Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

  • Spinster

  • Making a Life of One's Own
  • By: Kate Bolick
  • Narrated by: Kate Bolick
  • Length: 9 hrs and 34 mins
  • 4.1 out of 5 stars (30 ratings)
Offer ends May 1st, 2024 11:59PM GMT. Terms and conditions apply.
£7.99/month after 3 months. Renews automatically.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Spinster cover art

Spinster

By: Kate Bolick
Narrated by: Kate Bolick
Get this deal Try for £0.00

Pay £99p/month. After 3 months pay £7.99/month. Renews automatically. See terms for eligibility.

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Listeners also enjoyed...

All the Single Ladies cover art
The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober cover art
Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake cover art
Reading My Father cover art
The Art of Vanishing cover art
Self Contained cover art
Mercer Girls cover art
Joy cover art
Mind Waves cover art
Hard to Love cover art
Bobbed Hair and Bathtub Gin cover art
Bittersweet cover art
Shirley Jackson cover art
The Dollhouse cover art
Mad Girl's Love Song: Sylvia Plath and Life Before Ted cover art
Germaine cover art

Summary

A New York Times Book Review Notable Book

“Whom to marry, and when will it happen—these two questions define every woman’s existence.” 

So begins Spinster, a revelatory and slyly erudite look at the pleasures and possibilities of remaining single. Using her own experiences as a starting point, journalist and cultural critic Kate Bolick invites us into her carefully considered, passionately lived life, weaving together the past and present to examine why­ she—along with over 100 million American women, whose ranks keep growing—remains unmarried.

This unprecedented demographic shift, Bolick explains, is the logical outcome of hundreds of years of change that has neither been fully understood, nor appreciated. Spinster introduces a cast of pioneering women from the last century whose genius, tenacity, and flair for drama have emboldened Bolick to fashion her life on her own terms: columnist Neith Boyce, essayist Maeve Brennan, social visionary Charlotte Perkins Gilman, poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, and novelist Edith Wharton. By animating their unconventional ideas and choices, Bolick shows us that contemporary debates about settling down, and having it all, are timeless—the crucible upon which all thoughtful women have tried for centuries to forge a good life.

Intellectually substantial and deeply personal, Spinster is both an unreservedly inquisitive memoir and a broader cultural exploration that asks us to acknowledge the opportunities within ourselves to live authentically. Bolick offers us a way back into our own lives—a chance to see those splendid years when we were young and unencumbered, or middle-aged and finally left to our own devices, for what they really are: unbounded and our own to savor.

©2015 Kate Bolick (P)2015 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

New York Times bestseller

One of Flavorwire's 10 Books That Will Define the Conversation in 2015

One of Newsday's Books Not to Miss

One of Publishers Weekly’s Top 10 Social Science Titles of 2015

One of Bookpage’s "15 Books We Can’t Wait to Read in 2015"

One of Vogue.com’s Recommended Spring Books for 2015

Featured in Bookish’s Spring Preview

Featured in Bustle’s Spring Preview

“What’s surprising about Spinster is how, in its charmingly digressive style, the book sets forth a clear vision not just for single women, but for all women: to disregard the reigning views of how women should live, to know their own hearts and to carve out a little space for their dreams.” —New York Times Book Review

“Awakened and inspired by the lives of five historical women, Bolick revels in her own singledom in this blazingly smart memoir, which argues that “spinster” should be a coveted destination, not a dirty word. Her eloquent, provocative story illustrates how charting a unique course can make any life truly singular.” —People

More from the same

What listeners say about Spinster

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    16
  • 4 Stars
    6
  • 3 Stars
    5
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    3
Performance
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    11
  • 4 Stars
    7
  • 3 Stars
    3
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    1
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    11
  • 4 Stars
    5
  • 3 Stars
    4
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    3

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.