Room cover art

Room

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Room

By: Emma Donoghue
Narrated by: Michal Friedman, Ellen Archer, Suzanne Toren, Robert Petkoff
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About this listen

A major film starring Brie Larson.
Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize.
Shortlisted for the Orange Prize.

Unsentimental and sometimes funny, devastating yet uplifting, Room by Emma Donoghue is a story of boundless maternal love. Read by a full cast of narrators.

Scared is what you're feeling. Brave is what you're doing.

Jack lives with his Ma in Room, which has a locked door and a skylight, and measures 11 feet by 11 feet. He loves watching TV, and the cartoon characters he calls friends, but he knows that nothing he sees on screen is truly real – only him, Ma and the things in Room. Until the day Ma admits that there’s a world outside . . .

Told in Jack’s voice, Room is the story of a mother and son whose love lets them survive the impossible...

Part of the Picador Collection, a series celebrating fifty years of Picador books and showcasing the best of modern literature.

©2010 Emma Donoghue (P)2010 Hachette Audio US Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Heartfelt Scary Thought-Provoking Feel-Good

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Critic reviews

"Emma Donoghue's writing is superb alchemy, changing innocence into horror and horror into tenderness. Room is a book to read in one sitting. When it's over you look up: the world looks the same but you are somehow different and that feeling lingers for days." (Audrey Niffenegger)
" Room is one of the most profoundly affecting books I've read in a long time. Jack moved me greatly. His voice, his story, his innocence, his love for Ma combine to create something very unusual and, I think, something very important.... Room deserves to reach the widest possible audience." (John Boyne)
"I loved Room. Such incredible imagination, and dazzling use of language. And with all this, an entirely credible, endearing little boy. It's unlike anything I've ever read before." (Anita Shreve)
"I’ve never read a more heart-burstingly, gut wrenchingly compassionate novel . . . As for sweet, bright, funny Jack, I wanted to scoop him up out of the novel and never let him go. In him, Donoghue has created 21st-century fiction's most uniquely loveable voice. She deserves to win this year's Man Booker Prize." ( Daily Mail)
"extraordinary power of Donoghue's utterly gripping story which, although not essentially just hers, has never been told in such a way before." ( Mirror Book of the Week)
"In filling this book with things that are both truly horrific and rather lovely, Emma Donoghue has achieved a work that is deeply unsettling on every level. It is a strange paradox that a book about imprisonment and torture should have become an arena for discussing the proper care and love of children. I think I am glad to have read it." ( Financial Times)
"What saves this beautifully nuanced book from being in any way a voyeuristic reaction to true crime is less the descriptions of captivity than the inevitably changing nature of the child / parent relationship, which Donoghue explores here so minutely, recognisably and exultantly." ( Sunday Telegraph)
All stars
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This book was hyped to me so much by my friends so I had high hopes but I think it was just 'ok'. The child's voice got on my nerves after a while. It's an easy story to follow, not many twists or turns. I think it is rated highly because of the context in which it is set rather than it being a particularly good piece of literature.

Underwhelmed

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I enjoyed this book, which was well-narrated, but found aspects of the plot somewhat unconvincing. A really interesting subject for a book - I just thought it fell a bit short.

Compelling if a little unconvincing...

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If you could sum up Room in three words, what would they be?

Amazing, brave, beautiful

Who was your favorite character and why?

Of course Jack!
He is a beautiful, very smart, very brave child and He made me smile, he made me cry with his intelligence

Have you listened to any of the narrators’s other performances? How does this one compare?

The narration was outstanding and it once again proved me that I should pay less attention to other reviews when buying a book. I don't understand the negative reviews about narration of Jack, it was outstanding for me

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Yes. I had already watched the film but still, the story was so compelling..

Any additional comments?

I remember ı felt as if I was hit by a truck after I watched the film. This time I was much prepared but still, the story is a page turner

Amazing story, outstanding narration

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A really interesting story, definitely worth a listen. I was gripped throughout even through the slower paced chapters. The actor's voice is slightly irritating at first but you get used to it as the story develops so don't let that put you off.

Great story

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Fabulously read!! A surprisingly gripping listen- I was not sure what to expect- very clever indeed!

Gripping

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Incredible story telling font the child's perspective.at first I found the narrative hard to listen too but then the little voice just got right into my head and had to listen to the end .At times I wanted to shoot at his mum to listen with her brain and not her ears but she did in the end
Fantastic

Brilliant

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I have no idea why the two covers for this book are both bright and happy. This is a pretty damn tough book that will make you feel claustrophobic and in constant danger. It is all made worse by being seen through the eyes of a child. At first, I didn't like the narration since it was child-like, but I soon realized that this was the whole point.

Tough and rewarding read (don't trust the cover!)

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A story that will stay with you forever, it is both tragic and triumphant and you will enjoy every minute of its telling from beginning to end. Highly recommended!

Haunting

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A firm new favourite. The first thing I've read by Emma Donoghue but definitely won't be the last

I didn't want it to end.

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exceptionally well portrayed story that leaves you feeling both bereft and grateful. thoroughly addictive.

spell binding extraordinary tale

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