Swan Song An Odyssey – Audiobook Online By: Lisa Alther
A new, humorous, wise, touching, real novel, as only Lisa Alther could write (“[S]he made me laugh at 4 a.m.” (Doris Lessing)), set in a scene on a cruise ship, about a woman, a doctor in charge of the ship’s clinic.
Recovering from the loss of her longtime female lover, a much-admired writer, and confronting with the madness of life on a cruise ship as she looks back at her past and feels her way into the future.
Dr. Jessie Drake, in her 60s, after the sudden death of her parents and Kat, her partner of 20 years, fled the Vermont life she had known for decades.
In an attempt to escape the constant stifling of grief, she accepts a job from the old fire from her residence at New York City’s Roosevelt Hospital and agrees to assist Ben in her capacity, was the ship’s doctor on a British train. Jessie boarded a ship in Hong Kong, and as Amphitrite set sail across Southeast Asia and the Middle East, cruise ship antics ensued. Jessie is lulled into a longstanding romance with the ship’s co-doc, and both she and her new/former lover become enamored with the lead singer/entertainer (female) of the ship.
Among the passengers who put social behavior aside on the high seas: a former Miss Florida (Miss Power and Light Florida) on her second honeymoon with her husband, when she caused a speeding scandal, altitude, while juggling ship chores with a suicide golf pro and a mission accomplished priest is hired as one of the ship’s gentleman hosts, until she disappears – crash! – from a ship off the coast of Portugal…. As the ship sails through the Gulf of Aden and is possibly attacked by Somali pirates, Jessie retreats to her lover’s diary, written in the last months of her life her diary, filled with sketches of her characters’ potential, observations on life and love – as well as the draft of a new, unfinished poem, “Swan Song”, seems to talk about falling in love with someone else, someone new. As Jessie’s grief turns to suspicion of a woman she thinks she knows so well, her illumination of the poem’s meaning begins to untie the bonds of the past and pave the way for the future.
It is a slow book, like a journey that is the main content of this book. I like the main character, Jessie, but it’s not an uplifting book, I don’t want to stop halfway, which is a good sign. I like the narration.
Jeff Swan writes great poetry! His descriptive image makes you feel as if you are “seeing” the scene as he sees it. His connection and passion for nature is evident in the stories that take you on mountain hikes and seaside walks. If you need a natural, but can’t get out at the moment, just pick up Swan Song and tune in.
