The Death and Life of August Sweeney

A Novel

By: Samuel Ashworth

Narrated by: Rachel Yong

On the night he dies, August Sweeney is just pulling himself out of the weeds in the restaurant that was supposed to be his comeback. An immense man of immense appetites, August worked his way up from the bowels of a greasy spoon in Queens to international culinary stardom, and his fall, when it came, left a crater visible from space. When Dr. Maya Zhu, a guarded, intense autopsist, is summoned to investigate, she discovers she must operate under strict conditions Sweeney himself dictated before he died. Over the course of a single day, Zhu's fate becomes forever tied to Sweeney's, and her life, and his death, will change in ways she never imagined. For August Sweeney isn't about to let a little thing like death stop him from raising hell.

This is a novel of fame, food, and forensics: The Bear meets Bones. It's a book to make you hungry and ease your fear of death. Ashworth spent weeks working as a prep cook in a Michelin-starred restaurant in France, and learning to perform autopsies at a hospital in Pittsburgh. The result is an unprecedentedly accurate depiction of the restaurant industry, as well as a true New York novel, spanning fifty years of the city's turbulent growth. More than anything, it's a book about the body and its appetites, one that forces us to rethink what it means to live, and what it means to die.

©2025 Samuel Ashworth (P)2025 Tantor Media

life & death: An interesting and complex story

a great story told from different perspectives. Life from the inside out. Much more than I had expected.

My favorite book of the year

I loved this book throughly. The dueling story had me captivated. The character development was rich and provocative. A weird and wild ride from snout to tail

Transcendent beautiful

So very beautiful. Disarming and brilliant views of life and death. No notes on the story as it must be read without any prior knowledge. Probably the best listen of my year!

A brilliant exploration of life and food through the lens of death

The narrator brings to life these characters in a way that feels right. She gives them voice and her pronunciation in different languages is excellent.
But the story itself is so thoughtfully and intelligently weaved together with the narration moving between the characters of Dr. Zhu and August over the course of his life. This book will help you learn about not only the human body, but also the soul. And food is also the soul. An excellent novel from Samuel Ashworth worth spending time with through print or audio.