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    Beautiful Ruins: A Novel
    Beautiful Ruins: A Novel
    Beautiful Ruins: A Novel
    Audiobook12 hours

    Beautiful Ruins: A Novel

    Written by Jess Walter

    Narrated by Edoardo Ballerini

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    The acclaimed, award-winning author of the national bestseller The Financial Lives of the Poets returns with his  funniest, most romantic, and most purely enjoyable novel yet: the story of an almost-love affair that begins on the Italian coast in 1962 . . . and is rekindled in Hollywood fifty years later.  

    “Why mince words? Beautiful Ruins is an absolute masterpiece.” —Richard Russo

    “A ridiculously talented writer.” —New York Times

    Editor's Note

    Charming bestseller…

    Skillfully alternating between 1960s Italy and present-day Los Angeles, this charming hit weaves together the romance between an innkeeper and a starlet, Italy and Hollywood, failure and fame.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateJun 12, 2012
    ISBN9780062201621
    Beautiful Ruins: A Novel
    Author

    Jess Walter

    Jess Walter is the author of six novels, including the bestsellers Beautiful Ruins and The Financial Lives of the Poets, the National Book Award finalist The Zero, and Citizen Vince, the winner of the Edgar Award for best novel. His short fiction has appeared in Harper's, McSweeney's, and Playboy, as well as The Best American Short Stories and The Best American Nonrequired Reading. He lives in his hometown of Spokane, Washington.

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    Reviews for Beautiful Ruins

    4/5

    1,751 ratings185 reviews

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    • 5/5
      When a book like Beautiful Ruins exists that's when you know the world is a beautiful place indeed.

      Have to get my thoughts together for a more extensive review, but for now, I'll just say, "Wow!" I'm glad my parents encouraged me as a young reader so I could read books like this today.
    • 2/5
      Deliver me from literary fiction.Lots and lots and lots of Italian words and phrases.The performer adds rich Italian accents to all of the Italian characters.The Italian pronunciation is pitch-perfect.
    • 5/5
      I listened to this book on audio and Edoardo Ballerini did a superb job reading. I don't think I would have enjoyed it as much (and given it 5 stars) if I had read it myself. There was quite a bit of Italian in the dialogue that would have frustrated me while reading. Ballerini read each part, male and female, with perfect pacing and understanding of the character. I absolutely loved it!
    • 4/5
      The character we meet first in the book is not a major character--which may throw some readers. The character just sets a certain tone and gives us an overall point of view about how the main characters fit together. There are many, many stories wrapped up in this novel. Most of them are beautiful, and some of them are very funny. It's a very creative piece of writing, and helps to see your own life as a story and parts of others stories. Beautiful Ruins is a very satisfying novel, with intriguing themes. Don't wait for a trip to the beach to read it.
    • 3/5
      Once again I'd like a step between 3 and 4 stars. I more than 'liked' it but I less than 'really liked' it. It took me a while to get into the story; almost 100 pages, but then the story took off. The characters are damaged and at first it was hard for me to care for them when so much of the damage came from their own hands but as the story kept unfolding I found myself drawn into it.
    • 5/5
      Profound portraits of many lives
      Tremendously enjoyable.
      Story telling at its best
    • 5/5
      I love the twists and turns. I expected it to work out and it didn’t quite which I also enjoyed
    • 5/5
      One the best books I ever heard. Wonderful storyline. Just excellent
    • 4/5
      I was reluctant to read this only because it is so popular - however, I thoroughly enjoyed it - I'd give it a 4.5 stars. The changing of locale and stories kept me interested in reading the next section in order to get back to the last story.
    • 4/5
      Simply marvelous! I so enjoyed Jess Walter's style and warm sense of humor. Terrific story, or rather stories, there were so many characters and relationships that comprised this novel... something for everyone. (On loan from Cindy. Thanks, Cindy!)
    • 5/5
      Very nice read
      Good story well read by the author.
    • 4/5
      This book was really a pleasure. I mean, isn't the cover enough? They made it kind of glow too. The best compliment I can offer the author is in the creation of the many characters, and the portrayal of some in both their youth and maturity with so much life having been lived in between. From looking at his past work I get the sense that this a bit of a departure for him also, not being focused on some sort of crime. Nicely done. I can't tell if the market is really awash with books that go back and forth between the present and the past, or if I am just overly attracted to them, but I like seeing how the stories come together. At the end of the book, the author wraps up the story of nearly every person mentioned in the book for more than a sentence or two - it was very interesting. I read this for one of the two book clubs I am in, and I am definitely recommending it to the other ladies!!
    • 4/5
      A novel of cinematic breadth, anchored in a tiny fishing villaggio in Italy in the early 1960s, while nearby Rome hosts the ego-drunk filming of the movie Cleopatra. A lithe blonde actress decamps at Pasquale Tursi's toehold of a hotel, and no one's life will be the same. These well -drawn characters, from both Italian settings, are brought forward to modern day Hollywood, Spokane and Idaho, generally to entertaining effect. The story's post-punk foray to the London music scene irritated me some, as maybe I'd have created a different life experience for that character (it didn't help that the book began to remind me of A Visit From the Goon Squad- eek!). The eventual reuniting of Pasquale, Michael Deane ( a near-sociopathic, delusional movie producer), and the actress Dee Moray, provides enough pathos, revelation and humor to please a wide audience, but has a frenetic pace that doesn't allow as much emotional depth or poignancy as I'd prefer. A brisk read and imaginative, and I'll revisit the writer.
    • 5/5
      Insights for practical living from the teachings of Jesus. I hope this book will become a manual for use by Christians in the next generation.
    • 5/5
      Amazing book. Brutal to read, but worth the pain. Opened my eyes to Kingdom and the experience of God like no other book.
    • 5/5
      Enjoyed this challenge of discipleship to Jesus as the very heart of the gospel, and these favorite quotes:
      More than any other single thing, in any case, the practical irrelevance of actual obedience to Christ accounts for the weakened effect of Christianity on the world today, with its increasing tendency to emphasize political and social action as the primary way to serve God. It also accounts for the practical irrelevance of Christian faith to individual character development and overall personal sanity and well-being.
      "The command 'Be ye perfect' is not idealistic gas. Nor is it a command to do the impossible. He is going to make us into creatures that can obey that command." C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
      Kingdom praying and its efficacy is entirely a matter of the innermost heart's being totally open and honest before God. It is not an informational but intimate communion with the one who truly knows our needs It is a matter of what we are saying with our whole being, moving with resolute intent and clarity of mind into the flow of God's action. In apprenticeship to Jesus, this is one of the most important things we learn how to do. He teaches us how to be in prayer what we are in life and how to be in life what we are in prayer.
      "The discipline of secrecy will help us break the grip of human opinion over our souls and our actions. A discipline is an activity in our power that we do to enable us to do what we cannot do by direct effort. Jesus is here leading us into the discipline of secrecy. We from time to time practice doing things approved of in our religious circles – giving, praying, fasting, attending services of the church, and so on – but in such a way that no one knows. Thus, our motivation and reward for doing these things cannot come from human beings. We are liberated from slavery to eyes, and then it does not matter whether people know or not. We learn to live constantly in this way."
      "The adult members of churches today rarely raise serious religious questions for fear of revealing their doubts or being thought of as strange. There is an implicit conspiracy of silence on religious matters in the churches. This conspiracy covers up the fact that the churches do not change lives or influence conduct to any appreciable degree." Clyde Reid
      Prayer is a matter of explicitly sharing with God my concerns about what he too is concerned about in my life. And of course he is concerned about my concerns and, in particular, that my concerns should coincide with his. This is our walk together. Out of it I pray.
      Prayer as kingdom praying is an arrangement explicitly instituted by God in order that we as individuals may count, and count for much, as we learn step by step how to govern, to reign with him in his kingdom. To enter and to learn this reign is what gives the individual life its intended significance. This high calling also explains why prayer frequently requires much effort, continuous effort, and on some matters possibly years and years of effort. Prayer is, above all, a means of forming character. It combines freedom and power with service and love. What God gets out of our lives - and indeed, what we get out of our lives - is simply the person we become. It is God's intention that we should grow into the kind of person he could empower to do what we want to do. Then we are ready to 'reign for ever and ever' (Rev. 22:5).
      "Brother Lawrence, who was a kitchen worker and cook, remarks, Our sanctification does not depend upon changing our works, but in doing that for God's sake which we commonly do for our own. . . It is a great delusion to think that the times of prayer ought to differ from other times. We are as strictly obliged to adhere to God by action in the time of action as by prayer in the season of prayer."
      Nondiscipleship is the elephant in the church. It is not the many moral failures, financial abuses or amazing general similarity between Christian and non-Christians. These are only the effects of the underlying problem. The fundamental negative reality among Christians believers today, is the failure to be constantly learning how to live their lives in the kingdom among us. And it is an accepted reality. The divisions of professing Christians and to those for whom it is a matter of whole life devotion to God and those who maintain a consumer or client relationship to the church has now been an accepted reality for the last 1500 years.
      Henri Nouwen well describes our common situation: “We simply go along with the many "musts" and "oughts" that have been handed on to us, and we live with them as if they were authentic translations of the Gospel of our Lord. People must be motivated to come to church, youth must be entertained, money must be raised, and above all everyone must be happy. Moreover, we ought to be on good terms with the church and civil authorities; we ought to be liked or at least respected by a fair majority of our parishioners; we ought to move up in the ranks according to schedule; and we ought to have enough vacation and salary to live a comfortable life.”
      Do we now even have any idea of what discipleship evangelism, as we might call it, would look Ilke? What message would we preach that would naturally lead to a decision to become an apprentice to Jesus in The Kingdom Among Us? I hope we can now understand what it might be, having worked our way this far. I hope that our understanding of what it is really to trust Jesus Christ, the whole person, with our whole life, would make the call to become his whole-life apprentice the natural next step. That would be discipleship evangelism. And it would be very different from what is now done.
      One of the greatest weaknesses in our teaching and leadership today is that we spend so much time trying to get people to do things good people are supposed to do, without changing what they really believe. It doesn't succeed very well, and that is the open secret of church life.
      Very little of our being lies under the direction of our conscious minds, and very little of our actions runs from our thoughts and consciously chosen intentions. Our mind on its own is an extremely feeble instrument, whose power over life we constantly tend to exaggerate. We are incarnate beings in our very nature, and we live from our bodies. If we are to be transformed, the body must be transformed, and that is not accomplished by talking at it.
    • 5/5


      I love a book that makes me laugh out loud!
    • 5/5
      I think this could go down as one of the great Christian books of all time, but who am I ?
    • 4/5
      The Kingdom of the Heavens is not then and there, but here and now. Jesus’ radical reordering of society in His ‘sermon on the mount,’ offers a sustained and penetrating look into this new reality. Willard provides a methodical and immensely practical examination of this profound sermon. Although at times drifting into questionable exegesis, Willard’s central thesis is rock solid. In particular, Willard’s explanation of the Kingdom of God and discipleship make this a must-read. A-
    • 5/5
      Simply stated, perhaps the greatest contemporary Christian book I have read.
    • 3/5
      I did not enjoy this as much as I expected to. I loved the parts set in Italy, but did not care for the rest. The same goes for the characters. The story comes together very nicely at the end, but I still felt as if I missed something that other readers found.
    • 4/5
      Engaging plot with characters that interconnect through several decades. Very entertaining and well read. SRH
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed the writing and the story of this book. I'm glad I persevered because the chapters switched not only persons but to the past and then present and involved a lot of characters and I would normally quit. But it was for my book group and well worth the effort. The book was about there are screen actors, a novelist, and Pasquale, an innkeeper, who keeps his patrons fed and watered on homemade wine and dreams. Among all the shimmer and hope are the lost souls who long to create something, anything. And just as Jess Walter introduces us to these characters, he follows them for fifty years. The journey will delight and captivate you.
    • 4/5
      In 1962 a young movie starlet arrives at an isolated Italian seaside village and captivates the young local innkeeper. Fifty years later we find this same Italian in Hollywood in search of the woman who disappeared out of his life In-between these tow bookends we find a rollicking story - part send-up of Hollywood and part the story of fragile characters in search of themselves and their dreams. Jess Walter tells his story in the form of a literary jigsaw puzzle and keeps the reader turning the pages until all is revealed.
    • 3/5
      The rhythm was slow, portraying incidents and characters in detail, but it took a fast pace at the final chapter, and it doesn't appear right to me as a reader savouring details.
      Hollywood plays a proactive role which does not seem necessary to me, and the book could stand alone without focusing on Hollywood. I liked how stories are woven together though and each of the stories could have been a single story as well.
    • 5/5
      If you are a Christian and want to take in something that will challenge you to live a radically Christlike life, then this is one book you must read. Willard, a professor of philosophy at USC, uses the Sermon on the Mount of Matthew 5-7 as the basis for this 1997 work that is already widely recognized in evangelical circles as a classic in the genre of Christian spiritual formation. He gives practical, concrete teaching on living as subjects of the King in the “kingdom of the heavens” (Willard’s preferred rendering of the Greek). While his understanding of Christian theology at times seems to be influenced more by Plato than Moses – and this is a shortcoming in my opinion – he skillfully explains discipleship in terms of present kingdom realities. His “curriculum for Christlikeness” (chapter 9) is worth the price of the book alone. Willard’s syntax is sometimes complex, even cumbersome, which means it may not be the easiest reading for some. However, those willing to work slowly and carefully through the book, as I did, will enjoy an abundant feast of spiritual nourishment. There is an ample index and a wealth of endnotes.
    • 5/5
      Half way through and I can already say that every Christian should read this book (in fact they should read all of Dallas Willard’s books). It will take patience and determination to stay completely engaged because the reading level is not for the faint of heart. He’s a Philosophy Professor at USC and his writing is a direct reflection of higher education. If the Lord Jesus tarries, his writings will be considered classics. I wish he were a professor at my seminary, I would have taken every one of his classes. If you are involved in any kind of ministry, you need to read this book!
    • 4/5
      enjoyed the entire book except the ending
    • 5/5
      "all these lovely wrecked lives . . .""the sweet lovely mess that is real life"What an amazing, alive juxtaposition of things: a worn out pensione in a small, Italian town; a young actress whose pregnancy is being "managed" by the studio system; an inhuman producer who tries to cheat death and sees life as his to develop into deals; a failed novelist; and Richard Burton! I loved this novel so much. The language is clear and simple, the love stories are fresh and new, and really as Jess Walter writes, isn't every story a love story?
    • 1/5
      I realize we're dealing with the 'freaks of Hollywood' here, but is this really necessary (page 28):

      "Unfortunately, most of these... come from Michael's past... people he owes favors to... women he slept with in the sixties and seventies, men he slept with in the eighties..."

      Nope. Exit time