The Ninth Hour audiobook by Alice McDermott
Narrated by Euan Morton (2017)
In early twentieth-century Brooklyn, a young Irish immigrant's suicide leaves behind a pregnant widow. Sister St. Saviour of the Little Sisters of the Sick Poor steps in unbidden, setting Annie to work in the convent laundry. The novel follows Annie's daughter Sally as she grows up among the nuns and eventually confronts a choice that tests the limits of faith. Told in retrospect across several decades, the story traces how a single act of despair reverberates through an Irish-Catholic community in Brooklyn.
The narration
Euan Morton narrates the full audiobook as solo narrator, voicing the large cast of characters — sisters, laywomen, husbands, priests, and children — across a span of decades and a range of Irish and Irish-American registers. The assignment is demanding: the novel is quiet in pitch but dense in character, and McDermott's prose requires a reader who can sustain concentration and restraint across eight hours without losing the emotional undercurrent that runs beneath the surface.
The recording draws on Morton's considerable experience as both a stage performer and a narrator of literary fiction, and the fit between voice and material is noted in the critical response the audiobook received.
Critical acclaim
Morton's steady, gentle delivery allows McDermott's elegant prose to shine. It's a quiet story about love and sacrifice that manages to be extremely moving without becoming sentimental or maudlin. Morton's performance similarly brims with emotion but never overflows.
— E.C., AudioFile magazine, September 2017
Literary recognition
The Ninth Hour was selected as a finalist for two major American literary prizes in 2017: the Kirkus Prize for Fiction and the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction. It was longlisted for the 2018 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction and received the Prix Femina Étranger in France. The novel appeared on several year-end best-of lists: the New York Times Book Review 100 Notable Books, Time Top 10 Novels, the NPR Best Books, Kirkus Reviews Best Fiction and Best Historical Fiction, and the Wall Street Journal Top 10 Novels.
About Alice McDermott
Alice McDermott is the author of eight novels, all published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Her 1998 novel Charming Billy won the National Book Award for Fiction. Three earlier novels — That Night, At Weddings and Wakes, and After This — were finalists for the Pulitzer Prize. She was for more than two decades the Richard A. Macksey Professor of the Humanities at Johns Hopkins University. More information is available at alice-mcdermott.com.
Publication Details
The Ninth Hour
Links
Purchase & Listen: Audible | Amazon | Downpour
Visit Alice McDermott's page for The Ninth Hour for more information about the novel.