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    Costalegre
    Costalegre
    Costalegre
    Audiobook4 hours

    Costalegre

    Written by Courtney Maum

    Narrated by Frankie Corzo

    3.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    "A lush chronicle of wealth, art, adventure, loneliness, love, and folly told by a narrator you won't be able to forget." ―Kirkus, starred review

    One of Literary Hub's Most Anticipated Books of 2019.
    A Best Book of Summer at amNY, Moda Operandi, Publishers Weekly, Southern Living, and Thrillist.
    A Best Book of July at The Washington Post, Hello Giggles, Refinery 29, TIME Magazine, and Mind Body Green.

    It is 1937, and Europe is on the brink of war. In the haute-bohemian circles of Austria, Germany, and Paris, Hitler is circulating a most-wanted list of “cultural degenerates”―artists, writers, and thinkers whose work is deemed antithetical to the new regime.  To prevent the destruction of her favorite art (and artists), the impetuous American heiress and modern art collector, Leonora Calaway, begins chartering boats and planes for an elite group of surrealists to Costalegre, a mysterious resort in the Mexican jungle, where she has a home. 

    The story of what happens to these artists when they reach their destination is told from the point of view of Lara, Leonora’s neglected 15-year-old daughter, who has been pulled out of school to follow her mother to Mexico. Forced from a young age to cohabit with her mother’s eccentric whims, tortured lovers, and entourage of gold-diggers, Lara suffers from emotional, educational, and geographical instability that a Mexican sojourn with surrealists isn’t going to help. But when she meets the outcast Dadaist sculptor Jack Klinger, a much older man who has already been living in Costalegre for some time, Lara thinks she might have found the love and understanding she so badly craves. 

    Sinuous and striking, heartbreaking and strange, Costalegre is heavily inspired by the real-life relationship between the heiress Peggy Guggenheim and her daughter, Pegeen. Acclaimed author Courtney Maum triumphs with this wildly imaginative and curiously touching story of a privileged teenager who has everything a girl could wish for―except for a mother who loves her back. 

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateJul 16, 2019
    ISBN9781721354931
    Costalegre
    Author

    Courtney Maum

    Courtney Maum is the author of Touch (a New York Time editor's choice and NPR's Best of 2017), as well as the acclaimed I Am Having So Much Fun Here Without You. Her book reviews, essays and articles about the writing life have been widely published in outlets such as The New York Times, O the Oprah Magazine, BuzzFeed, Interview Magazine and Electric Literature.

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    Reviews for Costalegre

    3.5/5

    41 ratings2 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Where do I begin?! The protagonist’s voice is ever so clear and it’s read quite well in this audio version. Each sentence is justly emphasized accordingly and to be transported to the time, the place that is Costalegre was quite a treat. Loved reading along and I can’t wait to recommend this audiobook to fellow readers. Thank you!!

      1 person found this helpful

    • 3/5
      Dreamy surreal. Would not recommend to anyone unless they were interested in the Guggenheim's. Sad and frustrating. As Fitzgerald said, the rich are different from us.