The World Cannot Give
Written by Tara Isabella Burton
Narrated by Sarah Beth Pfeifer
4/5
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About this audiobook
When shy, sensitive Laura Stearns arrives at St. Dunstan’s Academy in Maine, she dreams that life there will echo her favorite novel, All Before Them, the sole surviving piece of writing by Byronic “prep school prophet” (and St. Dunstan’s alum) Sebastian Webster, who died at nineteen, fighting in the Spanish Civil War. She soon finds the intensity she is looking for among the insular, Webster-worshipping members of the school’s chapel choir, which is presided over by the charismatic, neurotic, overachiever Virginia Strauss. Virginia is as fanatical about her newfound Christian faith as she is about the miles she runs every morning before dawn. She expects nothing short of perfection from herself—and from the member of the choir.
Virginia inducts the besotted Laura into a world of transcendent music and arcane ritual, illicit cliff-diving and midnight crypt visits: a world that, like Webster’s novels, finally seems to Laura to be full of meaning. But when a new school chaplain challenges Virginia’s hold on the “family” she has created, and Virginia’s efforts to wield her power become increasingly dangerous, Laura must decide how far she will let her devotion to Virginia go.
The World Cannot Give is a “hypnotic and intense” (Shondaland) meditation on the power, and danger, of wanting more from the world.
Tara Isabella Burton
Tara Isabella Burton is the author of the novels The World Cannot Give and Social Creature, which was named a Best Book of the Year by The New York Times, Vulture, and The Guardian. She is also the author of the nonfiction books Strange Rites and Self-Made. She has written on religion, culture, and place for The New York Times, National Geographic, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and more. She received a doctorate in theology from Trinity College, Oxford.
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Reviews for The World Cannot Give
34 ratings1 review
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Did an interesting job on loneliness, idolization, and manipulation. Kind of long winded but entertaining nonetheless