Mania: A Novel
Written by Lionel Shriver
Narrated by Abby Craden
()
About this audiobook
""A fantasy that hews uncomfortably close to today’s reality, where facts and the truth are selectively recognized at increasingly subjective whims . . . . The specifics of Mania are the stuff of bleeding satire, but the novel’s guiding concept cuts close to the bone with no anesthesia. Shriver isn’t one to tip-toe around her subjects. She still knows how to poke the bear. In this case, the bear is us.” — Boston Globe
Set in a parallel yet all too familiar near past, a brilliant subversive novel about a lifelong friendship threatened by culture wars, from the New York Times bestselling author.
In an alternative 2011, the Mental Parity movement takes hold. Americans now embrace the sacred, universal truth that there is no such thing as variable human intelligence. Because everyone is equally smart, discrimination against purportedly dumb people is ""the last great civil rights fight."" Tests, grades, and employment qualifications are all discarded. Children are expelled for saying the S-word (“stupid”) and encouraged to report parents who use it at home.
A college English instructor, the constitutionally rebellious Pearson Converse rejected her restrictive Jehovah’s Witness upbringing as a teenager, and so has an aversion to dogma of any kind. Made impotent in the university classroom, she’s also enraged by the crushing of her exceptionally bright children’s spirits in primary school. Fortunately, she enjoys the confidence of a best friend, a media commentator with whom she can speak frankly about her socially unacceptable contempt for the MP movement. Or at least she thinks she can . . . until one day the political chasm between the two women becomes uncrossable, and a lifelong relationship implodes.
With echoes of Philip Roth’s The Human Stain, told in Lionel Shriver’s inimitable and iconoclastic voice, Mania is a sharp, acerbic, and ruthlessly funny book about the road to a delusional, self-destructive egalitarianism that our society is already on.
Lionel Shriver
Although Lionel Shriver has published many novels, a collection of essays, and a column in the Spectator since 2017, and her journalism has been featured in publications including the Guardian, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, she in no way wishes for the inclusion of this information to imply that she is more “intelligent” or “accomplished” than anyone else. The outdated meritocracy of intellectual achievement has made her a bestselling author multiple times and accorded her awards, including the Orange Prize, but she accepts that all of these accidental accolades are basically meaningless. She lives in Portugal and Brooklyn, New York.
More audiobooks from Lionel Shriver
The Mandibles: A Family, 2029-2047 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5We Need to Talk About Kevin movie tie-in: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Property: Stories Between Two Novellas Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The New Republic: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Post-Birthday World Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A Perfectly Good Family Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Big Brother: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5So Much for That Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related to Mania
Related audiobooks
Clean Hands: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Trophy Son: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Siberia Job Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Darkest White: A Mountain Legend and the Avalanche That Took Him Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bad Animals: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBreakheart Hill Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5IF YOU SEE THEM: Young, Unhoused, and Alone in America. Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFreedom Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5The Hank Show: How a House-Painting, Drug-Running DEA Informant Built the Machine That Rules Our Lives Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ghosts of Manhattan: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lark and Termite Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ways of the Dead Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDawson's Fall: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsJust One More Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTwice Lived Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBirdy Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fearless: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Rumor Game: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Concrete Smile Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Backstreets: A Novel from Xinjiang Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Sometimes People Die Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Like Falling Through a Cloud: A Lyrical Memoir of Coping with Forgetfulness, Confusion, and a Dreaded Diagnosis Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Man in the Gray Flannel Suit Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Unthinkable Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Mortal Memory Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Extinction: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Fundamentals of Play Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDon't Know Tough Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Plinko Bounce Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Original Sins: A Novel Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Literary Fiction For You
All the Light We Cannot See: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes: A Hunger Games Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Covenant of Water Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Demon Copperhead: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Remarkably Bright Creatures: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Poisonwood Bible Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Alchemist Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Yellowface: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Man Called Ove: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Leave the World Behind: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Bell Jar Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Stardust Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Their Eyes Were Watching God Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Tom Lake: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Picture of Dorian Gray: Classic Tales Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Measure: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Song of Achilles: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cloud Cuckoo Land: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Parable of the Sower Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5It Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Name of the Wind Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nothing to See Here Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Road Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Overstory Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dutch House: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Kindred Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Hate U Give Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Anxious People: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Future Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Mania
0 ratings0 reviews