness, pain and laughter. His life was a thing of moment and urgency, pure and undistracted. (Marilynne Robinson)
All stars
Most relevant
This was an odd book, beguiling but also a little slow. It's the first I've read by Denis Johnson. I saw it in a bookshop and read a paragraph and didn't buy it. But... found the images created in that paragraph stuck with me. And that's how I've found much of this book - images from it return repeatedly.

The narration is very slow and I listened at double speed (and it still didn't feel fast). Add to that the fact the stories themselves unfold quite slowly and there is a ponderous moment or two in the text. There's a very long rambling piece about a drunk who may or may not be going mad that I found quite tedious - but again with moments of lucid clarity of image that have stuck.

Definitely worth the read and I'll probably read more by the author

Bewitching, slow and intense

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Discovered this in an Industry episode. Well read but ultimately disappointing. All good, engaging stories but nothing earth moving.

Not a patch on Angels

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