The Widows of Eastwick

More than three decades have passed since the events described in The Witches of Eastwick. Alexandra, Jane, and Sukie each had remarried and left town. Now all three are widowed and return to the Rhode Island seaside community, in this long-awaited follow-up. Unabridged. 10 CDs.

About the Author :
John Updike was born in 1932, in Shillington, Pennsylvania. From 1955 to 1957 he was a staff member of "The New Yorker" and since 1957 he has lived in Massachusetts. He is the father of four children and the author of more than fifty books, including collections of short stories, poems, and criticism. His novels have won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, the American Book Award, the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Rosenthal Award, and the Howells Medal.

Review :
"John Updike is the great genial sorcerer of American letters. His output alone . . . has been supernatural. More wizardly still is the ingenuity of his prose . . . This isn't writing. It is magic . . . Updike's asperities on age reflect back on himself, but not in the way we might expect. At 76, he still wrings more from a sentence than almost anyone else. His sorcery is startlingly fresh, page upon page . . . [Updike's subject is] nothing less than 'the whole mass of middling, hidden, troubled America.' No writer of our time has reached into it so deeply or conjured so many of its mysteries so pulsingly to life." -Sam Tanenhaus, "The New York Times Book Review" "If wit is a form of witchcraft, igniting sparks from airy nothingness, concocting a peppery brew of words, then John Updike's powers are undiminished . . . In wickedly glinting sentences, Updike explores the distinctly unmagical humiliations of advancing age, and the prickly temptations of sin." -"O, the Oprah Magazine " ""The Widows of Eastwick" might just be his best novel since 1990's Pulitzer Prize-winning "Rabbit at Rest,"" -John Mark Eberhart, "Kansas City Star " "There's no one quite like John Updike for a trip to New England. History, theology, period-detailed houses and frequent sex whiz by in a blur of inimitable writing . . . Thank whatever deity you happen to worship . . . because Updike has now written "The Widows of Eastwick," a frolicsome new book about the trio [of witches of Eastwick]. As with New England autumns, we witness a maturing of these women's natures-a last, hot-red, end-of-season change as rendered by this literary sorcerer." -Celia McGee," Town & Country ""Vibrantcharacters, careful detailing, and a sense of anticipation of impending dire events leave this an absorbing read, enjoyable to its fullest even by readers unfamiliar with its predecessor." -"Booklist ""[I]ts seamless blending of dexterously plotted narrative with penetrating characterizations . . . evoke with nearly Tolstoyan poignancy the weary, resigned clairvoyance of old age . . ." -"Kirkus Reviews " "Updike hasn't only written a stunner. This serious literary novelist has also used romance fiction to supply important insights into what narrative art of any kind consists of: tons of hard work and a devotion to detail. The luminosity of "Widows" confirms the wisdom of his advice." -Peter Wolfe," St. Louis Post-Dispatch " ""The Widows of Eastwick "is by turns funny, philosophical, suspenseful, and sad. At 76, Updike remains America's greatest writer, invoking his distinctive brand of magical realism in an elegantly written, occasionally crabby, often moving meditation on original sin, aging, and atonement . . . Updike provides in "Widows" a penetrating and poignant portrait of the domestic lives of women, married and single, so many of whom feel disempowered or warped." -Glenn Altschuler," Jerusalem Post" "From the Hardcover edition."