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Laura Rider's Masterpiece
Laura Rider's Masterpiece
Laura Rider's Masterpiece
Audiobook5 hours

Laura Rider's Masterpiece

Written by Jane Hamilton

Narrated by Alyssa Bresnahan

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

3/5

()

About this audiobook

The bestselling author of A Map of the World and The Book of Ruth serves up an entirely different kind of novel: Le Divorce meets The Love Letter.

Married for 12 years, Laura and Charlie Rider have come to share almost everything: their nursery business, their love for their animals, and, most especially, their zeal for storytelling. And though they no longer share a bed, they are happy enough continuing along in their pleasant, platonic routine. Then Charlie begins an email exchange in earnest with Jenna Faroli, the host of a popular radio show, and, according to Laura, "the single most famous person in the town." Seeing her opportunity, Laura cannot resist using Charlie’s new connection to promote her writing skills, and together, the couple crafts florid, strangely intimate messages that entice Jenna into their game. "The Project," as they come to call it, quickly spins out of control. As the lines between Laura’s words and Charlie’s feelings become blurred, Jenna finds herself effected in ways most disturbing, while Laura is transformed into an artist of the highest caliber—in her own mind. The end results are hilarious and poignant, and for Laura Rider, beyond even her wildest imagination.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherHarperAudio
Release dateApr 7, 2009
ISBN9780061805660
Laura Rider's Masterpiece
Author

Jane Hamilton

Jane Hamilton lives, works, and writes in an orchard farmhouse in Rochester, Wisconsin.

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Reviews for Laura Rider's Masterpiece

Rating: 3.104545557272728 out of 5 stars
3/5

110 ratings21 reviews

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  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    Adult fiction. A woman obsessed is a dangerous thing, apparently. I'm not sure what to think about this book, actually--it's pretty strange.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This book is quite a departure from Jane Hamilton's other novels, which are harrowing and strike to the heart. (I love them but I can only read one about every five years as they haunt me thereafter. Thankfully, she is not prolific in her output.) Here, she allows her detailed observations of human frailties, foibles, ego and love to emerge in humorous, satirical ways.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I didn't understand the book. And I'm worried about the fate of at least one of the characters. I guess I don't read enough books like this. It made me want to take a literature course and learn more about literary devices.Jenna is smart and knowledgeable and elitist. She believes that being a great writer requires a lifetime of preparation, self-awareness, and insight. I'm sure there are important, meaningful stories created by people who did not immerse themselves in books; although, admittedly, none comes to mind. Laura, on the other hand, thinks reading a few books, watching some movies loosely based on great literature, and maybe taking a writing workshop is more than enough to write the ideal romantic novel. Most disturbing is that Laura likes the Keira Knightley version of Pride and Prejudice; it never occurs to her that she should read the book, that Jane Austen's genius lies in her descriptions of her characters' thoughts and actions. Maybe Hamilton mentions Laura's opinion as a pointer to the fact that Laura is an unreliable narrator. SPOILER: There is a wonderful scene where Jenna tries to show Laura how ridiculous her hopes of being a writer are, but Laura is too unaware to realize she is being insulted; instead, she is inspired by their discussion. Nevertheless, clueless as she is, Laura is the character who makes the deepest comment, reminiscent of the mystical concept of how the world was created:“Maybe the whole point of love was to break each other so that from those shattered selves you could build a better, a sturdier self, so that you could go forward - not had in hand but a comfortable arm’s length apart. Ideally, if both parties were conscious in the romance, Every Man and Every Woman would enter the relationship with arms spread wide open, ready for the adventure of being broken to pieces and reassembled.”
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This is a strange book. It's clearly meant to be funny, but I didn't laugh out loud. Well, no laughing at all really. None of the characters was particularly likable or even interesting. I kept reading to the end because I was in the mood for something light and fluffy and the plot was sufficiently enticing to keep me turning the pages. I've read other works be Jane Hamilton and I usually find them a tad better than this (but on the other hand, she's never going to win a Pulitzer Prize either).
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    I feel guilty about being too critical, but the word "masterpiece" has no place being used anywhere in reference to this book. Perhaps it is intended to come off as trashy, as some sort of commentary on the romance novel Laura hopes to write, but that intention is swallowed up beyond any hope of ironic redemption.

    Foremost among the book's sins is that Hamilton seems to have no idea how people talk. Consider the first conversation in the book, between Laura and Jenna, which is little more than a series of lengthy non sequiturs, with each woman rambling along some weird tangent. All the characters in the book, to be sure, speak as if reciting some carefully-constructed, previously-written dissertation.

    Even aside from the awkwardness of their dialogue, Hamilton's characters are insufferable boors -- pretentious, yet somehow still ignorant. They seem to exist in a state where their every utterance could be a precursor to some grand personal revelation. They orate from a limited sphere of cultural references, as if they'd selected ten items from some list of topics about which learned people think and discuss, and so must constantly return and rereference Faulkner or the Clintons.

    To her credit, Hamilton does manage to glimpse some of the goofiness to which otherwise reasonable people might succumb in the throes of new love or obsession, but buried beneath the weight of her nauseatingly florid prose, the only hope that a reader can have for Laura Rider's Masterpiece is that it will end.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    "Laura Rider's Masterpiece" is a short, humorous and totally unexpected novel by Jane Hamilton, author of "A Map of the World" and "The Book of Ruth." In its own small way, it may be a masterpiece, too.Laura Rider is a successful businesswoman who, with her husband, Charlie, runs a greenhouse and garden business in Wisconsin. Although she admits Charlie is a perfect lover, she decides as she enters middle age that she has had enough sex for one lifetime, and she exiles him to a separate bedroom. Charlie, though frustrated. accepts this with little complaint. Laura, clearly, is in charge.Although she reads little and has written little besides her business newsletter, Laura yearns to become a writer of romances. Stuck for a plot, she decides to orchestrate a real-life romance featuring her unassuming husband.One day Charlie happens by accident to meet Jenna Faroli, host of a popular radio show that Laura listens to regularly. When she hears about this meeting, Laura sees her chance to create a romantic plot. She encourages Charlie to see Jenna again and to maintain an e-mail correspondence, with Laura writing most of Charlie's e-mails for him.The romance turns hot. Jenna's husband remains in the dark, while Charlie's wife manipulates events to thicken her plot.Laura is a strange character, intelligent yet at the same time mindless and heartless. When the affair, thanks to her, becomes a public scandal, she simply revels in the story she has created. She has her masterpiece, never mind the pain it has caused others.Jane Hamilton obviously had fun writing this short 2009 novel, and her readers will have fun reading it, though they may find themselves a bit disturbed, as well.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I enjoyed this story and Hamilton's way of writing. It was a little close to the bone in some aspects and I can say that Hamilton describes certain situations as if she is intimately familiar with them and the emotions they create.I laughed out loud reading this book. Especially toward the end.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    This novel makes an attempt at social satire, but its effectiveness will certainly depend on the reader. It's a book for a very narrow audience. Disappointing.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I enjoyed this book. Quirky and it made me LOL many times. Read some reviews on Amazon and am not sure what bothered those with negative reviews. She definitely had a good sense of humor and I thought that her characters inner thoughts were very uniques
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    From this week's Entertainment Weekly Must List: "Why this novel? Well, who wouldn't want a peek inside the mind of an aspiring romance writer who cuts off sex with her hubby, then engineers an affair for him so she can study it?"Me: Did I just read the same book?Laura Rider's Masterpiece is a satirical love/lust triangle of sorts mixed with a character study in novel form. The triangle involves Laura Rider, an aspiring novelist and successful garden business owner; her husband, Charlie, whom everyone in their small Wisconsin town thinks is gay, but whose main gift in life is his sexual prowess; and Jenna Faroli, a local turned syndicated public radio show host who has moved to town because it is equidistant between the radio station and her judge husband's courthouse. Laura idolizes Jenna, and is eager to start a friendship.I love Jane Hamilton's novels, but one of my favorite things about her novels is that it's always easy to relate to the characters, regardless of their background. Laura Rider's Masterpiece started off well. I was instantly intrigued with Laura's wit and honesty as a narrator. Her description of small-town life was comedic and spot-on. As the narrative shifted to Jenna as the narrator, I again found myself mesmerized by her experiences and perspective.As the novel wore on (and it's hard to say it wore on at all, given it's only 214 pages), it became more satirical, which made the characters less accessible. I was torn between feeling sorry for them and not caring about how things turned out. For such a great start, I did not enjoy the second half of the book. The setup was more enjoyable than the fulfillment. I really wanted to like this novel, and I loved the first half of it, but ultimately, it was underwhelming.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    There is something so cruel about this book, as far as its treatment of its characters, that it left an unpleasant taste in my mouth. Why write about people one cares for so little, people one actually disdains?The only good thing about this book is the cover.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Jane Hamilton tries something new and succeeds. This was a fun read, very funny. A cautionary tale of be careful what you wish for - you never know what will happen. I loved the characters and Hamilton devised a plot which allowed buried aspects of each of them to shine.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    The premise (Laura Rider lures her husband and a local celebrity into an affair with each other to use the material for a novel she wants to write) was interesting. However, I thought that the characters were too easy to dismiss as "kooks" to really want to delve into their motives. Really, if the book had been any longer, I probably wouldn't have finished it. I think it might have worked better as a heavily edited short story.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Great beginning turns into a bizarre story. Laura Rider has "sexual fatigue" from her exuberant husband of 12 years, Charlie. They agree to stop having sex and seem to be living a nice life, running their impressive and beautiful gardening farm. But then Jenna Faroli, an NPR personality similar to Terry Gross, enters their lives. Laura loves Jenna's show and wants to use her as a model for Every Woman in her quest to write a great romance novel. Charlie and Jenna meet by chance and form a friendship through email. Not sure what Jane Hamilton was trying to accomplish with this novel - an exploration of what love really is? Does it have to be fire and passion and heartache or can there be "conscious romance" that avoids all the mess? But it ends up abruptly switching focus from Charlie and Jenna back to Laura and tries to make a statement about authorship instead.This book may just be over my head, like many of the literary references it contains!
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Interesting premise (woman sets up/facilitates her husband's affair with an older woman who is in fact the wife's idol) -- but it was weirdly flat. The characters seemed implausible (except for Jenna Faroli, the idol/adulterer) and the whole thing felt a bit gimmicky. It is, however, very short so it's a quick read. And there are definitely some great observations on the NPR/academic/literary/legal set. If I'd started it expecting social satire instead of a realistic novel I might have liked it better.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Laura Rider's Masterpiece was fun and funny, filled with eccentric characters and interesting details. Now that I've finished, I still can't figure Laura Rider out: she is either a stranger to her emotions or is without feeling, as she coldly and deliberately manipulates the lives of others (her loved ones!) in order to understand how they tick. I read this quickly, as it was entertaining and the characters felt real. What is missing, for me, is a little more depth: there is a great deal of grief in all of the characters, but which I felt somewhat distanced from. I think the form and content are well-married, though, and Jane Hamilton's writing is refreshing and witty. It appears to be an exploration about the mysteries of motivation, of people who do not always behave in ways that are predictable to themselves and others. It raises quite a few questions about human nature, especially at mid-life, especially in regards to love, sex and marriage. I'll read more by her.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    clever, short, fun story of love, writing, emails, affairs. Charlie meets Jenny Faroli, a radio show person). Is Charlie even the least bit homosexual as the whole town thinks he is. His wife Laura, knows he isn't. A pleasant romp.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Laura and Charlie Rider own and run Prairie Wind Farm in rural Wisconsin, with Laura ruling and delegating, and Charlie obliging along. While she is planting and pruning, Laura Rider listens to Jenna Faroli of the famous Jenna Faroli Radio Show and dreams of writing a romance novel. She envisions Jenna simultaneously as a teacher, a confidante, and the heroine of her book. Charlie’s chance encounter with Jenna on the side of the road is the turning point, and Laura sees it as a chance to understand what makes Jenna tick. Together, Charlie and Laura begin corresponding with Jenna via e-mails that are at first friendly, but become increasingly intimate. Jenna’s interest is at first a surprise, but pretty soon they are all crossing lines they never thought they’d cross.I did enjoy the book, and more so after the first twenty pages. At first it was almost too dreamy too be enjoyable, but it eventually moved along into an interesting look at the characters’ motivations. Each was scheming to reach his or her objective, and I do not believe anyone actually did.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Laura Rider lives with her husband, Charlie, in Hartley, Wis., where they own and run the Prairie Wind Farm. After 12 years of marriage, Laura decides to stop sleeping with Charlie, and although Charlie’s best talent is lovemaking, she has decided that she’s done with the whole "sex" thing. Upon meeting local public radio host Jenna Faroli, Laura decides that the time has come to fulfill her fantasy and write a romance novel. It just so happens that fate was on her side and there was a chance meeting between Charlie and Jenna. Laura sees this meeting as her chance to experiment and helps Charlie concoct e-mails to Jenna and inspire a friendship of sorts. Little does Laura know that Charlie and Jenna have their own plans that ignite a feisty affair.I found it a bit hard to get through the first couple of chapters, but eventually the story started to grow on me. I especially liked reading the e-mails between the supposed-Charlie and Jenna. And, although Laura was mischievous, conniving and manipulative (at times) - she was also quite funny and I really ended up liking her. Overall, I thought this story was fun, and Ms. Hamilton’s writing was witty and smart. This book has not been released yet, it comes out on April 9, 2009.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    It had a rough start, some of the writing towards the beginning forced me to reread a sentence or two to get to their meaning. Too many words and emotions in one sentence? Once we get to the point where we are introduced to all the characters, it flows simpler. I loved the packaging of this little book, it was quite adorable. A cute little hardcover with a vintage cover, but I had mixed feelings about the contents. I could not bring myself to empathize with any of the main characters and the subject matter was pretty shallow, or convoluted. I can't make up my mind. It is good ***************** Please visit the Burton Review for the Detailed Review, Thanks!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Totally enjoyed the ride (tee-hee) on this fun exploration of how a writer creates a character. It's just a wee-bit meta. But in such a good way.