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Elaine

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Elaine

By: Will Self
Narrated by: Laurel Lefkow
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About this listen

Standing by the mailbox in Ithaca, New York, Elaine thinks of her child and husband, an Ivy League academic, inside her house and wonders...is this it? As she begins to push back against the strictures of her life in 1950s America, she undertakes a disastrous affair that ends her marriage and upends her life.

Based on the intimate diaries Will Self's mother kept for over forty years, Elaine is a writer's attempt to reach the almost unimaginable realm of a parent's interior life prior to his own existence. Perhaps the first work of auto-oedipal fiction, Elaine shows Self working in an exciting new dimension, utilizing his stylistic talents to tremendous effect.

©2024 Will Self (P)2024 W. F. Howes Ltd
Biographical Fiction Literary Fiction Psychological Women's Fiction
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Will Self is one of today’s most brilliant writers.

Self’s exquisite use of words, ability to allow the reader to fully live within his characters, and impeccable pacing combine to create a work of genius.

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Fascinating thoughts from a complex mind

If only Elaine put her energy and brains to better use, we’d have her books in our Libary. Born too soon x

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