The Listeners explores the seduction of the wild and unknowable, the human search for the transcendent, the rise of conspiracy culture in the West, and the desire for community and connection in our increasingly polarised times. The Hum becomes a gateway for Claire to meet people who understand her deeply while simultaneously driving away those she loves the most. It opens her eyes to new possibilities by challenging her pre-established ways of thinking and understanding.

In the face of this story, one might ask themselves what the appealing feature of such a dementedly irritating plot might be & I should like to highlight that I came across this book while looking to read stories written by Canadian authors. I have a great appreciation for the bizarre, especially in literature, & therefore felt that this book would be right up my alley. When Claire begins to hear a hum she goes insane, in the literal medical meaning of the word. I was intrigued by the topic & admit to having high hopes for this book. What you need to know about the 2021 Scotiabank Giller Prize finalists". CBC Books, November 5, 2021. There was a team of French scientists who believed that possibly the hum was being created by ocean waves rolling against the ocean floor or concussing against the continental shelf and causing vibrations. There were theories about the possibility that it was the windstream shearing against a low pressure system that caused the sound, or possibly it was human made — a technological sort of noise pollution, like the sound of the electric grid or radio waves or submarine pings that were causing these sounds.

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As with all the novels on the 2021 Giller Prize shortlist, The Listeners is carefully plotted and expertly written. Tannahill’s prose is consistently sharp and darkly funny, but his story’s inventive premise is what pushes it into the “must-read” category. I think that was the departure point for this story and how that ostracizes her from her life and drives her into a more extreme trajectory where she's seeking the comfort and companionship of initially a student of hers, who can also hear the hum, and then ultimately strangers. So that's where, for me, it began." The intersection of conspiracy culture, faith and mania in America has been animating so much of our public life in the last few years and has led to this extremely paranoid state of mind that I feel like a lot of us are only just recovering from and we're very much still living through.

I hope that it is timeless is in the ways in which it meditates on faith and questions of truth, perhaps even mania. I think it feels timely in the very specific ways conspiracy theories are being mainstreamed in North American politics, specifically in American politics. This phenomenon of the hum was something that had been widely reported for several decades, at least since the early 1970s. And it was something that there was a lot of lingering mystery about, which intrigued me. The natural explanations for what this could be were sublime and interesting. Why should I care about developing sentiments of sorrow for a person who spends their time telling me that she doesn’t really like her husband as a person & whom I see write about how they performed aggression against their spouse when they did not hear the same hum as she did? What is redeeming about this person? This leads me to my initial points; perhaps I have not understood something innate, something very important within the plot & the presentation of this book. Perhaps, everything I expressed was meant to come across this way. Tom, the Earth is making us aware of itself in the most extraordinary way. And you can choose to listen or can choose not to. But I am listening. Because I have been given the gift of being able to. And so have you.Novelist Jordan Tannahill tells ue about his new novel exploring the fine lines between faith, conspiracy and mania in contemporary America, The Listeners. While lying in bed next to her husband one night, Claire Devon hears a low hum that he cannot. And, it seems, no one else can either. This innocuous noise begins causing Claire headaches, nosebleeds and insomnia, gradually upsetting the balance of her life. I was hoping that was the end of it, but I could tell it was still working on Paul as he lay there, staring up at the ceiling. For such a giant man, he could be like a little boy when he stewed on something. Paul turned his head on the pillow, and said, You know, I wasn't totally comfortable with you calling us atheists. Until that evening and my conversation with Ashley on the staircase, I don’t think I fully grasped the extent to which hysteria was a psychic wound that we as women still bore; a wound inflicted from centuries of our symptoms, our instincts about our own bodies, our pleasures and afflictions, always being the first to be discounted and discredited, even by other women. Even by our own daughters, as the case may be. It was a wound that we still carried, because we could, at any moment, have an entire history called upon to silence us in a word, in an instant.

I studied Paul's face, wondering if this was all a set-up for one of his laboured jokes. He then told me that ever since his father died in the fall, he had found himself thinking about faith. Happy publication day! I was drawn to this one initially for its trippy cover and it's safe to say the inside matches! The concept of this one is really interesting, it blends faith, conspiracies, cults and mania all into one.⁠Rather, we journey with her over the bridge to the other side. And if we don't, then we don't actually change and we don't actually question our own positionality. We don't really get to feel the seductions of what it is like to be part of a group who believes they have the only answer. I really wanted us to feel Claire's palpable need to answer this question in her life when nothing else seems to be answering it and to be heard when no one else seems to be listening to her. While lying in bed next to her husband one night, Claire Devon hears a low hum that he cannot. And, it seems, no one else can either.

I was intrigued for the first 25% and was HOPING for a story like ANY of those that M. Night Shyamalan gives us, or one like John Krasinski’s “A Quiet Place” (2018). I thought I would be reading a sci-fi/ horror tale. The Listeners is very well written and explores some interesting areas and ideas, but I’m not sure what it added up to in the end.

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While lying in bed next to her husband one night, Claire Devon hears a low hum that he cannot. And, it seems, no one else can either. This innocuous noise begins causing Claire headaches, nosebleeds, insomnia, gradually upsetting the balance of her life, though no obvious source or medical cause can be found. When she discovers that a student of hers can also hear the hum, the two strike up an unlikely and intimate friendship. Finding themselves increasingly isolated from their families and colleagues, they fall in with a disparate group of neighbours who also perceive the sound. What starts as a neighbourhood self-help group gradually transforms into something far more extreme and with far-reaching, devastating consequences. Tannahill has been described as "the enfant terrible of Canadian Theatre" by Libération [4] and The Walrus, [5] "one of Canada's most extraordinary artists" by CBC Arts, [6] and "widely celebrated as one of Canada’s most accomplished young playwrights, filmmakers and all-round multidisciplinary artists" by the Toronto Star. [7] In 2019, CBC Arts named Tannahill as one of sixty-nine LGBTQ Canadians, living or deceased, who has shaped the country's history. [8] Early life [ edit ] The Listeners is an electrifying novel that treads the thresholds of faith, conspiracy and mania. Compelling and exhilarating, it forces us to consider how strongly we hold on to what we perceive, and the way different views can tear a family apart. ( From HarperCollins) The novel’s willingness to explore The Hum from all perspectives is quite poignant. Tannahill explores its meaning and purpose through several lenses, including gender, sexuality, and the media. One night, while lying in bed next to her husband, Claire Devon suddenly hears a low hum. This innocuous sound, which no one else in the house can hear, has no obvious source or medical cause, but it begins to upset the balance of Claire's life. When she discovers that one of her students can also hear the hum, the two strike up an unlikely and intimate friendship. Finding themselves increasingly isolated from their families and colleagues, they fall in with a disparate group of people who also perceive the sound. What starts out as a kind of neighbourhood self-help group gradually transforms into something much more extreme, with far-reaching, devastating consequences.