From Lionel Shriver, the acclaimed author of the National Book Award finalist So Much for That and the international best seller We Need to Talk About Kevin, comes a striking new novel about family, money, and global economic crisis.

The year is 2029, and nothing is as it should be. The very essence of American life, the dollar, is under attack. In a coordinated move by the rest of the world's governments, the dollar loses all its value. The American president declares that the States will default on all its loans; prices skyrocket, currency becomes essentially worthless, and we watch one family struggle to survive through it all.

The Mandibles can count on their inheritance no longer, and each member must come to terms with this in their own way - from the elegant expat author Nollie, in her middle age, returning to the US from Paris after many years abroad; to her precocious teenage nephew, Willing, who is the only one to actually understand the crisis; to the brilliant Georgetown economics professor Lowell, who watches his whole vision of the world disintegrate before his eyes.

As ever, in her new novel Shriver draws larger than life characters who illuminate this complicated, ever-changing world. One of our sharpest observers of human nature, Shriver challenges us to think long and hard about the society we live in and what, ultimately, we hold most dear.

Listening Length

13 hours and 45 minutes
Author

Lionel Shriver
Narrator

George Newbern
Audible release date

June 21 2016
Language

English
Publisher

HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
ASIN

B07286LYTK
Version

Unabridged
Program Type

Audiobook
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Product details

Listening Length	13 hours and 45 minutes
Author	Lionel Shriver
Narrator	George Newbern
Audible.ca Release Date	June 21 2016
Publisher	HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
Program Type	Audiobook
Version	Unabridged
Language	English
ASIN	B07286LYTK
Best Sellers Rank	#26,153 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals) #1,262 in Literary Fiction (Audible Books & Originals) #2,793 in Family Life #7,879 in Literary Fiction (Books)

Customer reviews

4.1 out of 5

4,238 global ratings

5 star		45%
4 star		32%
3 star		15%
2 star		5%
1 star		3%

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Top reviews from Canada

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Kindle Customer

Fascinating and imaginative

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on May 4, 2023

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Great journey to a future that could be closer than we think. Imaginative, yet nothing so farfetched. Enjoyed the ending.

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Puffy eyes

Reality or fiction?

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on August 5, 2020

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This story hits home in so many ways. Any story that gets me thinking about the future, stocking up my pantry and hoarding gold is well worth reading. The author’s arrogant use of words was at first annoying but then it became clear it had its own purpose and fit well within the storyline. I appreciated the complexity of the characters and family relationships with no clear heroes or villains but instead an understanding of how each of us can be our best or worst under these circumstances.

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Bozzy

A fascinating but troubling book.

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on October 31, 2020

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It was written five years ago, but seems like it shouldn't be written for a few years yet. It's based on a catastrophe in the early 2020's that the American government tries to buy its way out of, only to spark an economic collapse a couple of years later. It recounts the lives and relationships of an extended American family, the Mandibles, living in several east-coast cities as the nations declines into chaos and repression. It is darkly believable and serves as a caution in this time of Covid, although that couldn't have been the intention when it was written. But it could have been provoked by any crisis we try to solve by spending vast amounts of government money. The story is quite readable, the characters seem familiar, and the economic collapse is believable, as is the breakdown in values and the troubling future it describes. It is the kind of collapse predicted in a more academic book, "The Fourth Turning," that came out a few years back, but has only been waiting for the right "catastrophe" to be validated. Given our present circumstances, it is an unsettling story--i.e. clean out your bank accounts, hide some gold, stock up on food, be prepared to defend yourself etc. Well, after all, it is only a story.

2 people found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Dystopic but incredibly realistic

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on November 2, 2019

Verified Purchase

Great Novel, taking place in a not too distant future (2042), in a not apocalictic scenario that could indeed materialize. A must read.

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Linda

Great product! Loved it.

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on January 4, 2022

Verified Purchase

Very appropriate for what is happening in our world today. This fiction book was a great read for me and I recommend people read it.

One person found this helpful

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Miguel

A novel I wish I could read again for the first time!

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on January 3, 2021

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Thank you, Lionel Shriver, for a very enjoyable, entertaining and educational read. Shared within my book club and it was a massive hit! If you have one book to read in 2021, this is it. Definitely a novel I wish I could read again for the first time!

One person found this helpful

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Steve

Politics

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on October 8, 2019

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Could have been a good book, except for the right wing politics. It is throughout the book but very apparent at the end. Too bad. It could have been a good story.

One person found this helpful

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Bob A

America in. Bankruptcy

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on October 14, 2021

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A dark look at the direction America is heading- bankruptcy and societal breakdown. Hard to put down.

One person found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Janie U

Big novel which gives a deep, meaningful read - frightening and darkly comic

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on August 10, 2018

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I had bought this book months earlier and I usually love anything written by Lionel Shriver. I think that I held off as I knew that the narrative had a high amount of economic comment (high for a novel anyway!!) and I've got to be in the right mood for this sort of book. Anyhow, the time came that I was up for it!!
Having read the first few pages I wasn't sure why I had delayed so long. This book is great and written in the author's usual, dry and sardonic style.
The novel starts in 2029 after an economic crash in the US which has turned the world upside down. It's really interesting to see the different levels of predictions from the mundane to the global. This book will become even more fascinating to read as we get closer to the actual date (remember all the interest in 1984?).
I love the details - the names of the characters are intriguing, particularly the children (Goog, Bing, Willing, Fifa as examples) and the use of technology is very inventive.
There is something quite eerie when you see a world which is similar to the present day but worse and all the differences are very plausible. It is a frightening to think about the speed of change - imagine a world with no Amazon, no Apple and no Google as they have all gone in this novel.
At times there are some very detailed descriptions of the financial markets which lost me unless I was working really hard with the narrative. It is an essential part of the story though as everything hangs on what happens with the money that is available.
The humour is bleak but laugh out loud funny at times - "Plots set in the future are about what people fear in the present" - how true is that!!
I've read a lot of recent work by this author in the media commenting on society and politics which gave this novel a huge amount of gravitas. There is an uneasy feeling that you are not just reading a work of fiction and that you are listening to someone who is telling the truth.
It's a sobering experience, watching on as the society crumbles and I found that I could only read this book in relatively short sessions, this also allowed her messages of doom to sink in. I took strong messages from this book and will be talking about it for sometime.
Much of the novel is negative about the human spirit but there are glimpses of good in humanity and they are shown when they are particularly needed.
I have to say that I was pleased when I reached the end as it is a tough read but I had gained much from the messages in the way that I think about the economy.
I desperately want to recommend this to everyone but will need to be selective as this will be too intense for many.

26 people found this helpful

Edward B. Crutchley

Grim, funny and marvellous

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on January 13, 2017

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The hellish image this book creates is unforgettable. Fortunately its generous dose of humour enables to get past all the expository dialogue, a lot of it on economic matters, needed to condition the reader. The Mandibles are several generations of a dysfunctional family, with a wealthy patriarch who won’t die, experiencing the implosion of the United States and their own fortune. There was the recent Stone Age, when the internet went down. In order to support a Social Security regime that takes up 80% of GDP, and to buy off the Chinese (to whom the United States has even ceded the 01 dialling code), the Latino-led government confiscates everything gold and cancels payments on Treasury Bonds. Among the countless hardships facing the Mandibles, they have to move into the same Brooklyn house, umpteen to a room (the house eventually gets stolen); there is general penury of water, not to mention loo paper (it gets quite gory here). The only breadwinner (not counting her 19-year-old niece who becomes a ‘stimulation therapist’) becomes Florence (mother of the young central figure, Willing); she works in a homeless shelter. Lionel Shriver spices her story with plenty of passing cracks. Chelsea Clinton is a past President, Ed Balls is British PM, IBM stands for Indonesian Business Machines, KFC is . . . Korean, and Judge Judy has been appointed to the Supreme Court! There is a tantalising mention of America’s military intervention in New Zealand being one of its last before standing back when China took over Japan. The Mexicans construct a wall to prevent American immigrants (no country seems to want them). Desperate for work, people drop their salary demands in order to be competitive with bots. Most of the population becomes chipped, with the advantage that they no longer have to file to the IRS because income and expenditures are monitored daily. Numerous other technological advances make an appearance, but nothing seems to make up for the failings of people. But why enjoy such a grim story? The theory of equilibrium extends to our minds: for everything we have and take for granted there exists the lingering nightmare of losing it. This story exploits it marvellously.

40 people found this helpful

jimbob1990

Like a child tried to write a modern 1984

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on April 26, 2020

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Repetitive vocabulary. Flip flops between explaining terminology and introducing characters in great detail, to repeating new ones multiple times before hinting at who or what they possibly are. The "dystopian" ideas in the book are in all seriousness existing problems in the world, depending on where you choose to look. It is like somebody tried to rewrite 1984 but had absolutely no creativity in coming up with how to make it different, so Googled "what's wrong with the world today" and used a random news fluff article to help. And as for other people finding that the book has humour, the only thing I have laughed at before deciding not to read to the end is how poor the writing style is.

10 people found this helpful

Mrs. Sarah Crabtree

A family is a political thing

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on October 25, 2022

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As I was reading this novel, outside fireworks punctured the night as Diwali was celebrated. Indeed, it was a double celebration because for the first time the UK was being run by somebody who had beaten the system. The day of the colonial masters was over.
This novel was recommended by Lord Frost, a person who has been described as having that rare ability of a really good grasp of technical policy detail and in the same breath can see the big picture. So I knew this novel was going to be a challenging read. And so it was.
Remembering this is just a novel as I read it was quite hard because there was so much in it that seemed portentous. In between complex financial way-over-my-little-head stuff, there was a flippant tone, as if the author were trying out different aspects of her personality through the various characters; in effect, trying these people on for size. Overall, what I took away from this novel was a content of stunningly raw emotion.

2 people found this helpful

hextol

hard work

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on June 2, 2021

Verified Purchase

although I like her as a writer, found this as a bit of a slog to get through. the extensive economics content particularly at the beginning did not help to engage the mind and it is too long since my A-level in it, to judge whether any of stuff about the collapse of the dollar is plausible. as to the techology predictions these seem all very possible and some were quite intriguing including the insertion of a chip to contol all sorts of things. the real problem was with the Mandibles who were a paricularly unlikeable selection of people. the only limited exceptions were Willing, the young know all and his witer aunt but there was never sufficient interest in any of the characters for me to sustain too much interest in the dystopian world portrayed. really just relived to now being able to move on to something more engaging.

2 people found this helpful

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The Mandibles: A Family, 2029-2047 Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

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