Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

By: Jeanette Winterson

Narrated by: Jeanette Winterson

The New York Times best-selling author’s Whitbread Prize-winning debut - “Winterson has mastered both comedy and tragedy in this rich little novel” (The Washington Post Book World).

When it first appeared, Jeanette Winterson’s extraordinary debut novel received unanimous international praise, including the prestigious Whitbread Prize for best first fiction. Winterson went on to fulfill that promise, producing some of the most dazzling fiction and nonfiction of the past decade, including her celebrated memoir Why Be Happy When You Can Be Normal?

Now required reading in contemporary literature, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a funny, poignant exploration of a young girl’s adolescence.

Jeanette is a bright and rebellious orphan who is adopted into an evangelical household in the dour, industrial North of England and finds herself embroidering grim religious mottoes and shaking her little tambourine for Jesus. But as this budding missionary comes of age, and comes to terms with her unorthodox sexuality, the peculiar balance of her God-fearing household dissolves. Jeanette’s insistence on listening to truths of her own heart and mind - and on reporting them with wit and passion - makes for an unforgettable chronicle of an eccentric, moving passage into adulthood.

“If Flannery O’Connor and Rita Mae Brown had collaborated on the coming-out story of a young British girl in the 1960s, maybe they would have approached the quirky and subtle hilarity of Jeanette Winterson’s autobiographical first novel.... Winterson’s voice, with its idiosyncratic wit and sensitivity, is one you’ve never heard before.” (Ms. magazine)

©1985 Jeanette Winterson (P)2019 Audible, Inc.

Great Story!

I really enjoyed listening to her experiences as a young woman navigating family expectations, religion, and sexuality! Jeanette’s narration of her story was absolutely amazing!

Great narrator

Usually the authors are rarely good narrators of their own work. I’d read this decades ago but it was pleasure hearing her read her own work. It was wonderful hearing the dialect.

Great performance of a great book

Jeanette Winterson has always been a favorite—but having her perform it is a real treat.

Love the story and the way is told

Love the story and they way is told, story touched me deeply. Author does a fantastic job narrating it.

A classic novel in the UK, on reading lists

This novel won all sorts of awards when it first came out and has been made into a BBC television series, and is obligatory reading in UK schools. It tends to fall into the category of feminist and LGBTQ literature, but it's a very good read even if none of that interests you -- did I mention it won the Whitbread Prize (very fancy literary prize, very hard to win, the book is chosen by the booksellers of the UK for the best new book of the year by a British author)?

It's a semi autobiographical novel about the author's unusual childhood, and a coming of age tale. Adopted by an Christian Evangelical (somewhat twisted woman) with the intention of raising her daughter to be a preacher, the title character was a beacon of her church and lauded for her ability to preach and bring in converts... up until the day she realizes she's a Lesbian. Ultimately she's kicked out by her mother (and her church) and ultimately ends up going to Oxford to study literature and becomes a successful writer... mostly she's known for her children's literature and her autobiographical works.