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Why We Came to the City
(OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen)

Book Cover
Average Rating
Published:
Books on Tape 2016
Accelerated Reader:
IL: UG - BL: 6.5 - AR Pts: 23
Lexile measure:
970L
Status:
Available from OverDrive
Description
“Stunning . . . A beautiful, sprawling, and generous book. Jansma is a brilliantly talented writer, but he also has a unique insight into what friends mean to one another, and what it means to be part of a city in which you never quite belong, but can’t quite bring yourself to leave. It’s a heartfelt novel, tender and painful and cathartic all at once, and even if the characters belong to New York, the story belongs to us all.” —NPR

December, 2008. A heavy snowstorm is blowing through Manhattan and the economy is on the brink of collapse, but none of that matters to a handful of guests at a posh holiday party. Five years after their college graduation, the fiercely devoted friends at the heart of this richly absorbing novel remain as inseparable as ever: editor and social butterfly Sara Sherman, her troubled astronomer boyfriend George Murphy, loudmouth poet Jacob Blaumann, classics major turned investment banker William Cho, and Irene Richmond, an enchanting artist with an inscrutable past.
Amid cheerful revelry and free-flowing champagne, the friends toast themselves and the new year ahead—a year that holds many surprises in store. They must navigate ever-shifting relationships with the city and with one another, determined to push onward in pursuit of their precarious dreams. And when a devastating blow brings their momentum to a halt, the group is forced to reexamine their aspirations and chart new paths through unexpected losses.
Kristopher Jansma’s award-winning debut novel, The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards, was praised for its  “wry humor” and “charmingly unreliable narrator” in The New Yorker and hailed as “F. Scott Fitzgerald meets Wes Anderson” by The Village Voice. In Why We Came to the City, Jansma offers an unforgettable exploration of friendships forged in the fires of ambition, passion, hope, and love. This glittering story of a generation coming of age is a sweeping, poignant triumph.
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More Details
Format:
OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen
Edition:
Unabridged
Street Date:
02/16/2016
Language:
English
ISBN:
9780147524515
Accelerated Reader:
UG
Level 6.5, 23 Points
Lexile measure:
970
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Citations
APA Citation (style guide)

Kristopher Jansma. (2016). Why We Came to the City. Unabridged Books on Tape.

Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation (style guide)

Kristopher Jansma. 2016. Why We Came to the City. Books on Tape.

Chicago / Turabian - Humanities Citation (style guide)

Kristopher Jansma, Why We Came to the City. Books on Tape, 2016.

MLA Citation (style guide)

Kristopher Jansma. Why We Came to the City. Unabridged Books on Tape, 2016.

Note! Citation formats are based on standards as of July 2022. Citations contain only title, author, edition, publisher, and year published. Citations should be used as a guideline and should be double checked for accuracy.
Copy Details
LibraryOwnedAvailable
Shared Digital Collection22
Staff View
Grouped Work ID:
b4b540cd-f718-b04d-04d7-8bf68fb34e52
Go To Grouped Work
Needs Update?:
No
Date Added:
Mar 29, 2019 09:58:52
Date Updated:
Mar 29, 2019 09:58:52
Last Metadata Check:
Apr 21, 2024 12:54:51
Last Metadata Change:
Jun 05, 2023 10:26:12
Last Availability Check:
Apr 21, 2024 12:54:55
Last Availability Change:
Apr 28, 2021 19:41:21
Last Grouped Work Modification Time:
Apr 24, 2024 02:13:21

OverDrive Product Record

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Why We Came to the City
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“Stunning . . . A beautiful, sprawling, and generous book. Jansma is a brilliantly talented writer, but he also has a unique insight into what friends mean to one another, and what it means to be part of a city in which you never quite belong, but can’t quite bring yourself to leave. It’s a heartfelt novel, tender and painful and cathartic all at once, and even if the characters belong to New York, the story belongs to us all.” —NPR

December, 2008. A heavy snowstorm is blowing through Manhattan and the economy is on the brink of collapse, but none of that matters to a handful of guests at a posh holiday party. Five years after their college graduation, the fiercely devoted friends at the heart of this richly absorbing novel remain as inseparable as ever: editor and social butterfly Sara Sherman, her troubled astronomer boyfriend George Murphy, loudmouth poet Jacob Blaumann, classics major turned investment banker William Cho, and Irene Richmond, an enchanting artist with an inscrutable past.
Amid cheerful revelry and free-flowing champagne, the friends toast themselves and the new year ahead—a year that holds many surprises in store. They must navigate ever-shifting relationships with the city and with one another, determined to push onward in pursuit of their precarious dreams. And when a devastating blow brings their momentum to a halt, the group is forced to reexamine their aspirations and chart new paths through unexpected losses.
Kristopher Jansma’s award-winning debut novel, The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards, was praised for its  “wry humor” and “charmingly unreliable narrator” in The New Yorker and hailed as “F. Scott Fitzgerald meets Wes Anderson” by The Village Voice. In Why We Came to the City, Jansma offers an unforgettable exploration of friendships forged in the fires of ambition, passion, hope, and love. This glittering story of a generation coming of age is a sweeping, poignant triumph.
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      • source: AudioFile Magazine
      • content: Edoardo Ballerini's narration finds an appropriately erudite yet youthful tone that draws the listener in. Four friends come to post-9/11 New York after college to stake out their lives, only to face a personal tragedy within their group. The audiobook may speak most clearly to listeners who relate closely to the experiences of these characters: young university graduates navigating the city during the early recession years. The themes, however, are universal. Ballerini provides the right tone for these engaging characters, who are collectively earnest, witty, sarcastic, and thoughtful. S.C. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine
      • premium: True
      • source: Publisher's Weekly
      • content:

        January 11, 2016
        Jansma's compelling paean to New York City features a group of post-college friends who manage the vagaries of love and friendship against the backdrop of living in the big city: opportunity, stress, beauty, as well as the allure of the über rich juxtaposed against the impoverished. The cast includes Irene Richmond, an artist supporting her craft by working at a hip art gallery; George Murphy, an astronomer whose life research may be imploding; his college girlfriend and soon to be wife, Sara Sherman, an editor for a paper; William Cho, working in investments, living with his mother, and harboring a crush on Irene; and Jacob Blaumann, the quintessential graduate not living up to his potential—having made his mark as a poet, but working as an orderly at a mental health facility in the suburbs and having an affair with his boss. Underneath the interactions between the characters lurks an examination of relationships and the ways friendship is tested when one in their midst is beset by a rare form of cancer. Steering clear of the maudlin, the author gives searing portrayals of both challenging cancer treatment and how true friends rise to the occasion when necessary. Jansma (The Unchangeable Spots of Leopards) pens a tightly-written, smartly conceived story that puts an insightful spin on life in the Big Apple.

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“Stunning . . . A beautiful, sprawling, and generous book. Jansma is a brilliantly talented writer, but he also has a unique insight into what friends mean to one another, and what it means to be part of a city in which you never quite belong, but can’t quite bring yourself to leave. It’s a heartfelt novel, tender and painful and cathartic all at once, and even if the characters belong to New York, the story belongs to us all.” —NPR

December, 2008. A heavy snowstorm is blowing through Manhattan and the economy is on the brink of collapse, but none of that matters to a handful of guests at a posh holiday party. Five years after their college graduation, the fiercely devoted friends at the heart of this richly absorbing novel remain as inseparable as ever: editor and social butterfly Sara Sherman, her troubled astronomer boyfriend George Murphy, loudmouth poet Jacob Blaumann, classics major turned investment banker William Cho, and...
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      • code: FIC043000
      • description: Fiction / Coming of Age
      • code: FIC048000
      • description: Fiction / Urban & Street Lit