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    Tenth of December
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    Tenth of December
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    Tenth of December
    Audiobook5 hours

    Tenth of December

    Written by George Saunders

    Narrated by George Saunders

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    From the undisputed master of the short story comes a dazzling and disturbing new collection.
    A family member recollects a backyard pole dressed for all occasions; Divisional Director Todd Birnie sends round a memo to employees he thinks need some inspiration; and in an auction of local celebrities Al Roosten hides his own internal monologue behind a winning smile. Although, as a young boy discovers, sometimes the voices fade and all you are left with is a frozen hill on a cold day in December...
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherW. F. Howes Ltd
    Release dateJun 6, 2013
    ISBN9781471235771
    Unavailable
    Tenth of December
    Author

    George Saunders

    George Saunders is the author of twelve books. His debut novel Lincoln in the Bardo won the 2017 Man Booker Prize and the Premio Rezzori prize. His collection Tenth of December was a finalist for the National Book Award and won the inaugural Folio Prize. He has received MacArthur and Guggenheim fellowships, the PEN/Malamud Prize for excellence in the short story, and the 2023 Library of Congress Prize. He has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2013, he was named one of the world's 100 most influential people by Time magazine. He teaches in the creative writing program at Syracuse University. georgesaundersbooks.com

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    Reviews for Tenth of December

    4/5

    1,151 ratings103 reviews

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    • 4/5
      The first and last stories were well worth 5 stars.
    • 5/5
      Something real is at stake for the characters in the stories of George Saunders. In Home an Iraq war veteran struggles to adjust to civilian life and to be accepted by those he knew before he went away. In the title story the lives of a young boy and a cancer patient are threatened when the man attempts to freeze himself to death and the boy tries to rescue him. Two women with different ideas of how to love their families clash in Puppy. In Victory Lap two teenage neighbors with very different lives are brought together for only moments by a violent crime. Saunders addresses love, strength, humanity and notions of social class in his stories. His characters are varied and real, even those who “at birth” had “been charged by God with the responsibility of growing into total fuckups.” These stories and characters stick with you long after you’re done reading. Saunders is one of the few writers who can leaven deadly and serious situations with humor, and make it work.
    • 1/5
      Book DescriptionOne of the most important and blazingly original writers of his generation, George Saunders is an undisputed master of the short story, and Tenth of December is his most honest, accessible, and moving collection yet. In the taut opener, "Victory Lap," a boy witnesses the attempted abduction of the girl next door and is faced with a harrowing choice: Does he ignore what he sees, or override years of smothering advice from his parents and act? In "Home," a combat-damaged soldier moves back in with his mother and struggles to reconcile the world he left with the one to which he has returned. And in the title story, a stunning meditation on imagination, memory, and loss, a middle-aged cancer patient walks into the woods to commit suicide, only to encounter a troubled young boy who, over the course of a fateful morning, gives the dying man a final chance to recall who he really is. A hapless, deluded owner of an antiques store; two mothers struggling to do the right thing; a teenage girl whose idealism is challenged by a brutal brush with reality; a man tormented by a series of pharmaceutical experiments that force him to lust, to love, to kill-the unforgettable characters that populate the pages of Tenth of December are vividly and lovingly infused with Saunders's signature blend of exuberant prose, deep humanity, and stylistic innovation. Writing brilliantly and profoundly about class, sex, love, loss, work, despair, and war, Saunders cuts to the core of the contemporary experience. These stories take on the big questions and explore the fault lines of our own morality, delving into the questions of what makes us good and what makes us human. Unsettling, insightful, and hilarious, the stories in Tenth of December-through their manic energy, their focus on what is redeemable in human beings, and their generosity of spirit-not only entertain and delight; they fulfill Chekhov's dictum that art should "prepare us for tenderness."My ReviewAfter reading this book, I must say that satirical fiction is not for me. I found this book very difficult to read. The words did not flow and I really was not interested in what the author was trying to relate. There are a lot of good reviews for this book so some people did benefit from reading it. Not sure if I could honestly recommend it as I wouldn't want to put anyone else through the pain it was for me to read.
    • 4/5
      screwed me up.
      in a good way, I think.
    • 5/5
      Brilliant. I’d heard that Saunders told stories like no one else, and yes, it has to be read to believed. In some stories he switches between heads and it takes a while to understand which world the story is set in. No matter. Discover as you go and listen again and again.
    • 5/5
      This is likely my favorite collection of stories ever. It turns out I read each one along the way as they appeared in the new Yorker but in spite of laughing and crying and wondering at each one, I didn't bother to buy the author's books. A friend recommended this book to me, and then I was tickled to remember each story in the collection like meeting an old friend at a party, years later, and reminiscing about old times. That said, I haven't read his other books, and I fear I will love the others just as much, rendering this book as just one of my favorite books ever.
    • 5/5
      There are only about a handful of short story authors I enjoy reading and George Saunders is one of the top two. While I wanted to read Tenth of December straight through, I knew it best the let each story soak in before beginning the next. I would highly recommend Tenth of December to those who enjoy shot stories and those new to the genre. Saunder's works would make for intriguing discussion group questions.
    • 4/5
      Liked the interior monologues and the slightly SF stuff. Not exactly optimistic but sympathetic to humanity. And funny.
    • 3/5
      "Sometimes science sucks"
      Guy is in prison and being experimented on by a pharmaceutical development company. Neither the crime the guy was sentenced for, nor the nature of the experiments themselves, are very convincing.
    • 4/5
      Enjoyed some of these stories ire than others, but they were all crafted well of course…enjoy his writing on writing more than his writing? Hah!!
    • 5/5
      Lovely short stories
    • 1/5
      I only read this short story collection for my book club. It was extremely disturbing and not my cup of tea.
    • 5/5
      A brilliant collection of ten short stories from George Saunders – funny, poignant, and touching on things like class, aging, and the dehumanizing aspects of modern science. There is creativity and breadth here, an easy flow to the writing, and great pace. I also liked the excerpt of the conversation Saunders had with David Sedaris about the writing process itself that was present in this volume, which also talked about the semi-sacred, near-holy aspect of reading.Favorites:Tenth of December – the title story is actually last in the collection, but is so brilliant and memorable that I put at the top of the list. In it, an elderly man with a terminal illness elects to end his (and his family’s) suffering by hiking out into the snow of a deserted area. A boy with an active imagination is also out there, however, and they’re destined to meet. The imaginations of these two people, at such opposite ends of life, their struggles, and the great humanism in how the story plays out were masterful. Considering my own father at the end of his days while reading this was devastating.Victory Lap – a story of a kidnapping attempt cleverly told through the eyes of three people – a teenage girl (the intended victim), the criminal, and the teenage boy across the street. The boy’s parents are very strict, making the description of his life pretty funny, and we hear their voices in his mind, just as we hear the criminal’s parents’ voices in his. Parenting styles are thus reflected in these people – e.g. probably loving and supporting (resulting in a fanciful imagination and maybe naively opening the door to a stranger), cruel (resulting in cruelty), and ridiculously structured (resulting in rebelling in imagined obscenities but still feeling the heaviness of their instructions within his mind). A very well-executed story.Puppy – also very well done, and another window into parenting, this time with mom who is fully invested and supportive of her kids (tellingly a reaction to how poor her own mother had been), travelling to look at a puppy that’s up for adoption. Even in how the woman thinks of the playfulness of her husband, and the strength of her faith and optimism, we sense that the kids are in a wonderful family. Once they get to the place with the puppy, however, they get a disturbing glimpse into a family living in filth with a ‘problem child’ chained up in the back, which is quite a contrast. Saunders wisely humanizes the mother in that environment and gives her a lovely thought: “Love was liking someone how he was and doing things to help him get even better,” but still paints a pretty horrifying picture. Escape from Spiderhead – really enjoyed this one, a tale of near-futuristic experimentation on prisoners, where scientists inject them with advanced drugs to cause specific reactions. We see a broad spectrum of drugs, including one that induce the person to see another as their deepest possible soulmate, and one that causes horrible feelings of pain and depression. I loved it because it hints at how delicate our brain chemistries are, just a little tweak here and there and suddenly our entire outlooks are changed, which rings true, and because it touches on how cruel people can be, thinking they’re acting for the greater good. Well written, and could see this one expanded and made into a film.The Semplica Girl Diaries – a story that parodies a man through his diary entries, recounting his attempts to be a good parent and to have the better things in life like his daughter’s rich friends. It’s got some of those same elements of humor, but then the horror of what the rich friends have gradually unfolds, giving the story a very dark edge. The only thing that wore on me a bit was the semi-literate narration from the diary entries, which pushed the boundaries of enjoyability given this story’s length, 60 pages.My Chivalric Fiasco – A janitor at a medieval theme park stumbles across his boss raping a co-worker, and in the effort to insuring his silence, finds himself promoted to playing one of the costumed roles. As part of that role he’s given a designer drug meant to make him speak as a knight would, but it has the side effect that it also makes him more honorable – thus making it hard for him to hold his tongue about the crime. It’s a creative, funny story, and the narration that’s modulated to the drug’s onset and gradual withdrawal is clever.Others:Sticks – literally two pages long, detailing a family ritual of decorating a metal pole in the yard, and how it reflects the psyche of the father in increasingly blunt ways as he gets older. An interesting little vignette that speaks to regret and loss, but it would have been nice if it had been further developed.Exhortation – An email sent to the employees of a company asking them to work harder, where the humor comes from just how non-self-aware the manager is, and how he contradicts himself in his lame attempt to improve morale. Lots of fun probably for anyone who has been in a corporate environment.Al Roosten – A middle-aged man who runs a failing business volunteers himself for a fundraising auction where people bid on having lunch with him and others, including a more successful and attractive man that he alternately envies, hates, and befriends in his imagination. It’s funny how he consistently sees himself as better than he is, e.g. during the auction or thinking he can become mayor, and so when Saunders shows him thinking he’s better than the homeless, who he refers to as “hobos” and thinks of in an old-fashioned way of stealing pies off windowsills, we see even more how out of touch he is (and how he may become homeless someday).Home – Probably the least successful story for me; a veteran who was dishonorably discharged returns to his hometown to see his mother, who is living with a deadbeat, and his sister and her husband. While Saunders is talking about class in this story and several others, here it just felt rather dull, and I wish he had delved a little more into the vet’s psyche after what he had seen and taken part in while in the military.
    • 3/5
      Just a bit too much "style" for my taste. Fine writing, somewhat interesting, started skipping immediately.
    • 5/5
      Dystopian stories with hearts of gold. Saunders has an uncanny ability to transcribe those weird, only partly formed little thoughts we have and weave them into powerful, and funny, narratives. A unique book.
    • 4/5
      George Saunders is a fantastic writer. The way he writes environments, settings, and emotions pulled me completely into the worlds of the short stories in this collection. The stories were a little hit or miss for me - I adored "Escape from Spiderhead" (I would read a 400 page novel about the world he creates there) and "The Semplica Girl Diaries" but didn't love "Exhortation" or "Al Roosten." Overall this was a great collection of short stories and I'll be picking more Saunders up in the future.
    • 5/5
      Goddamn George Saunders, you rose above the hype. "The Semplica Girl Diaries" is genius, as is "Victory Lap" and "Escape from Spiderhead." I didn't expect to be so moved by these stories. This is a clever, human collection. Saunders' verbal dexterity enhances the dreams and plights of his characters.

      This book was read in a hospital waiting room, an American Airlines plane and finished poolside in Mexico.
    • 1/5
      This is a popular and well thought of book. Go figure.
    • 3/5
      A deeply weird, darkly comical collection of stories exposing class envy and exploring an array of ethical decisions. Saunders loves to make up words which can be fun but he also delves into the selfish and shameful aspects of human emotion, giving many of these stories a depressing tone. Some of the scenarios he imagines for these stories are worthy of any science fiction or fantasy novel and Saunders' ideas about the future of our society are decidedly not optimistic.
    • 4/5
      Saunders' stories are so original with interesting characters confronted with a moral problem. My Jesuit friend looks for movies in which the characters struggle with an ethical problem and move, sometimes in a roundabout way, to redemption. The characters in these stories remind me of this way of "seeing." Notable in the collection are the title story, Tenth of December, and Escape from Spiderhead. But all are of high quality.
    • 5/5
      I agree with everyone who thinks he's a genius.
    • 4/5
      Two things you need to know to evaluate whether you're gonna like this: 1) this is a collection of short stories and 2) Saunders' style of writing isn't for everyone. Saunders subverts familiar circumstances into something less familiar and less comfortable, while keeping honesty and human truth at the core with a twinge of irony. As such, some of the stories - or rather their themes and observances - poke at you uncomfortably and may even rub you a bit raw - like a tag on clothing you've forgotten to remove before wearing. While these stories aren't inaccessible or dense, they aren't breezy beach faire, either. If you're looking for light, entertaining reading...this probably won't be your thing. Of this collection, my favorites were:- The eponymous Tenth of December which is about a terminally ill man en route to his own suicide rediscovering the will to live, love and be loved, even as his body fails, when he expends all his strength to save a boy from freezing to death.- The Semplica Girl Diaries involve a father who purchases girls from a third world country to use as human lawn ornaments to impress his kids and neighbors. His youngest daughter sets the girls loose and they escape, which turns out to be a crime against the government that greatly endangers the family.- Puppy is about the casual cruelty with which puppies and small children are sometimes treated by those who are supposed to care, love and protect them.But there's really not a bad one in the bunch. A lot of early reviews of Tenth overhyped the collection as 'life altering' and 'mind blowing.' Few if any books can stand up to that kind of puffery and this doesn't either and isn't trying to; however, if you want something with enough fiber to stick in your ribs, give this a try.Also highly recommended if you're looking to sample some Saunders is his graduation speech - congratulations by the way (which I love and which is good for anyone entering or closing a season of life...or just thinking about it), as well as Lincoln in the Bardo, which is a novel about Abraham Lincoln being haunted (literally and figuratively) by the childhood death of his son Willie.
    • 2/5
      This short story collection was a miss for me. The stories attempt to be full of humor and satire, while at the same time formulating opinions and perceptions of class related to character, but I did not find them to be conceptually relevant. Overall, a disappointing read. However, I will not give up on Saunders yet.2 stars.
    • 3/5
      Not as earth-shattering as the reviews had lead me to believe. The stories are could just as easily have fitted into one of his earlier collections. That's not a criticism, as I love Saunders's short stories, but the hype made me think this collection would display the author's evolution. It was more of the same.
    • 3/5
      I have mixed reactions to Saunders’ writing. First, can anyone live up to the ridiculous level of praise from the blurbs on the cover of this trade paperback edition? That come from everywhere, including the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Khaled Hosseini? Is Saunders that good a writer? I’m forced to say “no.” Not that he isn’t always interesting. At his best, such as in the title story, he weaves together events in a way that end up telling us a lot about human nature, the human spirit, and ultimately ourselves, since if fiction doesn’t have some effect on the reader, even in a totally vicarious way, I think it fails. Another story that passes this test is “Victory Lap.” But often, as in “The Semplica Girl Diaries” and at least half of the other stories in this volume, there is an artificiality that is just annoying. You just want to shout at the author, “Can’t you just tell the story without fritzing around so much?” Sometimes, Saunders manages to ultimately succeed even when he is doing a lot of fritzing around, such as in the dystopian “Escape from Spiderhead.” One thing I must give him credit for is his imagination. Reading this collection, you don’t ever fall into a sense of monotony, seeing story after story proceed down the same path. But like his other collection I read, CivilWarLand in Bad Decline, I just can’t fully embrace his style. Recently, I read Denis Johnson’s Jesus’ Son. The experience, compared to reading Saunders, is remarkably different. With Johnson, it is total immersion. It is a shorter book that compels you to read it in one sitting. It is never boring or annoying. While I didn’t give it a perfect review, it is certainly more of my model for great short story writing. Or Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried. Near-perfect writing that never calls undue attention to itself or gets in the way of the story. Clearly, this just isn’t the type of writer Saunders is. The back of this edition includes a very interesting interview with Saunders conducted by David Sedaris (who joins the bandwagon of praising Saunders to the sky). It is clear that Saunders intentions are the best, and in some stories he achieves them. But if he is to be held up as the standard of the short story, it doesn’t speak too well of the state of the critical art.
    • 2/5
      I was looking forward to reading this book after hearing an interview with the author on one of the late night talk shows. I clearly didn't get it. I felt like I should have been on drugs while reading it, as it was very bizarre. The prose was difficult for me to follow. Some of the stories were OK, but as a whole, not for me.
    • 3/5
      Intricately constructed to the extent of obscuring characterization but fascinating nonetheless. Several of the stories will stick in my mind for quite awhile. Found it impossible to read more than one in an evening. On the other hand, much of it seemed quirky for quirk's sake. Would have preferred straight scifi than this somewhat awkward mix of imagination, odd structure, and remarkably unpleasant people and outcomes.
    • 5/5
      Emotionally manipulative, riveting, though somewhat limited. The same characters and themes keep coming up in only slightly different guises, though they're always funny and gut-wrenching and wonderful.
    • 5/5
      Short stories. The most memorable one is The Semplica-Girl Diaries, a tragicomic story of a short-sighted couple making a mess of things. Key ingredients of that story are the eponymous (human) Semplica-girls. Funny and serious. Recommended.
    • 5/5
      Absolutely extraordinary, breathtaking, imaginative, original, beautiful...I could go on and on. Perhaps the highest complaints I can give are the following: 1) I'm very jealous of the author's talent 2) I ordered two of his other collections and began rereading from page one while I await delivery. I imagine I'll spend the next few months trying to read everything Saunders has written. Simply put Tenth of December gave me the feeling of reading Joyce, Naipaul, Rushdie, Shakespeare, or Tolstoy for the first time. This is work that makes me aware of possibilities in literature that I didn't know existed.