Olive, Again

Author Elizabeth Strout
Narrator Kimberly Farr
Publisher Penguin Books Ltd
Publish Date 31 October 2019
Run Time 12 hours and 15 minutes
Format Audio
Genre Family life fiction, Modern and contemporary fiction, Narrative theme: Interior life.

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What to expect

Brought to you by Penguin.

An extraordinary new novel by the Pulitzer Prize-winning, Number One New York Times bestselling author of Olive Kitteridge and My Name is Lucy Barton

Olive, Again follows the blunt, contradictory yet deeply loveable Olive Kitteridge as she grows older, navigating the second half of her life as she comes to terms with the changes - sometimes welcome, sometimes not - in her own existence and in those around her.

Olive adjusts to her new life with her second husband, challenges her estranged son and his family to accept him, experiences loss and loneliness, witnesses the triumphs and heartbreaks of her friends and neighbours in the small coastal town of Crosby, Maine - and, finally, opens herself to new lessons about life.

'One of America's finest writers' Sunday Times

'A powerful storyteller immersed in the nuances of human relationships' Observer

'Strout really can write you into a world until you feel you are there with her, in that house, that life, that little Podunk of a place' The Times

© Elizabeth Strout 2019 (P) Penguin Audio 2019

Critics Review

A novel to treasure... Olive, Again, like Strout's first book, delivers roughly five hours of spine-tingling pleasure.

Sunday Times

Olive, Again is a tour de force. With extraordinary economy of prose - few writers can pack so much emotion, so much emotion, so much detail into a single paragraph - Strout immerses us in the lives of her characters, each so authentically drawn as to be deserving of an entire novel themselves. Compassionate, masterly and profound, this is a writer at the height of her powers

Observer

Emotionally honest, psychologically piercing and ultimately life-affirming

The i

Her writing is exquisite; her vision is boundless. What a sublime book.

A superbly gifted storyteller and a craftswoman in a league of her own. In Olive, Again, she teaches us that there is always more to know about human beings, even the ones we are closest to.

There's no simple truth about human existence, Strout reminds us, only wonderful, painful complexity. 'Well, that's life,' Olive says. 'Nothing you can do about it.' Beautifully written and alive with compassion, at times almost unbearably poignant. A thrilling book in every way.

Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Strout again demonstrates her gift for zeroing in on ordinary moments in the lives of ordinary people to highlight their extraordinary resilience

Publishers Weekly, starred review

She gets better with each book

Glorious

The Times

A perfect novel

Financial Times

User Reviews

Book 5.0

Narration 5.0

5.0

A remarkable book by a remarkable author, brilliantly narrated. Depicts the lives of ordinary people in a way that reveals how extraordinary they - we all - are, and makes them utterly engrossing.

jackdor 11/06/2025

5.0

angela_jm_austin@hotmail.com 03/05/2022

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