Olive, Again: A Novel

Elizabeth Strout

Oct 2019 · Sold by Random House

About this eBook

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK • Pulitzer Prize winner Elizabeth Strout continues the life of her beloved Olive Kitteridge, a character who has captured the imaginations of millions.

“Strout managed to make me love this strange woman I’d never met, who I knew nothing about. What a terrific writer she is.”—Zadie Smith, The Guardian

“Just as wonderful as the original . . . Olive, Again poignantly reminds us that empathy, a requirement for love, helps make life ‘not unhappy.’”—NPR

ONE OF PEOPLE’S TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR
 
Prickly, wry, resistant to change yet ruthlessly honest and deeply empathetic, Olive Kitteridge is “a compelling life force” (San Francisco Chronicle). The New Yorker has said that Elizabeth Strout “animates the ordinary with an astonishing force,” and she has never done so more clearly than in these pages, where the iconic Olive struggles to understand not only herself and her own life but the lives of those around her in the town of Crosby, Maine. Whether with a teenager coming to terms with the loss of her father, a young woman about to give birth during a hilariously inopportune moment, a nurse who confesses a secret high school crush, or a lawyer who struggles with an inheritance she does not want to accept, the unforgettable Olive will continue to startle us, to move us, and to inspire us—in Strout’s words—“to bear the burden of the mystery with as much grace as we can.”

A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: Time, Vogue, NPR, The Washington Post,Chicago Tribune, Vanity Fair, Entertainment Weekly, BuzzFeed, Esquire, Real Simple, Good Housekeeping, The New York Public Library, The Guardian, Evening Standard, Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, BookPage

Ratings and reviews

It's wonderful to pick up a book that so immediately and skillfully plunges you into the small, everyday events that make us all human. Just like her first book (Olive Kitteridge), Elizabeth Strout takes us into the orbit of Maine-born-and-raised Olive -- now older, retired, and just as prickly and wise. Like the first book, this sequel reads like a series of short stories about individuals in and around the small town of Crosby, Maine. Some are Olive's former students. Others, her neighbors. But each has a deeply touching story to tell about the everyday pain people routinely carry, their own resilience, and the kind of love and relationships that brings meaning to our lives. Whether it's a young woman visiting the burned down ruins of her family home, or a Civil War enthusiast who uses the dog to speak to his wife, or the residents of an assisted living facility struggling to find community -- each has a valuable and emotional story to tell. All of them, connected in some way to crusty but lovable Olive. Highly recommended.

FROM : FRANCIAS TO : E. M. B. (CTTKH) JUST TELL THE KING YOU SAW THE FUTURE, SAW ALL, THEN A RANDOM, THEN-- "IS... THAT... A... R.F. PREZ ACCOUNT?!" HAPPY NEW YEAR, HHJJ, BCZ IM A HERMIT TOO, IT'S A :) ): PROPOSAL PS IM 24. YKM. THE DAUGHTER OF HAWKING I DID IT -- VP

I enjoy Olive`s unfiltered outlook on society, people, and the world.

About the author

Elizabeth Strout is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Olive Kitteridge, winner of the Pulitzer Prize; Olive, Again, an Oprah’s Book Club pick; Anything Is Possible, winner of the Story Prize; My Name is Lucy Barton, longlisted for the Man Booker Prize; The Burgess Boys, named one of the best books of the year by The Washington Post and NPR; Abide with Me, a national bestseller; and Amy and Isabelle, winner of the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction and the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize. She has also been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the International Dublin Literary Award, and the Orange Prize. Her short stories have been published in a number of magazines, including The New Yorker and O: The Oprah Magazine. Elizabeth Strout lives in New York City.