Fear of Flying (1973) - Erica Jong

Written by Erica Jong
Read by Hope Davis
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 64 Kbps
Unabridged

Publisher: HarperAudio
Release date: May 23, 2006
Duration: 11:48:56

Bored with her marriage, a psychoanalyst’s wife embarks on a wild, life-changing affair

After five years, Isadora Wing has come to a crossroads in her marriage: Should she and her husband stay together or get divorced? Accompanying her husband to an analysts’ conference in Vienna, she ditches him and strikes out on her own, crisscrossing Europe in search of a man who can inspire uninhibited passion. But, as she comes to learn, liberation and happiness are not necessarily the same thing.

The groundbreaking, uninhibited story of Isadora Wing and her desire to fly free caused a national sensation. In The New York Times, Henry Miller compared it to his own classic, Tropic of Cancer and predicted that “this book will make literary history…” It has sold more than twelve million copies. Now, after over forty-five years, the revolutionary novel known as Fear of Flying still stands as a timeless tale of self-discovery, liberation, and womanhood.

Erica Jong’s first novel was published in 1973, when she was 30. It sold millions of copies and was considered revolutionary, ground-breaking, and shocking. Now, it’s just the often funny adventures of freethinking, freewheeling, sexually obsessed Isadora Wing. Hope Davis gives her just the right prickly edginess as Isadora philosophizes and fantasizes her way through husbands, lovers, and one meaningless-if-pleasurable erotic encounter after another. Isadora wallows in the depths of the male/female sexual relationship, and while she gets tiresome, often tasteless, Hope Davis never does. Her reading is fresh, inventive, and sincere. Her Isadora is wry, funny, abrasive, crude, and smart. A socially significant book and a terrific performance by Davis make this worth a listen. S.J.H. (c) AudioFile 2006