The Portable Veblen: Shortlisted for the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction 2016
Shortlisted for the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction 2016
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The Portable Veblen: Shortlisted for the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction 2016
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Narrated by:
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Laurence Bouvard
About this listen
SHORTLISTED FOR THE BAILEYS WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2016
Can squirrels speak? Do snails scream?
Will a young couple, newly engaged, make it to their wedding day? Will their dysfunctional families ruin everything? Will they be undone by the advances of a very sexy, very unscrupulous heiress to a pharmaceuticals corporation?
Is getting married even a remotely reasonable idea in the twenty-first century?
And what in the world is a ‘Veblen’ anyway?
‘Raw and weird and hilarious’ Guardian
‘A touching, wildly funny and peculiarly elegant look at the travails of love of all kinds’ Sunday Express
‘Elizabeth McKenzie is clearly some sort of genius’ Paul Murray
‘I can’t remember a book I enjoyed more’ Nina Stibbe
‘Seriously funny and extraordinarily well written’ Jonathan Franzen, Guardian books of the year
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Critic reviews
‘Man oh man, do I love this book! Audacious, imaginative and totally wonderful’ Karen Joy Fowler
'Smart, funny, charming and profound. Elizabeth McKenzie is clearly some sort of genius’ Paul Murray
‘The squirreliest novel I ever read. I enjoyed it completely’ Ursula K. Le Guin
‘Raw and weird and hilarious . . . very entertaining’ Scarlett Thomas, Guardian
‘Ambitious, spirited, funny, daring’ Financial Times
‘A touching, wildly funny and peculiarly elegant look at the travails of love of all kinds’ Sunday Express
‘Utterly charming. A true joy of a book’ Irish Examiner
‘Full of life and humour and compassion’ Times Literary Supplement
‘Witty and sharp’ Irish Times
‘Darkly funny, irrepressibly quirky and very, very hard to put down’ Sam Baker, The Pool
‘Quirky and smart. If you loved Karen Joy Fowler’s We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, you’ll love this’ Glamour
‘Wildly brilliant. Razor-sharp, intimate, hilarious and profound. Every page is a delight’ Emma Jane Unsworth
‘Terrifically entertaining . . . hard to resist’ Daily Mail
‘Offbeat, thoughtful, mischievous . . . McKenzie [has] a pin-sharp eye for the tragic-comic, and for dialogue’ Herald (Scotland)
‘McKenzie has a wonderful eye – and a relishing appetite – for the craziness that is everywhere in ordinary life if you know how to look’ Tessa Hadley
‘A novel of festive originality’ The New York Times
‘Unforgettable. A wild ride that you will not want to miss’ San Francisco Chronicle
‘If The Portable Veblen has a flaw, it is that its caricatures are so on the nose as to make the reader hope to flee the human race’ Boston Globe
‘Oddball characters and plot turns abound, including talking squirrels and bureaucratic ironies worthy of "Catch-22." But a sober question occupies its core: Do our parents' best intentions do us harm?’ Minneapolis Star Tribune
‘Accurately and funnily capture[s] the complexities of modern families . . . The Corrections meets The Wallcreeper’ Huffington Post
Any additional comments?
I probably would not have chosen this book except that I had set myself a challenge to read the whole of the long list for the 2016 Baileys Prize for Fiction ( it subsequently made the shortlist.) However, I am so glad I did give it a go and it is definitely a book that should not be judged by its cover (which is really boring.)The narrative is full of wit, modern-day wisdom, hippy lore, quirky storylines, feisty heroines/female characters, sibling rivalry, misunderstandings and animals who impart advice on life and love. Throw in a healthy dose of cynical corporate mendacity, medical research/ethics, philosophy, hypochondria and wedding planning and you have the basis of a very funny and refreshingly different novel. I would not normally give any time to novels with speaking squirrels but somehow, amazingly, the author manages to make this aspect of the plot work.
The main characters are all well drawn and fully rounded but it is Melanie, a main but secondary character, that is an absolute gem. I started off being irritated by her but by the end of the novel I really loved her.
The narrator was good but the variation in her voice characterisations was not as good as I would have liked, particularly for male voices. overall, she did a good job.
Quirky, Imaginative, Fun. A Revelation
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Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?
It was worth listening to because it is well written. Mckenzie has a good ear for dialogue and I really enjoyed the conversations between the various dysfunctional family members especially Veblen's mother.What was the most interesting aspect of this story? The least interesting?
The story wasn't that interesting and I found myself wanting to skip parts especially anything to do with squirrels - they were tedious in the extreme.Did the narration match the pace of the story?
Laurence Bouvard narrated the story well.Was The Portable Veblen worth the listening time?
On balance, The Portable Veblen is worth listening to, but not an award winning book.Pleasantly readable book
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Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?
No time with a book is ill spent, but this was bordering on vexatious. I can just about deal with books where the characters commune with squirrels, but when they answer back I'm afraid the jig is up.What didn’t you like about Laurence Bouvard’s performance?
It's never a great idea to attempt to do all the individual voices in a reading. Especially across the genders. And even more especially across the genders and those with disabilities.If this book were a film would you go see it?
I would not.Any additional comments?
The writing was fine, and the character of Melanie was a joy, and made the book bearable. At least, as it was audio, I was spared the cutesy illustrations that I gather pepper the text. But this book is up for the Baileys Prize, so what do I know?Sciurine-based irritation
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