Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

Preview

£0.00 for first 30 days

Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

The Blue Book

By: A. L. Kennedy
Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
Try for £0.00

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Summary

Longlisted for the 2012 Orange Prize for Fiction

Elizabeth Barber is crossing the Atlantic by liner with her perfectly adequate boyfriend, Derek, who might be planning to propose. In fleeing the UK - temporarily - Elizabeth may also be in flight from her past and the charismatic Arthur, once her partner in what she came to see as a series of crimes.

Together they acted as fake mediums, perfecting the arcane skills practised by effective frauds. Elizabeth finally rejected what once seemed an intoxicating game. Arthur continued his search for the right way to do wrong. He now subsidises free closure for the traumatised and dispossessed by preying on the super-rich. The pair still meets occasionally, for weekends of sexual oblivion, but their affection lacerates as much as it consoles. She hadn’t, though, expected the other man on the boat.

As her voyage progresses, Elizabeth’s past is revealed, codes slowly form and break as communication deepens. It’s time for her to discover who the true deceivers are and who are the truly deceived.

What’s more is the book itself - a fiction which may not always be lying - deceiving the listener? Offering illusions and false trails, magical numbers and redemptive humour, this is a novel about what happens when we are misled and when we are true: an extraordinarily intricate and intimate journey into our minds and hearts undertaken by a writer of great gifts - a maker of wonders.

©2011 A. L. Kennedy (P)2011 Penguin Audio
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

Listeners also enjoyed...

English Grammar Rules You Must Know cover art
Lily's House cover art
The Glass Ocean cover art
Star Gazing cover art
Lessons in Laughing Out Loud cover art
What Was Rescued cover art
The Full Legacy: A Lesbian Mystery Romance cover art
Lark Song cover art
The Memory Book cover art
The Coordinates of Loss cover art
The Anniversary cover art
A Summer Scandal cover art
In the Light of What We See cover art

What listeners say about The Blue Book

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 3.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    7
  • 4 Stars
    5
  • 3 Stars
    5
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    5
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    7
  • 4 Stars
    5
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    1
Story
  • 3.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    5
  • 4 Stars
    3
  • 3 Stars
    2
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    3

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Strangely unsatisfying

Any additional comments?

I am a great fan of Juliet Stevenson's narrations but I did not enjoy the substance and style of this book, making it the least satisfying encounter with JS I have had to date. I did not engage with the characters and I was not greatly entertained.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Perfect magic.

Incredible, right up until the last page. How does she get inside your head so? 18 stars

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

An extraordinary tale

This is a superb reading of a twisting and turning story, full of tricks without ever being a crude performance. Juliet Stevenson's reading is pitch-perfect, through scenes that range from distanced intellectual observation to lustful abandon. The characters are marvellously deep and thoughtful, the prose superb and often poetic, and the story fresh, always engaging, and very moving. Very much recommend, particularly if you like AL Kennedy's work

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Tour de force

I am a fan of AL Kennedy's, and have been ever since I read Paradise. The Blue Book is a tour de force, full of passion and poetry, read movingly and in total harmony with the writing. Though I would have loved the book if I'd read it off the page, it is not now possible for me to divorce the writing from the voice of Juliet Stevenson, who gave the book an extra dimension, adding so much more to the tale with her beautiful reading. The book bursts with poetry, it explodes with it, including in it's lyricism the 'f' word, which may spoil it for some, but not me. Unlike any other audible book I will listen to this again, and probably again after that. It knocked me off my feet, and the ending made sense of the whole book, in Anthony Burgess fashion. Stunningly good.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

8 people found this helpful