Mercury: A Novel
(OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen)
A taut emotional thriller about love, obsession and the secrets that pull a family apart.
Donald believes he knows all there is to know about seeing. An optician in suburban Boston, he rests assured that he and his wife, Viv, who works at the local stables, will live out quiet lives with their two children. Then Mercury—a gorgeous young racehorse—enters their lives and everything changes.
Viv's friend Hilary has inherited Mercury from her brother after his mysterious death—he was riding Mercury late one afternoon and the horse returned to the stables alone. When Hilary first brings Mercury to board at the stables everyone there is struck by his beauty and prowess, particularly Viv. As she rides him, Viv dreams of competing with Mercury, rebuilding the ambitions of grandeur that she held for herself before moving to the suburbs. But her daydreams soon morph into consuming desire, and her infatuation with the thoroughbred quickly escalates to obsession.
By the time Donald understands the change that has come over Viv, it is too late to stop the impending fate that both their actions have wrought for them and their loved ones. A beautifully crafted, riveting novel about the ways in which relationships can be disrupted and, ultimately, destroyed by obsession, secrets and ever-escalating lies.
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Margot Livesey. (2016). Mercury: A Novel. Unabridged HarperAudio.
Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation (style guide)Margot Livesey. 2016. Mercury: A Novel. HarperAudio.
Chicago / Turabian - Humanities Citation (style guide)Margot Livesey, Mercury: A Novel. HarperAudio, 2016.
MLA Citation (style guide)Margot Livesey. Mercury: A Novel. Unabridged HarperAudio, 2016.
Library | Owned | Available |
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Shared Digital Collection | 1 | 1 |
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A taut emotional thriller about love, obsession and the secrets that pull a family apart.
Donald believes he knows all there is to know about seeing. An optician in suburban Boston, he rests assured that he and his wife, Viv, who works at the local stables, will live out quiet lives with their two children. Then Mercury—a gorgeous young racehorse—enters their lives and everything changes.
Viv's friend Hilary has inherited Mercury from her brother after his mysterious death—he was riding Mercury late one afternoon and the horse returned to the stables alone. When Hilary first brings Mercury to board at the stables everyone there is struck by his beauty and prowess, particularly Viv. As she rides him, Viv dreams of competing with Mercury, rebuilding the ambitions of grandeur that she held for herself before moving to the suburbs. But her daydreams soon morph into consuming desire, and her infatuation with the thoroughbred quickly escalates to obsession.
By the time Donald understands the change that has come over Viv, it is too late to stop the impending fate that both their actions have wrought for them and their loved ones. A beautifully crafted, riveting novel about the ways in which relationships can be disrupted and, ultimately, destroyed by obsession, secrets and ever-escalating lies.
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July 11, 2016
Livesey’s latest (following The Flight of Gemma Hardy) is a fiercely intelligent exploration of the ways blindness—to ourselves, others, and the power of passion and grief—can divide and transform us. After his father dies of Parkinson’s, optometrist Donald Stevenson’s reserve deepens into what Viv, his wife of nine years, likens to the airless impenetrability of an astronaut’s suit. Viv’s teenage dreams of equestrian competition resurface when Mercury, an exceptionally promising thoroughbred, comes to board at the suburban Boston stable she helps run. Donald; Viv’s boss, Claudia; and Mercury’s owner, Hilary, assume that Viv accepts the obvious: Mercury is not hers to risk, compete on, or control. Facing their resistance to her growing obsession and increasingly distanced from Donald, Viv conceals the time and money she lavishes on the horse. When the stable is repeatedly broken into, she fears that telling Claudia or Hilary will lead to Mercury’s removal. Instead, she buys a gun. Seen primarily from Donald’s muffled, sometimes pedantic perspective, the novel unfolds patiently, through a chain of small and mostly well-intentioned deceptions that nevertheless yield catastrophe. Livesey’s skillful play with the title’s many meanings—trickster god of speed, diagnostic aid, minor planet, deadly poison—gives her narrative a rich imagery that interweaves seamlessly with its textured evocation of everyday life.
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- content: Margot Livesey's latest work explores blindness in both its literal and figurative manifestations. Narrator Derek Perkins performs wonderfully as Donald, a Scotsman who is transplanted to Boston. Donald is an ophthalmologist with perfect vision--except where his wife, Viv, is concerned. Donald fails to notice Viv's obsession with Mercury, a thoroughbred stallion she believes is her chance to make a name for herself. Narrator Nicol Zanzarella delivers Viv's sections in an agitated, sincere tone that is perfect for the high-strung middle-aged woman whose insights never touch on her own personal problems. Perkins and Zanzarella deliver convincing performances as a violent act brings devastation in this convoluted drama, which is less about a horse than about the erosion of trust due to secrets, lies, and willful blindness. Intense listening. S.J.H. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine
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A taut emotional thriller about love, obsession and the secrets that pull a family apart.
Donald believes he knows all there is to know about seeing. An optician in suburban Boston, he rests assured that he and his wife, Viv, who works at the local stables, will live out quiet lives with their two children. Then Mercury—a gorgeous young racehorse—enters their lives and everything changes.
Viv's friend Hilary has inherited Mercury from her brother after his mysterious death—he was riding Mercury late one afternoon and the horse returned to the stables alone. When Hilary first brings Mercury to board at the stables everyone there is struck by his beauty and prowess, particularly Viv. As she rides him, Viv dreams of competing with Mercury, rebuilding the ambitions of grandeur that she held for herself before moving to the suburbs. But her daydreams soon morph into consuming desire, and her infatuation with the thoroughbred quickly...
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