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To Be Sung Underwater: A Novel Hardcover – June 2, 2011

by Tom McNeal (Author)

4.3 521 ratings

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Judith Whitman always believed in the kind of love that "picks you up in Akron and sets you down in Rio." Long ago, she once experienced that love. Willy Blunt was a carpenter with a dry wit and a steadfast sense of honor. Marrying him seemed like a natural thing to promise. But Willy Blunt was not a person you could pick up in Nebraska and transport to Stanford. When Judith left home, she didn't look back.Twenty years later, Judith's marriage is hazy with secrets. In her hand is what may be the phone number for the man who believed she meant it when she said she loved him. If she called, what would he say? TO BE SUNG UNDERWATER is the epic love story of a woman trying to remember, and the man who could not even begin to forget.

Print length

448 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Little, Brown and Company
Publication date

June 2, 2011
Dimensions

6.25 x 1.5 x 9.5 inches
ISBN-10

0316127396
ISBN-13

978-0316127394
See all details

Kate Morton
14,905
Paperback
225 offers from $1.23

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Judith Whitman is 44, questioning her life, and thinking about the hometown boy she jilted almost 30 years before in McNeal's affecting second novel (after Goodnight, Nebraska). At Stanford, Judith had met the "older, urbane" Malcolm and they married, moved to Los Angeles, and built an enviable life. Now she's bored with her suave, unfaithful banker husband, guilty about her lack of maternal feelings for her teenage daughter, and overburdened and distracted at her job editing a "respected television drama." McNeal's agile prose manages to render Judith sympathetic, though she's not an easy character to like. Flashbacks evoke her youth in Vermont, and her decision, when her parents separate and her mother becomes neglectful, to move to Nebraska to live with her father. When Judith, as a high school senior, falls in love with Willy, a local intelligent and sensitive carpenter, she imagines a simple life in the town of Rufus Sage, but after she leaves for college the relationship unravels. Despite a slow start and dialogue heavy on aphorisms, McNeal succeeds with his obvious affection for the daily rhythms of life in Nebraska and his sensitive exploration of marital stresses and psychological accommodations, in addition to a moving surprise denouement. (June)

Review

"You don't so much read To Be Sung Underwater as you're consumed by it. The characters are unforgettable. The writing is staggering. More importantly, though, it's the courage of this book that sets it apart. It's the bravest, most beautiful book I've read in a long time."―Markus Zusak, author of The Book Thief

"Smart, sexy, gorgeous, and at times devastatingly sad--these words describe the woman at the heart of this wonderful novel almost as well as they do the book itself. This ravishing love story will envelop you for a few days and then linger for a long time thereafter."―Ann Packer, author of Swim Back to Me and The Dive from Clausen's Pier

"To Be Sung Underwater is such an immensely readable novel. McNeal has the enviable talent of making splendid writing look easy at no cost to the complexity and the beauties of what fascinates him (and me) -- the terrain occupied by women and men in love with each other. This is a wonderful book."―Richard Ford

"McNeal's ability to tell the story from a female point of view is shockingly accurate, as is his Richard Russo-esque ability to make small town characters simply complicated....a beautiful novel that bravely examines the effect a broken relationship can have on one's life path."―Carrie Keyes, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

"An exceptional novel.... McNeal writes a kind of prose that's almost endangered today: natural, smooth and subtle."―Cynthia Crossen, The Wall Street Journal

"Bautifully written.... a compelling story, uniting the literary, character-driven novel with what eventually becomes quite a page turner.... This novel will make for great book-club discussions."―Sarah Willis, The Cleveland Plain-Dealer

"This lovely novel is quiet and smart, drawing you so deeply into the characters that the ending might just leave you coming up for air."―Gale Walden, Oprah Magazine

"Love stories have a terrible gravity, a centrifugal force. McNeal has created characters so dimensional, so memorable, that we are caught up in that urgency. Our rationality is compromised; the rules of the world fade away."―Susan Salter Reynolds, Los Angeles Times

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Little, Brown and Company; 1st edition (June 2, 2011)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 448 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0316127396
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0316127394
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.55 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.25 x 1.5 x 9.5 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #2,857,874 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #16,529 in Psychological Fiction (Books)
- #23,757 in Women's Domestic Life Fiction
- #108,968 in Literary Fiction (Books)

Customer Reviews:
4.3 521 ratings

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Tom McNeal

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Tom was born in Santa Ana, California. His father was a native Californian who raised oranges, and his mother grew up on a farm in northwest Nebraska, where Tom spent his childhood summers. After earning a BA and a teaching credential from UC Berkeley, Tom moved to Hay Springs, Nebraska, taught high school English, drove a school bus, substituted briefly in a one-room schoolhouse, and began work on the novel GOODNIGHT, NEBRASKA. Tom holds an MA in creative writing from UC Irvine and was a Stegner Fellow and Jones Lecturer at Stanford University. His short stories have been widely anthologized, and "What Happened to Tully" was made into a film. He is the author, with his wife, Laura, of four critically-acclaimed young adult novels published by Knopf, and the solo author of FAR FAR AWAY (a finalist for the National Book Award in Young People's Literature). His most recent novel for adults, TO BE SUNG UNDERWATER, was published by Little Brown in 2012 and named one of the best books of the year by the Wall Street Journal and USA Today.

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4.3 out of 5

521 global ratings

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A real love story at last

Reviewed in the United States on February 10, 2014

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This novel succeeds on so-many levels that it's a pleasure to recommend it without reservation. At its heart is the love affair between Willy, the son of a Nebraska farmer, and Judith, daughter of a divorced couple who moves to rural Nebraska to be with her father for the last two years of high school. The minor characters are all beautifully drawn while the one silent character, beautifully evoked, is nature. We explore the creeks and buttes and hidden swimming holes of the Nebraska country and discover them with the same joy as Judith.

This book is half set in the present and half 25 years ago. We are quickly aware that Judith did not stay with Willy but went to college at Stanford and ultimately ended up as an editor for TV shows. She has acquired a banker husband Malcolm and a bratty teenage daughter. Where and how and why did end life this - and can it be put right? This novel provides the answers to those questions.

As the book begins, the present-day Judith suspects her husband of infidelity and is suddenly aware that her life has failed to fully satisfy her. She constructs a little hideaway in a storage garage, a reconstruction of her Nebraska bedroom. Judith, we learn, opted for professional success and married the kind of man she thought she should marry. After all, Willy was just a teenage love, an immature first love, wasn't he?

Well, he wasn't. It turns out that turning one's back on true love is the biggest mistake one can make and it condemns Judith and Willy not to deep unhappiness - both have children, successful careers and build a life - but to a kind of restless and persistent dissatisfaction - a sense that they have not been able to taste fully all the happiness that life has to offer.

Unfortunately, we can't ever go back and redo our mistakes. But this star-crossed couple will find some kind of ultimate honesty with each other. This book is lyrical and wise and I found it beautiful and moving.

9 people found this helpful

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Author's insightful view of young love and small town life.

Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2017

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I had read McNeal's earlier book, "Goodnight, Nebraska", and found it fascinating as a character study and picture of life in a rural small town. The author put the reader in the mind and life of a troubled youth who is given the chance to better himself after a rough start in a family with real problems. So I was eager to read another of McNeal's books. This didn't disappoint. His understanding of small town life and the interrelationships of the inhabitants is great. He is skilled in getting into the thoughts and feelings of impulsive, conflicted teens, in particular. I really enjoyed this book, but am only giving it four stars as I didn't particularly like the ending. Somehow the characters didn't mature and behave as I'd expected them to. But, I recommend reading both of these books.

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Nate's Mate

'It's Paradise To Be Near You Like This......'

Reviewed in the United States on July 16, 2011

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I read this book approximately six weeks ago and still can't forget Willy Blunt. I pictured Will Blunt looking much like Matt Damon - a man not easily forgotten.

This is an easy book to read but yet a difficult one to review. To review this fully is to reveal too much. It is a romantic book, nicely written - sometimes even beautifully written - and has the ability to compel a reader to ask, `If you had a chance to do it over again, would you?'

Judith appears to be experiencing a mid-life crisis. The reader gets to relive Judith's past with her. Her parents are separated yet not divorced. Her father, up to a point, is a romantic figure. He is a professor in Nebraska and loves opera. Judith and her father are listening to Leontyne Price's `Songs to Be Sung On the Water.' She misunderstands/mishears this thinking that the title of these songs are 'To Be Sung Underwater.'

Past and present are juxtaposed, and I liked this structure. One has the opportunity to learn where Judith is now and where she was during her childhood and adolescence.

If you like to be transported to another time and place, as well as be tossed back into your own past, I highly recommend this book. Please keep in mind that this may well be `very dangerous' if you act on impulse. This is not an edgy or new book, but it is one that allows for greater insight, debate and challenge.

`Because of you there's a song in my heart. Because of you, our romance had its start. Because of you the sun will shine, the sun and moon will say you're mine, forever and ever...'
[4.5]

5 people found this helpful

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Quintessential Summer Book......

Reviewed in the United States on June 21, 2011

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Today is the first day of summer. Summer Solstice....one of my favorite days of the year and I am feeling sad because I have just finished the perfect summer book. Can't help wish that I would of saved this one for my week on the beach later this summer. That's how much I loved "To Be Sung Underwater". This is a big, wonderful novel that the reader literally resides in during the reading experience.Didn't want to put it down. The story is about,Judith,a fortyish,married,mother and film editor who has become jaded and frustrated with the state of her life. She indulges in some pretty luxurious "daydreaming"/revisiting of her experience of "first love" 25 years previously.

Tom McNeal deftly leads us on a journey back in time to Nebraska and Judith's magical summer of love and self discovery and then back once again to Los Angeles as we become familiar with a cast of immaculately drawn characters that are quite flawed and impressively multi dimensional. The beautiful mid western landscape is presented as a vivid protagonist all of its own. It is magnificent. Sometimes while reading I felt like I was reading several short stories...the sub plots were fascinating enough to stand on their own and left me wanting to know more...all of these lovely vignettes were embroidered together in the most skillful writing I have seen in awhile.
Although people of all ages will enjoy this book...I feel those over 40 will especially find themselves treasuring the feelings that this theme evokes. Memory and reflection on ones own past experiences....it is definitely somewhere you want to go on a sweet summer afternoon.

2 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Bo Peep

A beautiful love story

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 26, 2016

Verified Purchase

This book has a wonderful knack of catching you, and then oh so gently, reeling you in until you are completely absorbed in its characters and story. It is a tale of first love, lost and regained, with an unexpected and somewhat uncomfortable twist at the end. One of those rare books that has you racing towards the end but then leaves you feeling so sad when it is finished. I just loved it.

4 people found this helpful

Mrs Stella M Fenner

A long read - more interesting as it progresses

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 14, 2019

Verified Purchase

I read this on holiday and by the end I couldn't wait to see how it turned out. It has 3 parts and the first part takes some perseverance to get to the end. After that it's much more interesting.

Marcia

To be sung underwater

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 22, 2014

Verified Purchase

I did find it a little slow to start with but once I got into it I loved it and did not want to stop reading at night. It was a lovely love story between Judith and Willy. It did get very sad at the end and I did shed a tear or too but really enjoyed it. Hope my next purchase will be as enjoyable.

debbie moffitt

Beautifully written

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 3, 2014

Verified Purchase

I was surprised to get so involved with the characters so early on and to feel part of the story myself. The writing is so good that every character feels very real. I read the last third of the book in one sitting as I wanted to see the story through to the end and couldn't put it down.
A great read.

Mrs F. Turner

Powerful

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 18, 2013

Verified Purchase

Found this such an interesting book that I couldn't put it down. I was totally absorbed with the two main characters and found the way that their story interweaves was so poignant. Very well written

One person found this helpful

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