Modern Girls Audiobook By Jennifer S. Brown cover art

Modern Girls

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Modern Girls

By: Jennifer S. Brown
Narrated by: Elizabeth Wiley
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In 1935, Dottie Krasinsky is the epitome of the modern girl. A bookkeeper in midtown Manhattan, Dottie steals kisses from her steady beau, meets her girlfriends for drinks, and eyes the latest fashions. Yet at heart, she is a dutiful daughter, living with her Yiddish-speaking parents on the Lower East Side. So when, after a single careless night, she finds herself in a family way by a charismatic but unsuitable man, she is desperate: unwed, unsure, and running out of options.

After the birth of five children - and 20 years as a housewife - Dottie's immigrant mother, Rose, is itching to return to the social activism she embraced as a young woman. With strikes and breadlines at home and National Socialism rising in Europe, there is much more important work to do than cooking and cleaning. So when she realizes that she, too, is pregnant, she struggles to reconcile her longings with her faith.

As mother and daughter wrestle with unthinkable choices, they are forced to confront their beliefs, the changing world, and the fact that their lives will never again be the same.

©2016 Jennifer S. Brown (P)2016 Tantor Fiction Historical Fiction Jewish World Literature Heartfelt

Critic reviews

"A clear-eyed view of the sharp, difficult choices facing women on the cusp of equality." (Kirkus)
All stars
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1930s. What lengths a woman will go to to keep herself and her family safe

3.5 Stars

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Thank you Elizabeth Wiley for narrating a text with such excellence and compassion. I’m not Jewish and I needed you to translate the words so that they were genuine. I am so infinitely glad I selected an audiobook v text on paper. The story of mother and daughter felt as real and devastating and beautiful as the day my own daughter was born. Thank you Jennifer Brown for making my heart ache and for writing about the love that is motherhood.

Thank you

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You know its a good book when you have to mourn it is over and are dying to know how things end up. I loved the character development and the perspectives that switched from the mother to daughter. Highly recomend it.

great

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Entertaining melodrama (heavy on the melodrama) and way over-the-top narration, which somehow worked for the character of Rose but not so much with Dottie. I liked the backdrop of the Jewish community in NYC, 1935.

Narration was a bit over-the-top

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Really interesting story, although at times trite and predictable. But I wish I had read it as opposed to listening to it as I found the voiceover reader to be irritating.

Super annoying voiceover

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A great story, but I want to know what happens next! Will there be a sequel?

I want more

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