Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Mislaid: A Novel
    Mislaid: A Novel
    Mislaid: A Novel
    Audiobook8 hours

    Mislaid: A Novel

    Written by Nell Zink

    Narrated by Cassandra Campbell

    3.5/5

    ()

    Switch to ebook

    About this audiobook

    A sharply observed, mordantly funny, and startlingly original debut from an exciting, unconventional new voice, about the making and unmaking of the American family that lays bare all of our assumptions about race and racism, sexuality and desire. Stillwater College in Virginia, 1966. Freshman Peggy, an ingenue with literary pretensions, falls under the spell of Lee, a blue-blooded poet and professor, and they begin an ill-advised affair that results in an unplanned pregnancy and marriage. The couple are mismatched from the start--she's a lesbian, he's gay--but it takes a decade of emotional erosion before Peggy runs off with their three-year-old daughter, leaving their nine-year-old son behind. Worried that Lee will never have her committed for her erratic behavior, Peggy goes underground, adopting an African American persona for her and her daughter. They squat in a house in an African American settlement, eventually moving into a housing project where no one questions their true racial identities. As Peggy and Lee's children grow up, they must contend with diverse emotional issues: Byrdie must deal with his father's compulsive honesty; while Karen struggles with her mother's lies--she know nether her real age, nor that she is ldquo;white,rdquo; nor that she has any other family. Years later, a minority scholarship lands Karen at the University of Virginia, where Byrdie is in his senior year. Eventually the long lost siblings will meet, setting off a series of misunderstanding and culminating in a comedic finale worthy of Shakespeare.

    Editor's Note

    Achingly good fiction…

    No one else writes like Nell Zink. Her dialogue is infinitely sharper than real life, and she manages to turn racism, sexism, classism, and Southern history into rich veins of pitiless, yet breezy comedy.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHighbridge Company
    Release dateMay 19, 2015
    ISBN9781622317547
    Author

    Nell Zink

    Nell Zink grew up in rural Virginia. She has worked in a variety of trades, including masonry and technical writing. In the early 1990s, she edited an indie rock fanzine. Her books include The Wallcreeper, Mislaid, Private Novelist, and Nicotine, and her writing has appeared in n+1, Granta, and Harper’s. She lives near Berlin, Germany.

    Related to Mislaid

    Related audiobooks

    African American Fiction For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      BITS & PIECES

      Apr 5, 2022

      In 1962 at Northwestern High School, the senior class put on the play Annie Get Your Gun. I dreaded the idea of being in a play; however, it was not my decision. Everyone in the class would have a part. When casting day came, I literally sank to the

      4 min read

    • Article

      Last Love

      Dec 8, 2023

      Last Love
      13 min read

    • Article

      Manhattan, 2035

      Mar 26, 2021

      There were problems with being the daughter of a former it girl. First of all, the designation, which, as her mother grew older, warped slightly across the society pages, affecting her mood. Most people remembered her mother’s modelling stints, brush

      4 min read

    • Article

      Dance with Me

      Sep 17, 2021

      Dance with Me
      9 min read

    • Article

      The Art of Fiction No. 251

      Mar 15, 2022

      The Art of Fiction No. 251
      20 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems

      Jul 1, 2023

      I The teenaged girl is searching for a placethat goes through, the holeto put the tampon inside. When she finds itshe asks her mother, Is this where the penis would go?Yes, her mother explains.Then I will never have sex. II Sweltering New York City.

      5 min read

    • Article

      HUNTER DAVIES Back in the Day

      Jun 1, 2022

      Sceptre £20 Melvyn Bragg is our greatest living Cumbrian – even bigger than haulage king Eddie Stobart. Like Wordsworth, Melvyn is Cumbrian born and bred, and has never really left Lakeland or stopped loving it. He is now a national treasure, loved b

      3 min read

    • Article

      Benjamin Nugent

      Jun 15, 2018

      Claire’s roommates threw her out on November third, for falling behind on rent and hogging the Xbox. During the next three weeks, she lived in other people’s houses. She missed the Xbox, but couch surfing was like a game. She had to not smell like co

      20 min read

    • Article

      Speed of Mercy

      Jul 30, 2021

      Speed of Mercy
      10 min read

    • Article

      Don’t Judge A Book By Its Cover The Modfather By David Lines

      Jul 25, 2023

      I’ll be honest and say that when I saw the cliché-riddled cover, I almost gave up there and then. In fact I only persevered because I’d been told that the book was set in my old school and that the author, David Lines, had been there at the same time

      2 min read

    • Article

      I Met Fear on the Hill

      Dec 15, 2018

      It’s the summer of 1966, and Sheila and Peter are a young married couple living in Berkeley. They are very much in love, and also very high—tripping on acid for the first time in their lives, in Tilden Park—walking in a shallow stream full of primord

      32 min read

    • Article

      Open mic WITH Di Morrissey

      Oct 30, 2019

      Lately, I’ve been musing on friendship. As a young girl I lived in an isolated area of Pittwater in Sydney, a boat ride to the quiet reaches of Lovett Bay where people had simple weekenders. The novelty of occasional playmates was immense. These girl

      3 min read

    • Article

      A Fantasy Fulfilled

      Aug 8, 2021

      A Fantasy Fulfilled
      2 min read

    • Article

      Notes on Etiquette

      Mar 1, 2019

      Notes on Etiquette
      10 min read

    • Article

      Great Read

      Nov 3, 2021

      Great Read
      5 min read

    • Article

      The Bennington Girl

      May 11, 2021

      The Bennington Girl
      19 min read

    • Article

      Ineffectual Tribute to Len

      Mar 15, 2019

      After graduate school I hung around another year and drove a cab for Iowa City Yellow Cab. The cab was a boat, a Chevrolet Caprice wagon. I could have put a mattress in the back and lived in it. I didn’t hate the job. I’d sit in the Kroger parking lo

      24 min read

    • Article

      The Only Rule

      Jul 13, 2020

      There is only one rule in polite English society, but it is iron clad. Of course, polite English society is a fiction. For one thing, its members are rarely polite. Politeness is for the middle classes rather than those who live off ancestral acres o

      5 min read

    • Article

      Locals

      Jun 11, 2021

      Locals
      26 min read

    • Article

      Great Read

      Mar 23, 2022

      Great Read
      5 min read

    • Article

      Great Dane

      Oct 23, 2022

      Great Dane
      7 min read

    • Article

      Excerpt

      Aug 13, 2019

      The following excerpt from my memoir Brave Face begins with a vocabulary lesson. Specifically, the vocabulary of hate. It wasn’t gay people I hated, however, it was myself. While I find the use of that particular F-word offensive, I used it in this s

      4 min read

    • Article

      Great Read

      May 17, 2023

      Great Read
      8 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Mislaid

    3.5/5

    153 ratings9 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Very funny, very silly. Fast paced, jokey, weird, perverted. I loved it!
    • 3/5
      Oh dear, an American novel that should have been written and screened on TV in the 70’s so we could laugh at the hairdos and flared trousers. Sorry to be so unfair but it did read in that 70’s unreal, pastiched, stereotyped, cliched manner. Sorry again.
    • 1/5
      TW: sexual assault, pedophilia

      This holds the distinction of being the worst novel I have the memory of reading. In all honesty, I skimmed a large amount of story starting around 40% through. Filled with repugnant characters, a severe misunderstanding of race relations, an insultingly absurd premise, homophobia, misogyny, casual pedophilia, and just plain poor writing, every reading session of this book felt like a particularly cruel form of Inquisitional torture. The scenes of the main character, whose name I can't remember, composing plays that spell out how she feels about relationships all too clearly, and then were even more clearly spelled out by the author literally telling me what they meant, had me rolling my eyes and wondering how something like this gets published. The scene in which her decision not to shoot a black man in cold blood is meant to convince us innocent readers that our protagonist had completely assimilated into black culture was when I put my head in my hands and thought deeply about what I was doing. The scene were the gay poetry professor casually fantasizes about sexually assaulting and murdering a bizarre straw-woman for feminism and Maoism was the icing on the cake. I would not recommend this horrible reading experience to anyone.
    • 3/5
      I'm not sure what to think of this book. It was interesting enough to keep my attention, but the character's circumstances were a bit whacky at times.
    • 3/5
      While in college, Peggy, a lesbian falls for one of the teachers, Lee, who just happens to be gay. During their affair, Peggy becomes pregnant and they become married. After years of misery, Peggy decides to run away taking her 3 year old daughter and leaving behind her 9 year old son. Afraid Lee will have her committed; Peggy devises a plan to hide from the world by adopting an African American identity for her and her daughter. With clever writing this book explores themes such as gender, race, and sexuality. I found myself enjoying the majority of this book but found myself skimming through the last part.
    • 4/5
      I found it quite bizarre in the beginning. Having purchased it because it was billed as being hilariously funny, I was immensely disappointed to not even crack a smile for about 60% of the book. But the last 40% caught me. I still heard no laughter, but I did enjoy it. I'm also glad I read it, which is worth a star by itdself.
    • 5/5
      I had just read about this on Charlotte's thread, and then I went to the library and what should be staring out at me from the new editions shelf?! Serendipity, I cried, as I snagged it. And what a lovely find it was! I read it in just two sittings. It is irreverent and witty, and I thought finally an American fairy tale that encompasses all of the bizarre, inconsistent and incongruous voices of a country whose doctrine declares equality for everyone but has yet to deliver its promise. It reminded me of those old screwball comedies (think Cary Grant) that had the clever dialogue and the plot that was always spinning slightly out of control, only without the censors to say, "Wait a minute, you can't do that. You can't say that." Completely and totally engaging, it will pull you into its pages and not release you until you have read every last word. Highly recommended."Because people never grow accustomed to lies. They either believe them or they don't. And a big lie is never forgiven. The person who told the lie stops existing, and in his place stands a paradox: the truthful liar. The person you know for sure would lie to you, because he's done it before and confessed. You never, ever believe that person again."
    • 4/5
      I loved the quirky wittiness of this book and the way gender, race, and legal lines were stretched and blurred. Anyone who has contemplated running away from prescribed roles, even if it is only in one's head, will find something in this book.
    • 3/5
      If Mislaid sounds a little off its rocker, that’s because it is. And it’s meant to be. It’s witty and funny and pointed and smart in ways many books never dare to be. Unfortunately, that pointed wittiness only works about 50% of the time. The rest of the novel feels less like a novel and more like a collection of scribbled drafts or tributaries Zink started to navigate before realizing they led nowhere—it just doesn’t add up.