Nobody Will Tell You This But Me: A true (as told to me) story
Bess Kalb
Mar 2020 · Penguin Random House Audio · Narrated by Bess Kalb
5.0star
4 reviews
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4 hr 21 min
Unabridged
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About this audiobook
NATIONAL BESTSELLER
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR:
VOGUE • FORBES • BOOKPAGE • NEW YORK POST • WIRED
“I have not been as profoundly moved by a book in years.” —Jodi Picoult
Even after she left home for Hollywood, Emmy-nominated TV writer Bess Kalb saved every voicemail her grandmother Bobby Bell ever left her. Bobby was a force—irrepressible, glamorous, unapologetically opinionated. Bobby doted on Bess; Bess adored Bobby. Then, at ninety, Bobby died. But in this debut memoir, Bobby is speaking to Bess once more, in a voice as passionate as it ever was in life.
Recounting both family lore and family secrets, Bobby brings us four generations of indomitable women and the men who loved them. There’s Bobby’s mother, who traveled solo from Belarus to America in the 1880s to escape the pogroms, and Bess’s mother, a 1970s rebel who always fought against convention. But it was Bobby and Bess who always had the most powerful bond: Bobby her granddaughter’s fiercest supporter, giving Bess unequivocal love, even if sometimes of the toughest kind. Nobody Will Tell You This But Me marks the creation of a totally new, virtuosic form of memoir: a reconstruction of a beloved grandmother’s words and wisdom to tell her family’s story with equal parts poignancy and hilarity.
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR:
VOGUE • FORBES • BOOKPAGE • NEW YORK POST • WIRED
“I have not been as profoundly moved by a book in years.” —Jodi Picoult
Even after she left home for Hollywood, Emmy-nominated TV writer Bess Kalb saved every voicemail her grandmother Bobby Bell ever left her. Bobby was a force—irrepressible, glamorous, unapologetically opinionated. Bobby doted on Bess; Bess adored Bobby. Then, at ninety, Bobby died. But in this debut memoir, Bobby is speaking to Bess once more, in a voice as passionate as it ever was in life.
Recounting both family lore and family secrets, Bobby brings us four generations of indomitable women and the men who loved them. There’s Bobby’s mother, who traveled solo from Belarus to America in the 1880s to escape the pogroms, and Bess’s mother, a 1970s rebel who always fought against convention. But it was Bobby and Bess who always had the most powerful bond: Bobby her granddaughter’s fiercest supporter, giving Bess unequivocal love, even if sometimes of the toughest kind. Nobody Will Tell You This But Me marks the creation of a totally new, virtuosic form of memoir: a reconstruction of a beloved grandmother’s words and wisdom to tell her family’s story with equal parts poignancy and hilarity.
Ratings and reviews
5.0
4 reviews
Tyler Gage
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March 20, 2020
Devoured the whole book in one listen! With ease and fluidity, Kalb weaves together poignant hilarity with an abundant intensity of love (in its many pure and troubled forms) found tears streaming down my face at hard hitting moments, and bursting into laughter at others. I could have read entire books solely about almost every individual character. The narrative is beautifully sculpted as it traces multiple generations of women, and deftly flows back and forth from recent conversations between the author and her grandmother and stories from over 100 years ago.
About the author
BESS KALB is an Emmy-nominated writer for Jimmy Kimmel Live. Her writing for the show earned her a Writer's Guild Award in 2016. She has also written for the Oscars and the Emmys. A regular contributor to The New Yorker's "Daily Shouts," her work has been published in The New Republic, Grantland, Salon.com, Wired, The Nation, and elsewhere. She lives in Los Angeles.
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