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    Speak Softly, She Can Hear: A Novel
    Speak Softly, She Can Hear: A Novel
    Speak Softly, She Can Hear: A Novel
    Ebook426 pages7 hours

    Speak Softly, She Can Hear: A Novel

    By Pam Lewis

    3/5

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    About this ebook

    In this “gripping psychological thriller” (New York Post), two best friends at an exclusive Manhattan girls’ school make a pact: they will lose their virginity before graduation.

    Carole is a shy, overweight scholarship student who finds herself under the spell of the charismatic, pedigreed Naomi—it’s an unlikely friendship that will set in motion a series of events with dire and far-reaching consequences.

    Enter Eddie, a slick Upper East Side prep school dropout, expelled from a half-dozen private schools on the East Coast. Eddie is handsome, fatally charming, and more than willing to help the girls accomplish their goal. But something about him is not quite right—his overly familiar way with Naomi, his hair-trigger temper, the stories that just don't add up—and on one bitterly cold holiday weekend in an isolated cabin deep in the Vermont woods, a horrifying twist develops in the girls’ plan.

    #1 bestselling author Wally Lamb says, “Pam Lewis is a sly and sure-footed storyteller whose literary tale of treachery, deception, and truth sits comfortably alongside Donna Tartt's The Secret History and Patricia Highsmith's The Talented Mr. Ripley."
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster
    Release dateMar 1, 2011
    ISBN9781451640106
    Speak Softly, She Can Hear: A Novel
    Author

    Pam Lewis

    Pam Lewis lives in rural Connecticut with her husband, Rob Funk. Since 1991, she has worked as a freelance writer of business and marketing communications. She is the author of the novels Perfect Family and Speak Softly, She Can Hear and her short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker and various literary magazines.

    Read more from Pam Lewis

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    Reviews for Speak Softly, She Can Hear

    3/5

    139 ratings11 reviews

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    • 3/5
      Easy read, creepy topic.
    • 4/5
      Interesting, character driven story involving a fat, unhappy teenage girl whose first sexual experience turns into a humiliating tragedy. She gets involved with bad people, but succeeds in getting away from them, losing weight, and getting on with her life. Still, guarding her secret affects her whole life.
    • 1/5
      Excruciatingly long and with no real character development, the protagonist makes constant moves in the right direction to make it seem as though she’s as wise as all her peers and elders say she is yet she can’t figure out the one glaringly obvious lie being told to her. The dialog is choppy and tedious and even the characters that you’re supposed to love are frustrating and dull (why did the baby have to get frostbite?). No charm and no lesson learned. The author seems to have stumbled on the “no love in lies” narrative and quickly forgot it then threw it in at the conclusion to make a rambling story end on a somewhat meaningful note. For the villain being a persisting force in the life of the heroine he dies in a bush in less than 40 words? Ugh.
    • 4/5
      Fear is a great motivator. Any gullible 16 year old who believed she was responsible for another's death during a sexcapade would be in fear. And it follows her to a bitter end. Point is, you can never truly outrun your past or lies. Good book, and well written. Remember though, fear is a liar and will keep you bound to that fear.
    • 1/5
      I couldn't finish it. I hope something nice finally happens, eventually, to the girl who apparently has no intellectual ability at all.
    • 1/5
      I hated this book so much I get chills whenever I think of it.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 4/5
      Speak Softly, She Can Hear is one of those novels that is an unexpected surprise. I have a fondness for novels about girlfriends and sisters. When I purchased this novel last year, I was intrigued by the tale of two friends, a pact to lose their virginity and a handsome and fatally charming stranger. What I received was a story of one woman's resiliency. Carole was the average girl. She felt she wasn't anything special, plain, slightly overweight, normal when she would rather be anything but. Actually, that's not entirely true. One of Carole's characteristics I really like was she was confident in herself yet that confidence didn't communicate with her classmates. Sadly, I think she was the odd girl in class. Nothing really wrong with her, yet the perfect target for bullies and snobby girls. I think her desire to be perfect was her biggest downfall. With each page, I felt more compassion for Carole. She was thrown into a situation by the one person she felt was her friend yet Naomi was just a troubled young girl. I was extremely impressed with Ms. Lewis. This story was a relatively simple. One girl, one villain, one secret. It was intriguing, a page turner. I turned every single page because I needed to know how Carole would escape under the weight of guilt felt over Rita's death and under Eddie's thumb. She was a survivor, a fighter. A runner but she did what she had to for self preservation.What drives me crazy about novels like this is that if only Carole has told the truth, none of this would happen. Then again, their wouldn't be a novel if she had. What I'm getting at is people are so afraid of the truth. In reality it is the lies and deception that harm us. This novel is a must read. As a debut for Ms. Lewis, it is stellar. I'm looking forward to what else she brings us.
    • 4/5
      Interesting, character driven story involving a fat, unhappy teenage girl whose first sexual experience turns into a humiliating tragedy. She gets involved with bad people, but succeeds in getting away from them, losing weight, and getting on with her life. Still, guarding her secret affects her whole life.
    • 3/5
      A tall chubby girl and a petite bird-framed girl are fast friends at an exclusive prep school in Manhattan. During their senior year, in 1965, they decide they just "must" lose their virginity before going off to college in the fall. One would think that they could have chosen wiser than the 26 year-old unemployed cad who vacations with them in Stowe, Vermont, to facilitate this deflowering. That this sketchy plan goes horribly awry, completely wrecking the lives of the chubby girl and her family, should come as no surprise.This should make a great movie.
    • 2/5
      I thought this book was ok. I was got it at the library but would not recommend it to anyone. It was kind of weird that the seemingly bright main caractrer did not figure out that she was being blackmailed for a crime she didn''t commit.
    • 5/5
      I really enjoyed this book. I thought the characters were extremely well done as was the period detail. I especially liked that the main character was far from perfect, made some bad choices but I still identified with her and pulling for her to the end.

    Book preview

    Speak Softly, She Can Hear - Pam Lewis

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