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Lean Fall Stand

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Lean Fall Stand

By: Jon McGregor
Narrated by: Matt Bates
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About this listen

A WHITE REVIEW BOOK OF THE YEAR

‘It leaves the reader moved and subtly changed, as if she had become part of the story’ Hilary Mantel

The highly anticipated new novel from the Costa-award winning, three-times Booker-longlisted author of Reservoir 13.

When an Antarctic research expedition goes wrong, the consequences are far-reaching – for the men involved and for their families back home.

Robert "Doc" Wright, a veteran of Antarctic field work, holds the clues to what happened, but he is no longer able to communicate them. While Anna, his wife, navigates the sharp contours of her new life as a carer, Robert is forced to learn a whole new way to be in the world.

Award-winning novelist Jon McGregor returns with a stunning novel that mesmerizingly and tenderly unpicks the notion of heroism and explores the indomitable human impulse to tell our stories – even when words fail us. A meditation on the line between sacrifice and selfishness this is a story of the undervalued, unrecognised courage it can take just to get through the day.

’So moving and delicate and terrifying and haunting’ Maggie O’Farrell

©2021 Jon McGregor (P)2021 HarperCollins Publishers Limited
Action & Adventure Adventurers, Explorers & Survival Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Medical People with Disabilities Polar Region

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Critic reviews

Gripping, moving, magnificent’ Kamila Shamsie, author of Home Fire

‘Jon McGregor has crafted a unique narrative, encompassing frozen wastes & altered interior landscapes. The most gripping piece of writing I’ve read in a long time: Sit. Read. Applaud’ Jarvis Cocker

‘Utterly original. Jaw-dropping. The sort of book you’ll think about for ages’ Paula Hawkins, author of Girl on the Train

Another McGregor novel that, beneath its serene surface, takes huge risks … Fortunately, it’s also another McGregor novel that triumphantly gets away with itThe Times

Opens as excitingly as any work of fiction I’ve recently read … It’s extraordinarily tense and atmospheric – and McGregor’s prose is tight as a wire’ Telegraph

Exceptional. … So moving, and the use of language is remarkable. I absolutely loved it’ David Nicholls, author of Sweet Sorrow

‘A genuinely fascinating book and a troubling, riveting reading experience. A bold and masterful investigation into the weather system of the human mind’ Max Porter, author of The Death of Francis Bacon

‘A genuine masterpiece: poised, multilayered and full of the most astonishingly beautiful prose’ Alex Preston, Observer

‘McGregor’s precise, well-judged prose attests to both the power of language and to the havoc created by its loss’ Financial Times

All stars
Most relevant
NB this novel is in three parts: Lean, Fall and Stand. Lean is a gripping drama set in Antarctica. But Fall and Stand are the story of recovering what you can after **Spoiler Alert Spoiler Alert** a stroke. Taken as a whole the novel is a coherent narrative, but if you want an ice-bound adventure, give up after Lean. Please don’t though. You’ll be missing out on what Jon McGregor is brilliant at, why we all need him so much, why I guzzle up his books as soon as I hear about him. Here’s an example: one of the characters has a stroke. Most writers, at that point, would move the first person perspective away from that character. The perspective has been switching between the characters anyway. But McGregor continues - in turn - seeing the world as that character, even as words and sense begin ebbing away. One of McGregor’s hallmarks is writing proper, carefully considered gibberish where it’s required. Another is repetition; another is a generally slow pace. You need patience. Then, in this novel anyway, Jon McGregor takes you, with honest, deliberate thoroughness, into one of your dark places, with a candle.

Not A Gripping Drama Set In Antarctica

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Never has there been so many ways to communicate, and never has there been such a lack of communication. Excellent book.

Communication

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The book was beautifully narrated. However the story, having been heralded as an Antarctic adventure, was largely about the rehabilitation of a stroke patient. Well written and empathetic but not really what I was hoping for.

Not quite what I was expecting

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Profoundly moving to listen to. The breakdown of language, the frustration, sadness, humour and pathos were beautifully enhanced by the narration.

Profoundly moving

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OK story set up, rather disjointed and difficult to follow, but I think that's a chosen style. Tortuous middle section depicting lack of support post stroke for wife and main character. Absolutely awful depiction of someone I think Author is trying to make autistic, for instance she apparently hasn't learnt the meaning of "getting back on the horse" by the time she's in her 50s, but can hold down a job as a university lecturer and researcher. But I can believe how little support they got, can only assume Author chose to make wife autistic rather than introduce her fighting the system for more help, perhaps? But it was rather a flat and stereotypical portrayal, and a bit insulting

Starts in an antarctic exhibition. Ends in dealing with stroke

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