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Mildred Pierce (Unabridged)
 
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Mildred Pierce (Unabridged) [Audio Download]

by James M. Cain (Author), Christine Williams (Narrator)
4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
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Product details

  • Audio Download
  • Listening Length: 10 hours
  • Program Type: Audiobook
  • Version: Unabridged
  • Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.
  • Audible Release Date: 28 Mar 2007
  • Language: English
  • ASIN: B002SQBGFC
  • Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)

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Product Description

Mildred Pierce had gorgeous legs, a way with a skillet, and a bone-deep core of toughness and determination. She used those attributes to survive a divorce in 1940s America with two children and to claw her way out of poverty, becoming a successful businesswoman. But Mildred also had two weaknesses: a yen for shiftless men and an unreasoning devotion to her monstrous daughter.

Out of these elements, Cain created a novel (later made into a film noir classic) of acute social observation and devastating emotional violence - and a heroine whose ambitions and sufferings are never less than recognizable.

©1941 James M. Cain; (P)2007 Blackstone Audio Inc.
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First Sentence
In the spring of 1931, on a lawn in Glendale, California, a man was bracing trees. Read the first page
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Well worth reading 20 Oct 2011
By NorthBrit TOP 1000 REVIEWER
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Mildred Pierce is a gripping tale. It is the story of an abandoned wife, her business ventures, her love affairs and her family life against a background of an economic slump. She is a great character Mildred Pierce in that she is not a perfect, brave heroine, but she is a human with failings and one VERY blind spot, her love for the unworthy daughter.

The descriptions of cake-making, book-keeping, Californian middle-class homes, music lessons etc etc are so vivid that you see them with your own eyes, you live them. After reading this book, I felt as if I had visted pre-war California and begun to understand its ways, it society and its snobberies.

The book has a flaw, though. The author writes with Mildred as his focus in every scene, we are taken into her head and into her heart, BUT Mildred is female and the writer is not. At just a few points one thinks that a woman would not say or do or feel as described.

This was my first James M Cain novel. I enjoyed so much I have ordered The Postman Always Rings Twice.
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
pies, pies, pies 1 Oct 2010
Format:Paperback
This is a great book on lots of levels. There is fantastic detail about all sorts of topics: pies and how to make and sell them, the restaurant and real estate businesses, class differences (particularly in interior decoration), and the competitive world of professional musicians. The characters and situations are nicely varied and all very believable and you really care what happens. It is quite different to the film, so don't be put off by thinking you know the plot already if you've seen it (though I've heard rumours of a Kate Winslet remake which could be more faithful). This is an excellent option if you like the idea of 'hard-boiled' US fiction of the '30s and '40s but find crime writers like Hammett and Chandler objectionably macho. There's none of that here - we see the story from Mildred's point of view and it stays firmly rooted in a domestic and family context that makes the climactic events all the more plausible. If you like this I would also recommend Cain's 'Serenade', again a non-macho yet still hard-boiled(ish) classic with similar strengths.
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11 of 13 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Perhaps not technically in the 'film noir' genre as there is no smoking gun (unlike the joan Crawford film), Cain's writing is however gripping, and has a very modern feel. Cain achieves strong characterisation, principally by the excellent use of dialogue combined with earthy realism.

The story revolves around the destructive love of a mother for her spoilt, cold and manipulative daughter, upon whom she projects material ambitions buit fails to inculcate any moral index. Initially a victim, the eponymous hero becomes a self-made all-american success, only to be destroyed by those she loves and who have motivated her efforts to succeed.

The plot is startlingly different from the film adaptation, more convincing and bleaker if less dramatic. A suoerb holiday read

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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Great Book
This was a really good old-fashioned read. It's set in a time when women were home bodies, men made the money and kids were well behaved. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Kindle Junkie
THE UNKINDEST CUT OF ALL...
Having loved the film, I looked forward to reading this classic novel upon which the film was based. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Lawyeraau
Engrossing story
When Mildred's marriage ends in 1930s California she is forced to seek work with thousands of others if she is to feed her daughters and maintain her middle-class lifestyle. Read more
Published 3 months ago by Reddy
A (not so) modern fable
Mildred Pierce has been given a Hollywood and HBO treatment and the recent adaptation has been laden with awards. I haven't watched either and wanted to read this book 'clean'. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Syriat
Well written book
I had seen the TV series, which made me want to read the book. I wasn't disappointed. It was a really good read.
Published 7 months ago by molly
Mildred Pierce
It was a joy to read this book. I recently watched the mini-series on TV and it seemed so very real. Read more
Published 9 months ago by janetann
When odds are stacked against us, we adapt and keep moving forward.
Although this book is set in the 1930s depression, eighty years on and it fits extremely well into current climates. Read more
Published 9 months ago by Andrea Bowhill
Motherhood and apple pie
This 1941 novel opens ten years earlier, on the day Glendale housewife Mildred Pierce becomes a single mother. Read more
Published 12 months ago by Miss Moppet
You do it to yourself, that's what really hurts
Cain is 1 of my favourite noir authors with a taut style that brilliantly evokes the depression era and one woman's American dream. Read more
Published 23 months ago by Zigden
Forget the film ...
Because there's no crime of passion in the novel, so this isn't a film noir flashback ...
Rather it's a story of the Depression, of easy money made in the 1920s and lost in... Read more
Published 24 months ago by booksetc
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