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Sign up todayThe Center of Everything
A Novel
Narrator
Jane Oppenheimer
This audiobook uses AI narration.
We’re taking steps to make sure AI narration is transparent.
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Length
9 hours 56 minutes
Language
English
Bookseller recommendation
“This is a story about family, about history, and about love. The characters are like you and me; their stories are intertwined just as ours are, with a past and a hoped-for future. Author Jamie Harrison wields a mighty pen with precision and care, peopling her book with a myriad of interesting characters living believable lives. Her narrative is insightful and moving, and she has that rare gift of making a fictional story sound like the real thing.”
— Linda Bond • Auntie's Bookstore
In this compelling family drama set against the dangerous beauty of the Yellowstone, Polly is still trying to get her life back on track after a recent accident, not always trusting reality.
For Polly, the town of Livingston, Montana, is a land charmed by natural beauty and a close network of family extending back generations. But a recent head injury has scattered her perception of the present, surfacing events from thirty years ago and half a country away. As Polly’s relatives arrive for a family reunion during the Fourth of July holiday, a beloved friend goes missing on the Yellowstone River, dredging up difficult memories for a family well acquainted with tragedy.
A generational saga from the award-winning author of The Widow Nash, The Center of Everything offers a stunning and heartfelt examination of the deep bonds of family and how the ones we love—and the secrets we keep—echo throughout our lives.
Jamie Harrison, who has lived in Montana with her family for more than thirty years, has worked as a caterer, a gardener, and an editor. She is the author of five previous novels—the Jules Clement series of mysteries and The Widow Nash, a finalist for the High Plains Book Award and the winner of the Mountains & Plains Independent Booksellers Association Reading the West Book Award. Find out more at JamieHarrisonbooks.com.
Jane Oppenheimer is an experienced narrator, voiceover artist, and actress with a bachelor's degree in theater from Carnegie Mellon University. She has narrated numerous audiobooks and has performed on stage in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Her voiceover work can be heard on commercials as well as corporate campaigns and short documentaries.
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Reviews
“The Center of Everything is a bighearted, feet-on-the-ground, bracing, intelligent book. Its people will endure in readers’ memories, page after compelling page.”
“The Center of Everything slips deftly through time, all the while taking the reader to the marvelous unfolding of secrets (both wondrous and murderous) that were right before our eyes. How beautifully our attention is distracted and illuminated in this resonant novel.”
“A sharply intelligent, warmhearted embrace of human imperfection—the kind of book that invites a second reading.”
“This doesn’t feel like a work of fiction. It feels real, like reading someone’s diary…A brilliant book.”
“This gorgeous novel is well worth your time.”
“A meticulously crafted, graceful novel.”
“[A] wonderful cast of interesting characters…Harrison’s novel takes the unreliable narrator to a whole new place: in short, to the center of everything.”
“Gorgeous…Harrison’s writing is as lush as the landscapes themselves.”
“Harrison has created a world so total, so real, so personal, that the reader, on finishing it, is missing it already.”
“Jane Oppenheimer’s narration is thoughtful and appropriate in this story about memories and family…Oppenheimer adds just enough nuance to give all the characters clear voices.”
“A redemptive and hopeful novel guided by earthy, reliable men, women and children who inspire and encourage.”
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