Kate’s 2¢: “Her fearful symmetry: a novel” by Audrey Niffenegger

“Her fearful symmetry: a novel” by Audrey Niffenegger

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Laura Giannarelli did a good job of narrating this intriguing story of two sets of twins with quite a unique twist at the end.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

audreyniffenegger.com

Audrey Niffenegger (born June 13, 1963) is an American writer, artist, and academic. Her debut novel, The Time Traveler’s Wife, published in 2003, was a bestseller.

Biography[edit]

Audrey Niffenegger was born in 1963 in South Haven, Michigan. At the age of two,[2] she and her family moved to Evanston, Illinois, and she has since spent the majority of her life living in or close to Chicago.[3] Niffenegger started writing books when she was six years old. Niffenegger completed her undergraduate degree at the Art Institute of Chicago where she worked on becoming a visual artist.[3] After completing her undergraduate degree, she got her M.F.A at Northwestern University.[4] From 1994 to 2015, Niffenegger served on the faculty of the Creative Writing Department at Columbia College Chicago, where she co-founded the Columbia College Chicago Center for the Book and Paper Arts.[5]

Niffenegger is also the founding member of T3 or Text 3, an artist and writer’s group which performs and exhibits in Chicago. She is an alumna and board member of the Ragdale Foundation. She started making books herself by using processes such as intaglio and letterpress. She also wrote many novels which were produced on an offset press.[6]

She founded Artists Book House.[7] In 2024, Niffenegger announced that the center’s home would be built in the Old Irving Park neighborhood.[8]

From June 21 to November 10, 2013, the National Museum of Women in the Arts exhibited Awake in the Dream World: The Art of Audrey Niffenegger, a retrospective of her paintings, drawings, prints, and book art that “reflect her captivating narrative talent and her explorations of life, mortality, and magic.”[9] The catalog was written by Niffenegger with Susan Fisher Sterling, Krystyna Wasserman, and Mark Pascale.

Personal life[edit]

Niffenegger is married to cartoonist Eddie Campbell. Niffenegger and Campbell collaborated on the visual novel Bizarre Romance to celebrate the Comics Unmasked exhibit at the British Library.[25]

Niffenegger describes herself as “somewhere in the spectrum of agnosticism and atheism” and ascribes her disbelief to her Catholic background.[26]

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

Her fearful symmetry: a novel DB70505

Author: Niffenegger, Audrey

Reading Time: 15 hours, 21 minutes

Production: National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled, Library of Congress

Read by: Laura Giannarelli

Subject: Psychological Fiction

Downloaded: 04/26/2026

Mirror-image twins Julia and Valentina inherit the London flat of Aunt Elspeth Noblin, their mother’s estranged twin sister. After moving from Chicago to London, the young women meet obsessive-compulsive neighbor Martin, Elspeth’s shy younger lover Robert, and Elspeth’s ghost, who has plans for Robert and Valentina. 2009.

New York : Scribner, 2009.

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Kate’s 2¢: “Her one mistake” by Heidi Perks

“Her one mistake” by Heidi Perks

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   In light British accents, Julie Maisey, Kristy Dillon, and Sally Scott dd a good job of narrating this emotional story. It is time to let abused women know that they can reach out and safely get out of the abusive situation.

From the web:

I have always loved reading and writing.

For as long as I can remember I’ve been making up stories, poems and even magazines that I’d sell to family members for 20p back in the eighties. I fell in love with Enid Blyton and books like The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles, and somehow managed to get through GCSEs and A-levels while spending most of the lessons staring out of the window and creating other worlds in my head.  

But this was as far as it went, and instead I went onto university to study Retail Management and then started a fifteen year career in marketing, where I met my husband, and had my first child.

In 2012, just after my second child was born, I took redundancy from my job, and decided it was a good time to make some changes to my life. And one of these was to see if I could write a book.

It took a year to write a full novel, which I managed to complete by setting myself word count deadlines. I was then accepted onto the inaugural Curtis Brown Creative online Novel Writing Course, which fuelled my desire to become an author even more. But it took five years, two different agents and many rejections before I finally became a published writer. Writing is a passion, and I feel incredibly lucky to be doing a job that I love.

I write whenever and wherever I can. Often this has been up to the kitchen table but I am excited to soon be moving into my new ‘office’ in the garden!

Much of my inspiration comes from where I live and the areas surrounding it. My home is in Bournemouth and there are some stunning places along the south coast that I have used as locations for my books. See if you can spot them! They range from Portland, Lymington, Brownsea Island, West Dorset and soon to be the Isle of Wight. Sometimes the darkest things can happen in the most beautiful places! 

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

 Her one mistake DB115162

Author: Perks, Heidi

Reading Time: 10 hours, 1 minute

Production: National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled, Library of Congress

Read by: Julie Maisey, Kristy Dillon, Sally Scott

Subjects: Psychological Fiction, Suspense Fiction

Downloaded: 04/26/2026

“Charlotte was supposed to be looking after the children, and she swears she was. But while her three kids are all safe and sound at the school fair, Alice, her best friend Harriet’s daughter, is nowhere to be found. Frantically searching everywhere, Charlotte knows she must find the courage to tell Harriet that her beloved only child is missing—and admit that she’s solely to blame. Harriet, devastated by this unbearable loss, can no longer bring herself to speak to Charlotte again, much less trust her. Struggling to keep her marriage afloat, Harriet is more isolated than ever. But as the police bear down on both women, trying to piece together the puzzle of what happened to this little girl, dark secrets begin to surface—and Harriet discovers that trusting Charlotte again may be the only thing that will reunite her with her daughter…” — Provided by publisher. Unrated. Commercial audiobook.

New York : Simon & Schuster Audio, 2019.

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“Between Earth and Sky” by Amanda Skenandore

NOTE: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as, describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ shares her thoughts about what she’s read. In her opinion…

   Emily Sutton-Smith did a good job narrating this Psychological, historical novel. It presents a dark period in the history of the United States, when well meaning people did a horrible injustice to the Native Americans.

A few take-aways:

–She watched the sun glide toward thehorizon, until it hung red and brilliant above the trees. Its rays, for a fleeting moment, bridge between earth and sky.

…for all their good intensions, they hadn’t really saved them at all.

–Harry (or Asku) believed that the sinuous colors were the spirits of the dead dancing through the sky.

Featured snippet from the web

Amanda Skenandore is an award-winning author of historical fiction and a registered nurse. Her books have been translated into multiple languages and garnered accolades from the American Library Association, Reader’s Digest, Silicon Valley Reads, and Apple Books. She is a 2024 Nevada Arts Council’s literary fellow.

Profile – Amanda Skenandor

Amanda lives in Las Vegas with her husband and their pet turtle, Lenore.…

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

Between earth and sky DB92181

Author: Skenandore, Amanda

Reading Time: 11 hours, 37 minutes

Production: National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled, Library of Congress

Read by: Emily Sutton-Smith

Subjects: Historical Fiction, Psychological Fiction

1906. When Alma Mitchell opens the morning’s paper, she discovers that a childhood friend, Harry Muskrat, or Asku as she knew him, stands accused of murdering a federal land agent. Alma must reckon with her past as she asks her husband to help defend Asku. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2018.

[Ashland, Oregon] : Blackstone Audio, [2018]

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