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Leaving the Beach
- A Woman's Tale of Music and Mental Illness
- Narrated by: Gryphon Corpus
- Length: 10 hrs and 25 mins
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Publisher's summary
“This is an outstanding novel... Erin is a perfectly flawed heroine.” ~ Semifinalist, 2017 BookLife Prize (10 out of 10 in All 5 Categories Judged)
“Rowen’s angsty, passionate debut explores the virtues and pratfalls of rock and roll fandom... Rowen’s frank delivery will hold readers from start to finish.” ~ Publishers Weekly
Erin Reardon gets her first kiss from Jim Morrison and loses her virginity to David Bowie. When she flunks out of college, Bruce Springsteen comforts her, and Elvis Costello breaks her heart in Europe. So what happens when she finally meets a rock star in the flesh?
Erin’s a lonely misfit with an eating disorder and a wild imagination. She believes she was born to save—and love—at least one tortured musician, and is willing to risk almost everything to fulfill that destiny.
“...gracefully grapples with several important issues, including alcohol and drug addiction, loss, grief and sexuality... There are also many entertaining pop-culture references to offset the weighty themes... An intriguing novel that looks at the ways that people cope with the pain in their lives.” ~ Kirkus Reviews
EVOLVED PUBLISHING PRESENTS a newly revised and edited second edition of a critically-acclaimed, award-winning literary/women’s fiction piece sure to compel you to keep those pages turning.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Leaving the Beach is told in first person by an unreliable narrator named Erin Reardon. Erin is bulimic, she suffers from anxiety and depression, and she engages in dangerous behaviors. Other themes in the book include suicide and suicidality. If any of these topics might distress or trigger you, please read with caution or choose another book. And if you or anyone you know is struggling with eating issues or other mental health issues, help is always available. The National Eating Disorders Association is a great place to start.
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Wish You Were Here
- A Novel
- By: Renée Carlino
- Narrated by: Ava Lucas
- Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Charlotte has spent her 20s adrift, searching for a spark to jump-start her life and give her a sense of purpose. She’s had as many jobs as she’s had bad relationships, and now she’s feeling especially lost in her less-than-glamorous gig at a pie-and-fry joint in Los Angeles, where the uniforms are bad and the tips are even worse. Then she collides - literally - with Adam, an intriguing, handsome, and mysterious painter.
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language within first 2 minutes
- By kay on 04-11-20
By: Renée Carlino
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Lone Stars
- By: Justin Deabler
- Narrated by: Michael Crouch
- Length: 10 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Lone Stars follows the arc of four generations of a Texan family in a changing America. Julian Warner, a father at last, wrestles with a question his husband posed: what will you tell our son about the people you came from, now that they're gone? Finding the answers takes Julian back in time to Eisenhower's immigration border raids, an epistolary love affair during the Vietnam War, crumbling marriages, queer migrations to Cambridge and New York, up to the disorienting polarization of Obama's second term.
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Read for bookclub but fell in Love
- By Ericka Lawson on 09-11-22
By: Justin Deabler
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You Say It First
- By: Katie Cotugno
- Narrated by: Jorjeana Marie, Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 8 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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One conversation can change everything. Meg has her entire life set up perfectly: She and her best friend, Emily, plan to head to Cornell together in the fall, and she works at a voter registration call center in her Philadelphia suburb. But everything changes when one of those calls connects her to a stranger from small-town Ohio.
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Good for a placeholder
- By KJzCola on 07-16-21
By: Katie Cotugno
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Domestic Violets
- A Novel
- By: Matthew Norman
- Narrated by: Todd McLaren
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
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Tom Violet always thought that by the time he turned 35, he’d have everything going for him. Fame. Fortune. A beautiful wife. A satisfying career as a successful novelist. A happy dog to greet him at the end of the day. The reality, though, is far different. He’s got a wife, but their problems are bigger than he can even imagine. And he’s written a novel, but the manuscript he’s slaved over for years is currently hidden in his desk drawer while his father, an actual famous writer, just won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. His career, such that it is, involves mind-numbing corporate buzzwords....
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What a rollicking ride!
- By Pamela Harvey on 08-13-11
By: Matthew Norman
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The Secrets They Left Behind
- A Mystery
- By: Lissa Marie Redmond
- Narrated by: Laura Jennings
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Three college freshmen go missing from their rural hometown of Kelly's Falls while on Christmas break. Their cell phones, coats, and purses are left behind, but the girls have disappeared without a trace. As the days turn into weeks and the investigation grows cold, 23-year-old Buffalo police officer Shea O'Connor is called on to dig up leads undercover.
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Secrets and truths
- By Keenan on 09-28-20
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Stay Gold
- By: Tobly McSmith
- Narrated by: Theo Germaine, Phoebe Strole
- Length: 9 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Pony plans to fly under the radar this year. Tired of getting too much attention at his old school after coming out as transgender, he’s hoping for a fresh start as a Hillcrest High senior. But it’s hard to live your best life with the threat of exposure lurking around every corner. Georgia is beginning to think there’s more to life than cheerleading. She just wants to keep a low profile until graduation...which is why she promised herself that dating is a nonstarter for the foreseeable future.
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Must Read
- By Khoula on 08-17-20
By: Tobly McSmith
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Lucy in the Sky
- By: Anonymous
- Narrated by: Em Eldridge
- Length: 6 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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The author of this diary began journaling on her 16th birthday. She lived in an upper middle class neighborhood in Santa Monica with her mom, dad, and Berkeley-bound older brother. She was a good girl, living a good life...but one party changed everything. One party, where she took one taste - and liked it. Really liked it.
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Navigator sounded like a robot
- By Snow Dunn on 01-06-20
By: Anonymous
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The Time Traveler's Wife
- By: Audrey Niffenegger
- Narrated by: Fred Berman, Phoebe Strole
- Length: 17 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Clare and Henry have known each other since Clare was six and Henry was 36. They were married when Clare was 23 and Henry was 31. Impossible but true, because Henry is one of the first people diagnosed with Chrono-Displacement Disorder: periodically his genetic clock resets and he finds himself misplaced in time, pulled to moments of emotional gravity from his life, past and future. His disappearances are spontaneous, his experiences unpredictable, alternately harrowing and amusing.
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One of my favorite books
- By Joey on 01-13-08
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Scars and Stilettos - 2nd Edition
- By: Harmony Dust
- Narrated by: Harmony Dust
- Length: 7 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Scars and Stilettos: At 13, after being abandoned by her mother one summer and left to take care of her younger brother, Harmony becomes susceptible to a relationship that turns out to be toxic, abusive, and ultimately exploitative. She eventually finds herself working in a strip club at the age of 19, and her boyfriend becomes her pimp, controlling her every move and taking all of her money. Ultimately, she discovers a path to freedom and a whole new life.
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A religious book
- By Amazonbuyer on 10-12-21
By: Harmony Dust
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The McAvoy Sisters Book of Secrets
- A Novel
- By: Molly Fader
- Narrated by: Nancy Peterson
- Length: 9 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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It’s been 17 years since the tragic summer the McAvoy sisters fell apart. Lindy, the wild one, left home, carved out a new life in the city, and never looked back. Delia, the sister who stayed, became a mother herself, raising her daughters and running the family shop in their small Ohio hometown on the shores of Lake Erie. But now, with their mother’s ailing health and a rebellious teenager to rein in, Delia has no choice but to welcome Lindy home.
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Great story
- By Nessa on 09-25-23
By: Molly Fader
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Better Than Chocolate
- By: Sheila Roberts
- Narrated by: Gayle Hendrix
- Length: 11 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Sweet Dreams Chocolate Company has been in the Sterling family for generations, ever since Great-Grandma Rose literally dreamed up her first fabulous recipe. But now it looks as if they're about to lose Sweet Dreams to the bank - and that would be a disaster, not only for the family but for the town of Icicle Falls, Washington. Can Samantha, the oldest daughter and new head of the company, come up with a way to save it? After Samantha does some brainstorming with her mother and sisters, inspiration strikes.
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No consent!
- By R. Hernandez on 10-01-19
By: Sheila Roberts
What listeners say about Leaving the Beach
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Lomeraniel
- 03-01-21
Relatable and flawed character, addictive book
This book has been on my TBR pile for some months, and I regret it now so much! From the very first minutes, it trapped me and didn’t let go. I listened to it literally every free moment I had for the last days as I wasn’t able to stop.
Erin Reardon has serious problems. Not only dealing with bulimia, but also losing her father to a tragic accident, and the world, in general, being unfair to this misunderstood woman. My younger years were much less eventful but I could see myself in so many of Erin’s experiences that it was like Rowen was speaking directly to me. I think the fact that Erin is such a flawed character makes her so relatable and close to our hearts. She makes a bunch of bad decisions, but I was able to understand why she was acting the way she did. Waiting for fr things to go wrong was like watching a car crash in slow motion. You know it’s going to hurt but you just can’t stop looking.
There are two alternating storylines in this book, one from Erin’s younger years in high school and college, and another from several years later when she is a young independent woman but still a hostage to her fears and insecurities. There’s a common aspect to both storylines that I won’t reveal here but it adds a great deal of intrigue to the plot and complements perfectly Erin’s story.
This would have been a 5-star book for me, but I found the ending a bit anticlimactic. It’s not that the story was building towards something big, and we’ve definitely seen Erin’s castles in the air plenty of times before, but there’s something not sitting well with me and I can’t put my finger on it. A solid 4.5 stars.
Gryphon Corpus delivered a delightful narration. She really became Erin in this story, bringing her to life with her warts and all. The book is so well written, and the narration is so well done, that it was like listening to Erin’s thoughts and being with her at concerts, vomiting in the bathroom, and driving to work in the stranger’s car. Gryphon Corpus was also able to interpret the rest of the characters in a way that each had a different style and voice, allowing the listener to easily follow the dialogs and just relax.
A book I thoroughly enjoyed and that I absolutely recommend.
I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
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- Laura
- 06-16-20
Complex and Compelling Story
Mary Rowen wrote a truly complex and compelling story centered around a character named Erin, who although flawed, she had an eating disorder and suffered from the grandiose idea that she is meant to love a famous musician, is still very human. It is a story which gives a voice to issues such as bulimia, alcohol and drug addiction, body image, loss of a parent, sexuality, etc...and although one might think that there are so many issues that the reader would get lost in the miasma of the complexities, Rowen skillfully weaves a tale that has the reader relating to and cheering for the main character completely. The references to some of the musical greats such as Queen and David Bowie help to make the book memorable and very entertaining. I felt that Gryphon Corpus did a great job as narrator in this story. Her expressive voice brought the characters to life and this helped to further depict the complexities in this story. I was given a free copy of the audiobook and I have voluntarily left this review.
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- Margaret
- 07-21-20
Hard to connect to the story
I did not particularly enjoy this book. I had high hopes for the music references, but I fond they mostly fell flat for me, and that in many cases the lyrics (or rather descriptions of the lyrics, to avoid actually quoting the songs) felt like fillers to make the book longer.
Erin as a character did not make a lot of sense to me either. Yes, she definitely had some difficulties and struggles, but I couldn't make sense of her choices and actions. At times she was outright delusional (e.g. Bowie concert)
I did enjoy the narration of the book, and how it was immediately obvious which character was speaking.
I was given a free copy of the book and have left the review voluntarily.
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