Ship Sooner - by Mary Sullivan (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Envision an imaginary dial with which you can turn all sounds from your everyday experience onto the highest level of volume: that is the world of 13-year old Ship Sooner whose incredible ability to hear sounds normally indiscernible to the human ear defines her life-"Carson McCullers meets Alice Hoffman" (Baltimore Sun).

Ship Sooner hears everyone and everything in her sleepy Massachusetts town. Sounds of frost forming on glass; a rabbit hopping on just fallen snow; and of a fork making indentations on pie crust are as familiar to Ship as an old Sinatra tune played full volume at the town diner. Misunderstood by her classmates and ignored by her disdainful older sister, thirteen-year old Ship consoles herself by listening to the sounds of others' secrets: her mother's lips pressing against those of a balding salesman's; her sister Helen's trysts in a secluded shed; family friend Trudy's breath quickening as she cuts the hair of the town priest; and her only friend Brian Dodd's promise to his parents not to tell where he goes with them on Sunday afternoons.

Ship's isolation intensifies when Brian disappears inexplicably the day after Christmas. During the long winter of 1981, as Helen retreats behind her slammed bedroom door and her mother is increasingly absent, Ship keeps a vigil for Brian and slowly loses hope. But as winter melts to spring, an unexpected calling from the woods will lead her to make an astonishing discovery that compels her to abandon all that she has known, and set out on a journey to transform her life.

Review Quotes

"Compelling characters...not to mention the evocative descriptions of Ship's 'miracle hearing'...hold the reader's interest to the end." -- Publishers Weekly

"Explores the pain-drenched life of an emotionally fragile family...a compelling novel." -- Elle

"...Ship Sooner somehow captures the dimly remembered child sense of the world...What an accomplishment." -- David Mamet

"Sullivan has created the quintessential metaphor for a coming of age tale...Ship Sooner is that rare novel with perfect pitch." -- Jodi Picoult, author of My Sister's Keeper

"Mary Sullivan gives us a protagonist we can't help but love...This is a lovely and redemptive novel." -- Andre Dubus III, author of The House of Sand and Fog

"Sensitive and spellbinding, this beautiful...gripping, heartfelt family tale, is...on many new must-read lists for teens and adults." -- Copley News Service

"Riveting...a beautiful contemporary drama...the gripping mystery makes you rush to the end...heartfelt." -- Booklist

"An inventive twist on the coming-of-age genre...Realistic and heartbreaking yet hopeful, this story...engrosses the reader." -- Library Journal

"Lyrical...well-wrought...with an edge of magical realism: Carson McCullers meets Alice Hoffman...sharply drawn characters...tinged with allegory...startling." -- Baltimore Sun

"Gripping...Sullivan succeeds in making Ship's supersensitivity believable...a meticulously prepared dish." -- Boston Herald

"Ship Sooner stays with you long after you put it down." -- Chicago Sunday Tribune

"Ethereal and lovely...There's not a scene or action that doesn't reverberate with what Ship hears." -- Washington Post Book World