Divisadero

By: Michael Ondaatje

Narrated by: Hope Davis

From the celebrated author of The English Patient and In the Skin of a Lion comes a remarkable new novel of intersecting lives that ranges across continents and time.

In the 1970s in Northern California, near Gold Rush country, a father and his teenage daughters, Anna and Claire, work their farm with the help of Coop, an enigmatic young man who makes his home with them. Theirs is a makeshift family, until it is riven by an incident of violence—of both hand and heart—that sets fire to the rest of their lives.

Divisadero takes us from the city of San Francisco to the raucous backrooms of Nevada’s casinos and eventually to the landscape of south-central France. It is here, outside a small rural village, that Anna becomes immersed in the life and the world of a writer from an earlier time—Lucien Segura. His compelling story, which has its beginnings at the turn of the century, circles around “the raw truth” of Anna’s own life, the one she’s left behind but can never truly leave. And as the narrative moves back and forth in time and place, we discover each of the characters managing to find some foothold in a present rough hewn from the past.

Breathtakingly evoked and with unforgettable characters, Divisadero is a multilayered novel about passion, loss, and the unshakable past, about the often discordant demands of family, love, and memory. It is Michael Ondaatje’s most intimate and beautiful novel to date.

A+, What a pleasure!

The author paints such a beautiful backdrop of time and space for this story. You will love it! The characters are so alive and seem so real. I will be thinking about this book for a long time.

I loved this

I loved this book. Ondaatje's writing is incandescent. The structure, as others have noted, is unconventional. It shifts around in time and points of view and the two halves tell stories that are almost unrelated but they explore similar emotional terrain. The reader is absolutely perfect--a beautiful voice, thoughtful in her pacing and emphasis, and the book's many French names are completely natural to her. This is a story about the deepest bonds possible between people and the way they shape our lives.

A shining gem.

Divisadero may well be Michael Ondaatje's finest work. As a writer, Ondaatje always challenges his readers to go beyond what he has written. Divisadero is no exception. In this exquisite, elusive novel, he tosses his readers onto the shimmering web of human experience. Divisadero is a shining gem that elevates our consciousness by sending us on a mythic journey across time and space. Through the lives of his characters, Ondaatje, with breathtaking, beautiful prose, encourages us to recognize, honor and ultimately release the pivotal, often painful, events that shape every human life. Only then, can we find redemption and grace within the myriad, precious connections that make us who we are.

Incredible “stories” within a “story” 😊

Incredible plot lines weaved throughout this fabulous book! I had been going through my bookshelves and looking through my books and I had found many books that I didn’t have time to get around to reading because I buy so many. I honestly didn’t remember several and this books and a few others I decided to buy on audiobook for convenience of reading (yeah, I know) and I listened to it over night and I fell in love with this book. At first I was intrigued with the book and its introduction and then I was drawn into the general story of the book. As the book progressed I did feel that it had taken on a depressing tone and it had somewhat been at the back of my mind throughout the rest of the book, however the last part of the book had my full I interest and I enjoyed every last second and the ending was portentous. The narrator was excellent and her voice fit the story perfectly and I am not French so I don’t speak with a proper accent nor pronunciation, but the narrator sounded good speaking the French words and phrases. This book is a trip through time and all comes together at the end

all around outstanding

This audiobook has the customary mellifluous writing style of Ondaatje, like reading prose from an outstanding poet, coupled with superb audio narration by Hope Davis. The book has 3 intertwined plots -- a typical stylistic approach by Ondaatje -- that range in space from California to France, and in time from the 1890s to the 1990s.