Granted, it's easier to yell at a book you're listening to versus one you're reading; it's like you think you can reason with the narrator or something. I've yelled at a couple of books in the past year; the latest was The Dogs of Babel: A Novel by Carolyn Parkhurst.
The basic plot of the book is this (with apologies to Ms. Parkhurst): a man comes home to find his wife has died after a fall out of a tree in their backyard. The only "being" to have witnessed the fall is the family dog. The man, a professor of linguistics, decides that, in order to find out what happened (and why), he will teach the dog to talk. He puts the dog in a fair bit of danger in his quest for the truth--and at that particular point in the book, I'll admit that I was yelling and crying.
Because here's the thing: very early on, you know his wife killed herself. The man knows it too. But he keeps trying to communicate with the dog, as if by knowing WHAT happened, he'll know WHY it happened. But it never works that way, and that's why I was frustrated and yelling--the people left behind will never truly know, and certainly never truly understand, why another person would choose to end their life. You could leave the most intricate, detailed letter with all the reasons why, and the people you leave behind would still have those niggling thoughts: "What if I had...?"
Still, I think if any book evokes emotions like that from its reader, it must be worth a look. Bravo, Ms. Parkhurst.
