The Next Queen of Heaven audiobook

I must admit, I'm a complete sucker for books that are set in small towns. If I hear about a book or read the blurb on the back cover and it says something along the lines of "A group of characters live in a small town called X and X happens to them..." well chances are the money is already leaving my wallet and the book is coming home with me. Perhaps it's because I grew up in a small town myself, so I'm naturally drawn to these things. Whatever the case with my affinity for these small town books, Gregory Maguire has written perhaps his most understated and ambitious novel since Wicked in The Next Queen of Heaven, and it’s set in - of course - a small town called Thebes in upstate New York. Themes such as heartbreak, faith, and homosexuality are present here, and Maguire doesn’t pull any stops when it comes to displaying modern society and notions of religion in all its passion and irony. The book has virtually everything you could want in a novel that uses a small town setting - a cast of believable and amusing characters, themes that anyone who grew up in a small town could probably relate to, and to top it all off, the novel is set during the Christmas season. What's not to like about that? This isn't to say the book is perfect - I actually found myself embroiled in an internal debate halfway through of whether I was going to give it two stars or three stars, or even finish it for that matter due to some slower parts in the middle. Thankfully I did finish it, and the ending was complete and satisfying and answered any lingering questions I had regarding the book's ultimate message. Maguire isn't always the clearest about what's going on in his pages, though I suppose that's what comes with his poetic and sometimes indistinct style. Thankfully, Maguire's two protagonists, the high-school-age Tabitha and Jeremy, a lovesick gay twenty-something male, are strong, believable, and relatable. Tabitha is dealing with her own teenage rebellion and hopeless love (lust) for a wild loser while caring for her ailing and addled mother, and Jeremy is facing his own set of internal issues, namely a friend dying of AIDs and an old lover who lives close by and is now married. I won't spoil anything, but there is a chapter of unrequited, tragic love that is particularly well-written and memorable, and the ending of the book is perhaps one of my favorite Maguire endings ever. There's really not much to not like about The Next Queen of Heaven. It's a fun, festive book that doesn't take itself too seriously while at the same time tackling many, many complicated religious and societal issues. If you like Gregory Maguire or any of the themes I mentioned above, chances are you'll like this one.

This book was fantastic and is now one of my favourites. I've even gone back to read certain sections again (something I rarely if ever do). It was a joy to read it. I loved the characters, the small town setting, the plots. This book was very real, with real-life difficulties, which made the characters crystal clear and believable. They also had very believable flaws--which made them human. Painfully so. Yet their perspectives are told with their each unique brand of humor, that what would be a sad book is transformed into something poignant instead. And also something very, very funny. This book has many laugh-out loud moments. It's the best sort of comedy--its embedded and real life & has bite. This is a book of deep feeling and introspection. It's not a 'church' book but it is about people's relationship to the spiritual. It does take a critical look at people's hypocrisies. Beneath the rather 'mundane' look at 'ordinary lives' it's philosophical. This is perhaps the greatest comparison I can make between this and the other book I've read by this author (Wicked). Both have this questioning, philosophical base. But this book is 'wickedly funny' and modern, while Wicked was more serious (though no less fabulous) and fantasy based.It's very character driven. I absolutely adored the character Jeremy. He's got to be the best gay character in straight fiction since Jules Cassidy (Suzanne Brockman's Force of Nature). I loved him and I loved the choice he made at the end. You know you've read a great book when you think about the characters long after, and wonder what happens to them after the book ends, as if they were real people. PS. I just read over some of the other reviews and I'm quite baffled at the level of dislike in some of them. I'm usually a pretty good judge of bad writing and bad books. Am I so off the mark here? Or is it because I don't really 'know' his other works so this is something fairly fresh to me and I don't have a lot of comparison? I didn't go into it with a lot of expectation. I don't know. But it is strange at how many people found it tedious or not-funny. Maybe I was just in the right mood for it. Personally, I thought it was great!

Picked this up in my local Border’s going out of business sale, knowing nothing about author Gregory Maguire, and figuring the paperback would do as light-hearted entertainment on one of my upcoming plane trips across the Pacific. I was a little nostalgic for one of those pleasures Kindle has robbed me of: Finishing a paperback on a trip and being happy to leave it behind as a surprise for the next guest to inherit your hotel room ...or for the housekeeper, or the barista making my coffee each morning.So much for advance planning at the bargain bin: Started TNQOH at home instead, wanting to read something very different from other recent choices I’ve made, and wanting to read it quickly, as with chomping through a good meal when you know from where your hunger comes. Maguire delivered, but not as I expected, and I’ll have to try reading another one of his ‘normal’ novels, since this one apparently is a bit of a departure for him, or so he says... is he being honestly apologetic or blatantly mischievous in his Author’s Note? This is one of those books where the back-jacket copy is utterly accurate, while simultaneously proving that truthfulness can be misleading without enough context to prepare you for likely deceptions. You do feel a little deceived at the end, but when you think about it, you realize it would be worse to admit you were such a clueless reader — far better to give the author credit for being a sneaky genius. I felt almost completely ambivalent about the book nearly half-way through it, even wondering if I’d even bother to finish it, only to read a bit more and find it snuck up on me — couldn’t put it down the final third despite berating myself for reading instead of working (and fiction, really?) I think the hook sunk in for me when introduced to the ancient Sisters of the Sorrowful Mysteries, for I did survive a full 9 years of Catholic School with them, and there are some things you can never escape relating to at some level. Let’s just say that no one can ever accuse us Catholics of not being interesting, at least not us wayward ones who still say “Holy Ghost” precisely because people think “Holy Spirit” has become more p.c. — we know that ship sailed away from us a long time ago.There were a few unanswered questions for me with this book, but you know what? I am perfectly okay with them. Good job Gregory Maguire!

Very different from his usual work, but what a treat! Simultaneously irreverent and secularly divine.

The humor of this story is the slice of life humor that comes from a heart that can live a life and laugh at the stuff that life presents to that heart. This is a story with a big heart for all those that inhabit this small town in upstate New York. Gregory Maguire has created a world that is so real, rather than that of Wicked and his other fantasy books. I could imagine these things happening on an ordinary winter day in any small town in North America. Brilliant change of pace for Maguire and it is both touching and funny. I love his other books, but this shows his imagination does have some basis in the real world and I appreciate his vision.

this book was free online with the stipulation that you donate to a charity of your choice and log the donation amountand the charity's name on their website for tracking purposes and then pass the book on to someone after reading it and recording your name in the back of the book. It was different than any of his other books I've read but was perfect for the chilly damp weekend.

Although this is a departure for Maguire, and for those of you who know him from his WICKED books, it was still a great read and refreshing to see him step away from the familiar magical realism into more conventional realism. Highly recommended for its unique cast of characters, inspired setting, and the questions it asks about life.

This story has me when mother said to teenage daughter, "let's talk about hymen integrity". But even with hilarious and witty dialogue, it often waxed and waned my interest. This not being the fault of the author, as I often over obligate my mind, I give four stars to anything that makes me laugh out loud. In public. For no visible reason.

When I said re-read, I mean that this is actually something like my eleventh time reading this (the first time I was like fourteen and had no idea whether or not I was within the target audience. Now I'm 24 and still don't). And yes, I know it's nowhere near the ranking of some of Maguire's other books, and contemporary non-fantasy is not his forte, but...damn, some of the reviews here are harsh! Is this book overly flowery and pretentiously written, especially considering it doesn't even have the excuse of a flowery, fantastical setting? More than a little bit. Does the author have any idea how upstate New York-based teenagers talked in the '90s? Not by the looks of it. Is it dated and cringey at times? Ohhhh yes. Do I still have a soft spot for it? Absolutely. If "Wicked" weren't one of my favorite books, and if I hadn't read that one first and known the kind of writing Maguire is capable of, then maybe I wouldn't have liked "The Next Queen of Heaven" so much. After his previous novels, most of which were highly original retellings of fairy tales or older classics, this one is kind of just...there. The novel isn't always sure what it's trying to be. Its strongest points are when Maguire returns to familiar territory and themes that are clearly of interest to him--queer relationships (romantic and not), religion, and NUNS NUNS NUNS. Seriously. He can't get enough of the nuns. And I love him for it. More and more each time I read this book I feel it would have worked best if it had focused more on those aspects, and less on the Scales family. Ostensibly the protagonist of the story, Tabitha reads as the vaguest ever caricature of a rebellious teen girl who, though apparently not very intelligent, occasionally comes out with phrases like, "Statues aren't responsible parties." And while Mrs. Scales' weird head-injury plotline seems intended to be significant and heartwarming, she was barely a character to begin with. The book is at its most touching when delving into the unlikely friendship between a gay a cappella group and a sisterhood of aging nuns. It's more than a little corny and exaggerated--I believe Maguire is religious himself--the character of Jeremy might be semi-autobiographical?--and maybe this is the reason for his sometimes romanticized portrayals of tolerant, uncorrupted nuns. Even so, a scene where the nuns offer comfort and solace to one of the singers, who is suffering from rapidly worsening AIDS symptoms, a stark contrast to the disgust and judgement from the man's own parents, got me even more emotional than usual this time around. Other of the book's aspects--two feuding churches, a pervy pastor, the awkwardly repetitive jokes about Kirk's flamboyance, the goddamn NAMES in this--are at times little too cartoonish to be taken seriously. At the same time, that weirdness and self-aware campiness is part of what I've always liked about the novel, what makes it stand out among all the other contemporary feel-good holiday stories. It's clear that Maguire is more comfortable in wonkier, more fantastical territory, and it shows in the writing style of "The Next Queen of Heaven." And because of and/or despite everything, it's a four stars from me. P.S. The minus one star is mostly for Willem existing. I fucking hate Willem and always have. He can literally just go away, please and thank you.

"The Next Queen of Heaven" is part comic novel, part satire, part farce, and part poignant depiction of small town lives and families. It is not the fantasy or fairy tales many readers have come to expect from Gregory Maguire, but it certainly showcases his wit and lively language we've all come to know and love from his other books. Leotina Scales is a "devout" woman who, in truth, is a little strange even before she is clonked on the head by a Catholic statuette while trying to steal milk from the Catholic Church basement to take across the parking lot to her church, the Radical Radiants. But after being hit, she is even stranger--- hardly making complete sentences, swearing a great deal, and clutching her Bible. Her children, particularly the profane eldest, Tabitha, doesn't know what to do. Suddenly she is stuck in a role reversal, trying to take care of her mother, but finding herself ill-equipped, all while trying to figure out why her boyfriend isn't calling her. Hogan and Kirk, Tabitha's half brothers (they all have different "Daddys") have their own problems, Hogan being a good old boy with always a hint of darkness, and Kirk, the youngest, clearly struggling with his budding sexual identity.When not following Tabitha, "The Next Queen of Heaven" follows Jeremy Carr, a young, gay man in a very conservative, albeit, eccentric town. He is the choir director at the Catholic Church, and a special ed tutor at the school. He seems stuck in life, still pining for his first serious love, Willem, who is now married to a woman and has two children (and who also only lives about twelve miles away). Maguire expertly mines religion for humor, while also exploring what makes certain facets of our traditions sacred. Along the way, he builds a plot that, while over-the-top, feels grounded enough to take us along for the ride. Did I mention there are several laugh out loud moments? Because there are. Mr. Maguire mines humor from an order of nuns becoming friends with a gay singing group, as well as the hypocrisy of the Evangelical pastor lusting over the teenage Tabitha.But while there is a great deal of humor, there is also genuine pathos. And Maguire is capable of constructing some genuinely beautiful sentences, such as:"The past, an eternal force, always abuts the present, making of it a sort of wave of perpetual anguish that never finds anything to break itself against, and so keeps searching."While sometimes the humor goes a bit too big, risking distraction from the tale being told, all in all, Maguire proves once again that he is an exquisitely gifted storyteller, even if it is just in our plain little world outside the land of Oz.Grade: B+Thank you for checking out my thoughts on "The Next Queen of Heaven." Happy Reading!

hilarious and moves at a frantic pace - but has more tragedy and sorrow running through it thanyou would think possible in a book so funny - a master writer doing what looks to be impossible- three good friends , one of them nearing death due to AIDS - a gothic convent home to elderlynuns - Radiant Pentecostals vs. Roman Catholics - a single mother of three struggles to deal withan obstreperous foul mouthed teenage daughter (pregnant) and much much more going on ina small, snowy, upstate NY town.

Someone once told me that I have a very strong WAF [ Weirdness Attraction Factor ] which I thought was a good description/explanation for the strange and wonderful things that were constantly happening to me. Sadly, my WAF had not been working for a long, long time until it got a jumpstart when I read The Next Queen of Heaven. This tragicomic social satire is a gem.

I am a massive fan of Gregory Maguire. I can't explain why without writing a detailed thesis - this book I feel is one of the most special books i've read. I picked it up in Chicago as I ventured out of a Coast to Coast and back again adventure. It was my best companion.