Orfeo

by Richard Powers Narrated by Christopher Hurt

Overview

In Orfeo, Powers tells the story of a man journeying into his past as he desperately flees the present. Composer Peter Els opens the door one evening to find the police on his doorstep. His home microbiology lab-- the latest experiment in his lifelong attempt to find music in surprising patterns-- has aroused the suspicions of Homeland Security. Panicked by the raid, Els turns fugitive. As an Internet-fueled hysteria erupts, Els-- the " Bioterrorist Bach"-- pays a final visit to the people he loves, those who shaped his musical journey. Through the help of his ex-wife, his daughter, and his longtime collaborator, Els hatches a plan to turn this disastrous collision with the security state into a work of art that will reawaken its audience to the sounds all around them.

Editorial Reviews

Esquire - Elizabeth Sile

"Powers proves, once again, that he’s a master of the novel with Orfeo, an engrossing and expansive read that is just as much a profile of a creative, obsessive man as it is an escape narrative."

Chicago Tribune - Troy Jollimore

"Orfeo benefits from the deep sympathy Powers seems to feel for the brilliant and troubled protagonist he has created…[It] establishes beyond any doubt that the novel is very much alive."

Christian Science Monitor - Tom LeClair

"Of novelists in Powers’s generation with whom he is often compared—Franzen, Vollmann, Wallace—none equals Powers’s combination of consistent production, intellectual range, formal ingenuity, and emotional effect."

Entertainment Weekly

"Powers’ writing is complex and heady without being headachy, and his synesthetic descriptions of finding melodies in the mundane are full of their own kind of music."

Jim Holt

"Powers is prodigiously talented…He writes lyrical prose, has a seductive sense of wonder and is an acute observer of social life…I [was] unable to resist the emotional pull of Orfeo."

Nathaniel Rich

"Part of the fun of reading [Powers] is to see how he wriggles out of his own snares. But a greater thrill is to join with him in untangling the most urgent and confounding puzzles of our age."

Boston Globe - Adam Kirsch

"Biology and music, past and present, come together in a clever, explosive resolution."

Minneapolis Star Tribune - Harvey Freedenberg

"Orfeo is that rare novel truly deserving of the label 'lyrical'…Powers offers a profound story whose delights are many and lasting."

Slate - Scott Korb

"Orfeo is a first-class American road novel."

Newsday - Dan Cryer

"Extraordinary…his evocations of music, let alone lost love, simply soar off the page…Once again, Richard Powers proves himself to be one of our finest novelists."

San Francisco Chronicle - Ted Gioia

"For sheer bravado in constructing sentences, few authors of contemporary fiction can surpass Powers…One of his finest yet."

Los Angeles Times - David Ulin

"Magnificent and moving."

Salon - Laura Miller

"One long express-train ride to the gorgeous. And the scenery is as sublime as ever."

Product Details

BN ID:	2940169099966
Publisher:	Recorded Books, LLC
Publication date:	01/20/2014
Edition description:	Unabridged

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