
Beyond All Desiring
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
3 months free
Buy for $19.95
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Christy Lynn
-
By:
-
Judith Laura
About this listen
Recipient of 3 awards, Beyond All Desiring reveals the deep secrets of Sara, a woman who was "different" in a time of conformity. When Sara's niece, Janice, is notified that her sharp-witted aunt, now in her 80s, hasn't been seen for several days, Janice's panicky drive to find out what's happened begins our journey of discovering that Sara has led a life very different from what her relatives and friends assume. Historical events of the 20th century form a backdrop to Sara's often tumultuous personal life. As Sara visits a museum exhibit about Buddhism, we learn of her two marriages, the first to an abusive man and the second to a kinder man involved in top secret projects, who develops a bizarre illness. We discover Sara's long but secret love relationship with a woman. And we learn of hidden booklets that hold the key to yet another secret. Judith Laura's writing in this novel is stylistically innovative, realistic and magical, erotic and spiritual.
©2005, 2012 Judith Laura (P)2013 Judith LauraListeners also enjoyed...
-
The First Shot
- A Prequel
- By: Liv Constantine
- Narrated by: Suzanne Elise Freeman
- Length: 2 hrs and 35 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this gripping prequel to the blockbuster best seller and Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick The Last Mrs. Parrish, listeners will discover exactly how Amber Patterson transformed from small-town girl to master manipulator - after all, practice makes perfect.
-
-
I was not disappointed!
- By KKEC Reads on 11-14-20
By: Liv Constantine
-
Middlesex
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Kristoffer Tabori
- Length: 21 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 1974, Calliope Stephanides, a student at a girls' school in Grosse Pointe, finds herself drawn to a chain-smoking, strawberry-blonde classmate with a gift for acting. The passion that furtively develops between them - along with Callie's failure to develop physically - leads Callie to suspect that she is not like other girls. In fact, she is not really a girl at all.
-
-
Anything but middle.
- By Michael on 05-04-03
-
The Masterpiece
- By: Francine Rivers
- Narrated by: Susan Bennett
- Length: 15 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A successful LA artist, Roman Velasco appears to have everything he could possibly want - money, women, fame. Only Grace Moore, his reluctant, newly hired personal assistant, knows how little he truly has. The demons of Roman's past seem to echo through the halls of his empty mansion and out across his breathtaking Topanga Canyon view. But Grace doesn't know how her boss secretly wrestles with those demons: by tagging buildings as the Bird, a notorious but unidentified graffiti artist - an alter ego that could destroy his career and land him in prison.
-
-
Did not realize this was religious....
- By Amanda on 05-08-18
By: Francine Rivers
-
The Great Believers
- By: Rebecca Makkai
- Narrated by: Michael Crouch
- Length: 18 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1985, Yale Tishman, the development director for an art gallery in Chicago, is about to pull off an amazing coup, bringing in an extraordinary collection of 1920s paintings as a gift to the gallery. Yet as his career begins to flourish, the carnage of the AIDS epidemic grows around him. One by one, his friends are dying and after his friend Nico's funeral, the virus circles closer and closer to Yale himself. Soon the only person he has left is Fiona, Nico's little sister.
-
-
A story for all time
- By Carla jo Thompson on 08-06-18
By: Rebecca Makkai
-
In Short Measures
- Three Novellas
- By: Michael Ruhlman
- Narrated by: Lydia Mackay, Robert McCollum, Lauren Davis
- Length: 11 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In his three novellas, In Short Measures, Strong Conspirators, and Sally Forth, Michael Ruhlman delves deeply into the nuanced complexity of romantic and sexual love - and the inevitable evolution of the heart over the span of years and decades. Each novella asks questions about the nature of love in terms of loyalty and fidelity - what are one's obligations toward one's spouse, one's family, and one's heart?
-
-
achingly lovely
- By Kmeme on 09-13-20
By: Michael Ruhlman
-
We Are Water
- A Novel
- By: Wally Lamb
- Narrated by: Wally Lamb, George Guidall, Maggi-Meg Reed, and others
- Length: 23 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After 27 years of marriage and three children, Anna Oh - wife, mother, outsider artist - has fallen in love with Viveca, the wealthy Manhattan art dealer who orchestrated her success. They plan to wed in the Oh family’s hometown of Three Rivers in Connecticut. But the wedding provokes some very mixed reactions and opens a Pandora’s Box of toxic secrets - dark and painful truths that have festered below the surface of the Ohs' lives.
-
-
Lamb writes Fine Literature/What a Book!
- By Suzn F on 10-27-13
By: Wally Lamb
-
The First Shot
- A Prequel
- By: Liv Constantine
- Narrated by: Suzanne Elise Freeman
- Length: 2 hrs and 35 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this gripping prequel to the blockbuster best seller and Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick The Last Mrs. Parrish, listeners will discover exactly how Amber Patterson transformed from small-town girl to master manipulator - after all, practice makes perfect.
-
-
I was not disappointed!
- By KKEC Reads on 11-14-20
By: Liv Constantine
-
Middlesex
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Kristoffer Tabori
- Length: 21 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 1974, Calliope Stephanides, a student at a girls' school in Grosse Pointe, finds herself drawn to a chain-smoking, strawberry-blonde classmate with a gift for acting. The passion that furtively develops between them - along with Callie's failure to develop physically - leads Callie to suspect that she is not like other girls. In fact, she is not really a girl at all.
-
-
Anything but middle.
- By Michael on 05-04-03
-
The Masterpiece
- By: Francine Rivers
- Narrated by: Susan Bennett
- Length: 15 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A successful LA artist, Roman Velasco appears to have everything he could possibly want - money, women, fame. Only Grace Moore, his reluctant, newly hired personal assistant, knows how little he truly has. The demons of Roman's past seem to echo through the halls of his empty mansion and out across his breathtaking Topanga Canyon view. But Grace doesn't know how her boss secretly wrestles with those demons: by tagging buildings as the Bird, a notorious but unidentified graffiti artist - an alter ego that could destroy his career and land him in prison.
-
-
Did not realize this was religious....
- By Amanda on 05-08-18
By: Francine Rivers
-
The Great Believers
- By: Rebecca Makkai
- Narrated by: Michael Crouch
- Length: 18 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1985, Yale Tishman, the development director for an art gallery in Chicago, is about to pull off an amazing coup, bringing in an extraordinary collection of 1920s paintings as a gift to the gallery. Yet as his career begins to flourish, the carnage of the AIDS epidemic grows around him. One by one, his friends are dying and after his friend Nico's funeral, the virus circles closer and closer to Yale himself. Soon the only person he has left is Fiona, Nico's little sister.
-
-
A story for all time
- By Carla jo Thompson on 08-06-18
By: Rebecca Makkai
-
In Short Measures
- Three Novellas
- By: Michael Ruhlman
- Narrated by: Lydia Mackay, Robert McCollum, Lauren Davis
- Length: 11 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In his three novellas, In Short Measures, Strong Conspirators, and Sally Forth, Michael Ruhlman delves deeply into the nuanced complexity of romantic and sexual love - and the inevitable evolution of the heart over the span of years and decades. Each novella asks questions about the nature of love in terms of loyalty and fidelity - what are one's obligations toward one's spouse, one's family, and one's heart?
-
-
achingly lovely
- By Kmeme on 09-13-20
By: Michael Ruhlman
-
We Are Water
- A Novel
- By: Wally Lamb
- Narrated by: Wally Lamb, George Guidall, Maggi-Meg Reed, and others
- Length: 23 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After 27 years of marriage and three children, Anna Oh - wife, mother, outsider artist - has fallen in love with Viveca, the wealthy Manhattan art dealer who orchestrated her success. They plan to wed in the Oh family’s hometown of Three Rivers in Connecticut. But the wedding provokes some very mixed reactions and opens a Pandora’s Box of toxic secrets - dark and painful truths that have festered below the surface of the Ohs' lives.
-
-
Lamb writes Fine Literature/What a Book!
- By Suzn F on 10-27-13
By: Wally Lamb
-
The Beach Club
- A Novel
- By: Elin Hilderbrand
- Narrated by: Christina Delaine
- Length: 14 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Beach Club, the juicy first novel by Elin Hilderbrand, a series of personal dramas are played out during one summer at a Nantucket Beach Club. It's about the love of summer, summer love, and the special feelings we all have for that special summer place—in this case, a hotel and an island.
-
-
Narration of older characters is depressing
- By T. Martin on 02-27-19
By: Elin Hilderbrand
-
Barefoot
- A Novel
- By: Elin Hilderbrand
- Narrated by: Rachael Warren
- Length: 16 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From marriage, infidelity, and the mayhem of motherhood to scandal, tragedy, and illness - three women seek peace and comfort in Nantucket as they cope with life's challenges. Three women - burdened with small children, unwieldy straw hats, and some obvious emotional issues - tumble onto the Nantucket airport tarmac one hot June day. Vicki is trying to sort through the news that she has a serious illness. Her sister, Brenda, has just left her job after being caught in an affair with a student. And their friend Melanie, after seven failed in vitro attempts, is pregnant at last.
-
-
OMG...spoiler alert:
- By Abby Mamacos on 10-09-17
By: Elin Hilderbrand
-
The Perfect Mother
- A Novel
- By: Aimee Molloy
- Narrated by: Cristin Milioti
- Length: 9 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
They call themselves the May Mothers - a collection of new moms who gave birth in the same month. Twice a week, with strollers in tow, they get together in Prospect Park, seeking refuge from the isolation of new motherhood. When the group’s members agree to meet for drinks at a hip local bar, they have in mind a casual evening of fun, a brief break from their daily routine. But on this sultry Fourth of July night during the hottest summer in Brooklyn’s history, something goes terrifyingly wrong: one of the babies is taken from his crib.
-
-
What a tangled web we weave
- By MarisaReads on 05-07-18
By: Aimee Molloy
-
The Untelling
- By: Tayari Jones
- Narrated by: Michele Blackmon
- Length: 8 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Aria is no stranger to tragedy. Fifteen years ago, a family outing took the lives of her father and baby sister, leaving remaining members of this fractured family struggling with their own guilt - real and imagined. At 25, Aria believes she can reinvent herself through her planned marriage with all its promise of a family of her own. Her infertility changes her life as swiftly and irrevocably as the urban landscape around her.
-
-
Don’t waste your time!
- By shasha on 09-18-20
By: Tayari Jones
-
Fresh Complaint
- Stories
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Jeffrey Eugenides, Ari Fliakos, Cynthia Nixon
- Length: 8 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The stories in Fresh Complaint explore equally rich—and intriguing—territory. Ranging from the bitingly reproductive antics of “Baster” to the dreamy, moving account of a young traveler’s search for enlightenment in “Air Mail” (selected by Annie Proulx for Best American Short Stories), this collection presents characters in the midst of personal and national emergencies. We meet a failed poet who, envious of other people’s wealth during the real-estate bubble, becomes an embezzler; a clavichordist whose dreams of art founder under the obligations of marriage and fatherhood.
-
-
You’ll love this book if you love hearing about bodily fluids on a regular basis.
- By Cynthia C. Stellar on 11-13-17
-
Summer People
- A Novel
- By: Elin Hilderbrand
- Narrated by: Beth MacDonald
- Length: 9 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Every summer the Newton family retreats to their beloved home on Nantucket for three months of sunshine, cookouts, and bonfires on the beach. But this summer will not be like any other. When Arch Newton, a prominent New York attorney, dies in a plane crash on his way home from a business trip, his beautiful widow, Beth, can barely keep things together. Above all, though, she decides that she must continue the family tradition of going to Nantucket, and at the same time fulfill a promise that Arch made before he died.
-
-
I'm returning it
- By Sunworshipper3 on 07-09-18
By: Elin Hilderbrand
-
Family Secrets
- A Novel
- By: Nancy Thayer
- Narrated by: Coleen Marlo
- Length: 10 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Though Diane Randall’s jewelry business is a great success, her marriage is not, and she finds herself growing lonely as her children near adulthood. Meanwhile, her eighteen-year-old daughter Julia is falling dangerously in love, and Diane’s mother, Jean, is relishing her newfound freedom as a single woman in Europe. Distracted by their individual concerns, the three women are ill-prepared for the crisis that suddenly appears on Diane’s doorstep in the form of a handsome FBI agent asking about an explosive secret that’s laid buried for decades.
-
-
Nancy! Is there a sequel? What?
- By PattieLynn on 12-02-22
By: Nancy Thayer
-
When Your Mother Doesn't
- A Novel
- By: Jill Kelly
- Narrated by: Jill Kelly PhD
- Length: 10 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
What kind of women do daughters become when their fathers are missing and their mothers can't love them? How do they find love and ways to love themselves? Nearly three decades of secrets lie between Lola Ashby and the two girls she reluctantly raised. Now, prompted by the one father figure she respects, older daughter Frankie agrees to drive from Portland to visit her ailing mother, who abandoned the girls when they were in high school.
-
-
Difficult and depressing story
- By Petrina on 06-21-21
By: Jill Kelly
-
Sanctuary Cove
- A Cavanaugh Island Novel, Book 1
- By: Rochelle Alers
- Narrated by: Nicole Small
- Length: 8 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Still reeling from her husband’s untimely death, Deborah Robinson needs a fresh start. So she decides to pack up her family and return to her grandmother’s ancestral home on Cavanaugh Island. The charming town of Sanctuary Cove holds happy memories for Deborah, and, after she spies a gorgeous stranger in the local bakery, it promises the possibility for a bright future. Dr. Asa Monroe is at a crossroads. Ever since the loss of his family, he has been traveling from one town to another. When he meets Deborah, the beautiful bookstore owner with the sunny smile, Asa believes he has finally found a reason to stay in one place.
-
-
Not Good, Clean Fun
- By Cheryl on 12-20-12
By: Rochelle Alers
-
Happy Family
- By: Tracy Barone
- Narrated by: Courtney Patterson
- Length: 11 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1962 a pregnant girl staggers into a health clinic, gives birth, and flees. A foster family takes the baby in, and an unlikely couple, their lives unspooling from the recent death of their infant, adopts her. Forty years and many secrets and lies later, Cheri Matzner is all grown up and falling apart. Ironic and fierce, she's a former cop turned disgruntled academic, a frustrated wife trying to get pregnant, an iconoclastic daughter bearing war wounds from her dysfunctional family.
-
-
excellent
- By Marie E on 06-05-16
By: Tracy Barone
-
A Watershed Year
- By: Susan Schoenberger
- Narrated by: Amy McFadden
- Length: 9 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Lucy never confessed her love to her best friend Harlan before he passed away. Two months after his funeral, she is haunted by the power of things left unsaid. But then she receives the first of his e-mails arranged to be sent after his death. So begins the year that everything changes - Lucy's watershed year. In an e-mail, Harlan says something that consumes her: He's certain Lucy is destined for motherhood. In her grief, she suddenly rediscovers hope, journeying to Russia to adopt a four-year-old boy.
-
-
Ugh, chick-lit again, and a bad case of the blahs!
- By Kathy in CA on 02-16-15
-
Nappily Ever After
- A Novel
- By: Trisha R. Thomas
- Narrated by: Lisa Reneé Pitts
- Length: 9 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Venus Johnston has a great job and a long-term, live-in boyfriend who happens to be a drop-dead gorgeous doctor. She also has a weekly beauty-parlor date to keep her long, nappy hair slick and straight. But the tedious hours and harsh chemicals in the salon have long grated on Venus. One frustrating day, she trades in the long hair for a dramatically short, natural cut and sends her commitment-balking boyfriend packing. It's a bold declaration of independence and one that has effects she never could have imagined.
-
-
Great
- By Laura K. on 08-21-09
By: Trisha R. Thomas
Would you listen to Beyond All Desiring again? Why?
YesWhat other book might you compare Beyond All Desiring to and why?
I don't think I have listened to or read a book quite like this one. I think people judge a person by what they visually see. Aunt Sara proves this practice to be wrong.Which character – as performed by Christy Lynn – was your favorite?
Aunt SaraWas this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
I did listen to this book in one day.Great Story! Great Narrator!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Would you listen to Beyond All Desiring again? Why?
Absolutely! Ms. Lynn is one of my favorite readers. Which is what prompted me to buy Beyond All Desiring but it was the depth of the characters that had me hooked. I look forward to visiting this book again.Well fleshed out and believable characters
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.