Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Boy, Snow, Bird
    Boy, Snow, Bird
    Boy, Snow, Bird
    Audiobook9 hours

    Boy, Snow, Bird

    Written by Helen Oyeyemi

    Narrated by Susan Bennett and Carra Patterson

    3.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    From the prizewinning author of Mr. Fox , the Snow White fairy tale brilliantly recast as a story of family secrets, race, beauty, and vanity. In the winter of 1953, Boy Novak arrives by chance in a small town in Massachusetts, looking, she believes, for beauty-- the opposite of the life she' s left behind in New York. She marries a local widower and becomes stepmother to his winsome daughter, Snow Whitman. A wicked stepmother is a creature Boy never imagined she' d become, but elements of the familiar tale of aesthetic obsession begin to play themselves out when the birth of Boy' s daughter, Bird, who is dark-skinned, exposes the Whitmans as light-skinned African Americans passing for white. Among them, Boy, Snow, and Bird confront the tyranny of the mirror to ask how much power surfaces really hold. Dazzlingly inventive and powerfully moving , Boy, Snow, Bird is an astonishing and enchanting novel. With breathtaking feats of imagination, Helen Oyeyemi confirms her place as one of the most original and dynamic literary voices of our time.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRecorded Books, Inc.
    Release dateMar 6, 2014
    ISBN9781490614816
    Boy, Snow, Bird
    Author

    Helen Oyeyemi

    Helen Oyeyemi is the author of The Icarus Girl, The Opposite House, White is for Witching (which won the Somerset Maugham Award), Mr Fox, Boy, Snow, Bird, Gingerbread and the short story collection What is Not Yours is Not Yours. In 2013, Helen was included in Granta's Best of Young British Novelists.

    Related to Boy, Snow, Bird

    Related audiobooks

    Literary Fiction For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      'Dread Nation' Is A Rollicking 'Gone With The Wind + Zombies' Adventure

      Apr 20, 2018

      But don't underestimate the latest YA novel by activist Justina Ireland – it's also a biting commentary on contemporary race relations in America.

      3 min read

    • Article

      Perfection

      Jun 9, 2020

      For years I could barely write a page. I thought I was becoming a virtuoso of smallness while the grief, which is wordless, occupied an ever-greater volume. My friend lived in the estates on the bad side of town. Let’s go to the forest, she said when

      9 min read

    • Article

      Don’t Have A Bird

      Aug 2, 2020

      There are so many rites of passage you’ve already missed out on, and the school ball is destined to become another item on that ever-growing list. You try to delay the inevitable until every breath from your lungs sounds as if cystic fibrosis is cack

      12 min read

    • Article

      Button Chair

      Dec 16, 2020

      THE anxiety simmers and sputters, threatening to spill over into the sunshine of the day. I am consumed by the trivial things on my to-do list: E-mail this person, put the dishes away, vacuum the living room, balance the checkbook. And then there is

      6 min read

    • Article

      I Used to Give Men Mercy

      Feb 12, 2018

      I Used to Give Men Mercy
      12 min read

    • Article

      Anne Lamott

      Nov 2, 2020

      Anne Lamott
      6 min read

    • Article

      Henry Winkler

      Jan 8, 2024

      Henry Winkler
      6 min read

    • Article

      I Confronted My School Bullies

      Jul 3, 2019

      I Confronted My School Bullies
      6 min read

    • Article

      Alan Cumming

      Nov 1, 2021

      Alan Cumming
      5 min read

    • Article

      I Failed My Daughter

      Jul 29, 2022

      I Failed My Daughter
      9 min read

    • Article

      The Eulogy

      Jul 13, 2022

      The Eulogy
      7 min read

    • Article

      Coming To Terms

      May 25, 2021

      Coming To Terms
      14 min read

    • Article

      Shame Is Ever-Present When You’re Sitting in a Cell

      Oct 23, 2020

      Between a strained relationship with my family and the death of a good friend, I’ve struggled to feel like I’m worth something.

      5 min read

    • Article

      On Giving Up: Its Uses And Benefits In The Writing Life

      Jul 1, 2022

      It reminds me of a moment I used to have in college. I’d put off my term papers every single time till the last minute. So I’d be up at 3 or 4 in the morning working on some damn thesis totally confused, completely exhausted, and I’d have this glorio

      14 min read

    • Article

      Finding Peace—and Briefly, Freedom—at My Grandfather’s Funeral

      Oct 11, 2019

      “Saying goodbye with the people who loved him—and me—I remember that I am not the tomb that imprisons me.”

      6 min read

    • Article

      How Postcards From My Mother Helped Me Survive Childhood

      Mar 3, 2017

      For years, my mother wrote to me every day. I’d been sent away to boarding school and for the first weeks was forbidden to call home­. I was eleven. This was just before mobile phones came beeping and clicking into the lives of everyday people. I di

      4 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Boy, Snow, Bird

    3.5/5

    520 ratings64 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 3/5
      Excellent narration but I just couldn’t get into the story.
    • 2/5
      I really struggled with this - the characters voices were nearly indistinguishable, the plot oddly paced and the point hard to discern. It toys with some interesting themes, but there's something about the way it's written that meant I caught myself repeatedly glazing over, unsure what major plot shift had just been sneaked in between slightly pointless digressions. The big reveal at the conclusion of the book is crazy and the motivations of the characters throughout hard to engage with. Can't win them all I guess.
    • 5/5
      Finished outside Babelia. Lots of people at bookclub. Loved the book, and the ending, which many people didn't like, really impressed me for the depth it gave the novel. Expounded on the mirrors, abuse, search for love. Also loved the sister bonding. Jealous.
    • 5/5
      Great! I really enjoyed this unusual and fantastic story filled with magic and interesting if not quite odd relationships. I knew I was going to love this story and indeed I did! This my first book by this author so I am delightfully surprised. She is now on my “follow list”. I will be looking for her other novels to munch on as well…☺️
    • 4/5
      An interesting, original book - I've never read anything quite like it. The basic ingredients of the Snow White tale are sort of pulled apart and rewritten into something totally unique. The ideas about race and color are integrated in a fascinating way, and the writing is really good.
    • 2/5
      This was such an unsatisfying oddball story. "Boy, Snow, Bird" and I got off on the wrong foot and we never really got on track. As a retelling of the Snow White fairy tale it's not successful and the entire narrative is jumbled and perplexing.

      On the first page the writing seemed whimsical and really beautiful. As I read on I quickly grew tired of the unnatural flow of things, especially the stilted dialogue. I had to reread a lot of passages only to conclude that they in fact still made no sense to me. The characters were inauthentic and their actions didn't ring true in a lot of ways (like their reactions to the Big Secret), Boy more so than anyone else. Almost every character except for maybe Clara and Snow seemed unreal. I found it strange that I connected better with the grown up version of Snow than with either Boy or Bird, who were the two characters telling the story. I would have liked to have heard more from Snow, but her POV would have probably been written in the same frustrating way that Boy's and Bird's were.

      There were a few moments when the author's storytelling shined, but only a few: some of the earlier allusions to the fairy tale, the Thanksgiving dinner, and some of the yarns Bird spun. Other references to Snow White were rather heavy-handed though, like when Boy and Mia speculate about the significance of the snake bracelet and then inexplicably jump to their conclusion. Baffling. After heating up midway through the story flounders again. By the end I was still in the dark about the fuss surrounding Snow. I kept waiting for something to happen to explain the curiously strong feelings she evoked.

      For a story about racial issues this book wasn't particularly enlightening or in-depth. On top of that it wasn't enjoyable to read and the ending was preposterous. I can't think of a reason to recommend it.
    • 2/5
      This was definitely not the book for me. It was supposed to be a retelling of Snow White and it did not resemble the fairy tale at all. Instead, the 3 characters in the title, Boy (stepmother of Snow, and mother to Bird), were strange women/girls. I felt the story was disjointed and the ending was ridiculous.Completely disappointed.
    • 4/5
      It's hard to talk about this book without giving away key elements of the story. It starts with the main character, a girl named Boy, being cruelly beaten by her father, Frank. She runs away to a small New England town and makes a place for herself. She marries a local widow with a young child. Things become complicated when she has a child of her own.Set in the 1950s, the book is about racism, but also about the idea that things are not always what they seem to be, people are not always who they seem to be. At times it becomes too polemic, which might not really have been necessary for Oyeyemi to make her point. Nonetheless, the plot and dynamic characters pull you forward. An interesting read!
    • 3/5
      I hate stories that stop in the middle. I was enjoying this until the end when it just.
    • 4/5
      Helen Oyeyemi's writing is whimsical and serious at the same time. The relationship between characters named Boy, Snow & Bird, as well as several others, the author explores themes of sexuality, gender identification, and race. The reader is swept along in the plot and barely realizes the serious nature of the themes until almost the end of the book. Excellent writer, very good novel!
    • 3/5
      This is an interesting premise and start, but the ending fizzles out a bit.
    • 2/5
      I was really enjoying this book until Part 3. There was a deft touch with racism and colorism throughout the book that was completely ruined by the transmysogyny at the end. It's too bad.
    • 2/5
      Started off well, but lost it's way in the middle. The ending felt rushed, forced, and not well-integrated into the rest of the story. I didn't particularly care for the narration from Bird's POV. In short, it was ok, but I don't think the ideas were fully fleshed out and I didn't care for the writing style at points. There were allusions to magical realism at points, but it played no real part in the story and I found myself wishing Oyeyemi would delve deeper into those themes.
    • 1/5
      The first and last book by Oyeyemi that I will be reading. The ending was disgustingly transphobic.
    • 4/5
      Beautiful. I love Helen Oyeyemi's writing and her characters, and Boy, Snow, Bird is a fantastic novel. Set in 1950s New England, the story is rich and layered and I was absorbed in the lives of Boy, Snow, and Bird, and all those around them. My only complaint is that I wanted more of Snow from Snow's perspective, though I did like the way Oyeyemi shares Snow with the readers.

      All in all, a great book, and I will be picking up more of Oyeyemi's work!
    • 3/5
      Really. I liked the writing, but I feel like I wasted some time with this. Maybe I just didn't get it.
    • 5/5
      What a brilliant, brilliant novel! Making allegorical use of the Snow White fairytale the author explored a whole range of complex and inter-linked themes (eg race, bigotry, gender, the search for identity, secrets in families, what constitutes beauty, vanity ... to name just a few!) and has created an enchanting, multi-layered story. As with all fairy-stories, beneath the "magic" there's an all-pervasive underlying darkness and she doesn't shrink from exposing this, at times in ways which made me stop and re-read certain sections because they challenged me to look at something from a different perspective, to dig deeper beneath the surface.There is pain and darkness in this story and certain aspects of it made me feel angry about the experiences some of the characters faced, but there were also moments of joy and laughter which, without in any way denying the awfulness of the pain, lightened the story in a delightful way.This is the first of Helen Oyeyami's books I have read but I'll be catching up on her backlist as soonI can ... I'm just about to start Gingerbread!
    • 3/5
      This book was a deep dive into identity. Told by a couple of different narrators and over a span of many decades, the strength of this book for me was the characters. Though the subject matter was at times heavy, the charming narrators each had endearing humor and frivolity that kept me thoroughly engaged. To boot, the book examines identity from a multitude of angles: how one sees them self, how one is seen by others, how the perception by others can effect a person and on many levels: race, class, gender. There were certain plot points that didn't quite jibe for me, but the concepts it left me to ponder were well worth it. Good stuff!
    • 1/5
      i very much enjoyed the first 9/10 of this novel but ohhhh boy that ending. somehow it managed to be both incredibly transphobic and Fucked Up about rape and it all just comes out of nowhere??
    • 5/5
      Beautifully written novel, almost lyrical. I found the story captivating. Each character is expertly crafted, unique, and multidimensional. I didn't know what to expect but I am extremely glad this book was recommended to me. The ending isn't quite my cup of tea, but I will definitely be reading more of Helen Oyeyemi's works!
    • 3/5
      I think the book started in the 1930s. Boy is a girl who was raised by her abusive father; her mother wasn’t around. She doesn’t leave until she is 20ish, when she hops on a bus to take her anywhere else. She ends up in a small town and tries her best to fit in. She does marry and inherits a stepdaughter, Snow. Boy later has a daughter of her own named Bird. This was told mostly by Boy’s point of view, but the middle section is from Bird’s point of view when she’s 13. It was… different. I’m rating it ok, as some parts of it were interesting, but some of it wasn’t. It started off really promising, when Boy was younger, and I probably found that the most interesting part of the book. It wasn’t a long book, so it didn’t take long to read. It was hard keeping track of some of the characters. I skimmed over some of the long paragraphs. At first, I enjoyed the letters between the two sisters, but then they got wordy and talked about things I really didn’t care about… things that I’m not sure really meant anything to the story. Boy made some odd decisions/choices and I didn’t like her much of the time.
    • 2/5
      In Boy, Snow, Bird Helen Oyeyemi weaves an elaborate story around Snow White's not-so-wicked stepmother, one that involves separated sisters, tricky mirrors, a cruel rat-catcher, and the problems and indignities of blacks passing for white in a racist world.This overstuffed novel simply has too much--too many narrators, too many plot points, and too many secondary characters with similar names. I found it unengaging.
    • 2/5
      I made a comment when I was about halfway through this book that it was a novel I'd imagine Alice coming back from Wonderland to write. Mainly because it feels like it has a bit of Carroll to it and it's easy to fall down into it while more than a little confusing on the climb back out of it's pages. It's choppy yet lush, insightful yet removed, slow but quick, quick, quick at the last. The ending left me wanting to reach out for it's sequel, the lack of which is a big factor in the 2 star rating.

      It felt like there were these big issues spawned onto the pages, okay, good start. Give me something to chew on and I'm happy. Add a few character perspectives and show them chewing on said issues, also good. But it just fell for me from there because nothing really came of it all. The two scenes that could have really built into a profound novel were brushed over quickly and without resolution. The basic Snow White plot lurked behind unfinished parallels; parallels so unfinished that I found myself thinking it would have been more successful had it not been packaged as the plot twisted/reimagined. I think it's always good for an author to find a line between giving a reader something to consume and going to straight overkill. I don't think this novel reaches a desired and fulfilling line between the two even though the writing style itself is pretty stirring.

    • 3/5
      I was really disappointed with this. What was promising to be a great story, this was broken up into musings and ramblings which interfered with the main body of the work. I didn't really like the characters involved, either. I still feel this could have been so much better.
    • 5/5
      I read the book summary from a magazine article and was intrigued. In the end, I wasn't disappointed. Oyeyemi successfully illustrates the benefit of being white/having white privilege in a discriminatory society, and I'm interested in reading her other works. I also appreciate the vast amount of female characters.
    • 5/5
      I loved the language. She is a skilled and poetic writer. The characters were fascinating people and I loved everything about the book except the ending which seemed unrealistic. It seemed like Oyeyemi wanted a resolution to the story, and in many ways it really did not need one.
    • 4/5
      A vivid, stylish and unsettling modern fairytale full of surprises, ideas and striking imagery. Part family story, part reflection on racial identity and nature/nurture, and part exploration of fairytale themes, this is a dizzying and assured book from a talented writer.
    • 3/5
      There are so many impressive aspects in any Oyeyemi novel — form, subjects, character, dramatic scenes, etc. — that I’m at a loss for why they don’t work better. Here, an abused daughter in mid-20th century New York escapes to a town in Massachusetts where she begins a new life, falls in love with a man, and gives birth. Is it a fairy tale ending? No, it’s just the beginning of a completely different story about race, difference, passing as white, and motherhood. But then, just as that story is about to close we are treated to yet another substantive subject: sexual identity and transgender misidentification. It’s a bit much.The writing is vivid. Oyeyemi has a knack for startling images. She writes first-person narratives, especially from the point of view of a pre-teen, with sensitivity and insight. All of which sounds great except that throughout the novel it is nearly impossible to know where or when the story is taking place. So, voice over place, subject over narrative. No wonder things seem muddled.Oyeyemi is clearly a novelist with immense potential. I will continue to read her novels in hope that she pulls it all together at some point. And I on that basis, I would gently recommend her to others. Still one to watch.
    • 3/5
      Wow, I did NOT see that end coming! That said, I feel half the book could have been omitted, and neither Boy, Snow, nor Bird are the main character of the story.
    • 5/5
      Really like Oyeyemi's style - beautifully inventive, always surprising twists.