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Brick Lane

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Brick Lane

By: Monica Ali
Narrated by: Elizabeth Sastre
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About this listen

 Nanzeen's inauspicious birth in a Bangladeshi village imbues in her a sense of fatalism that she carries across continents. Married off to a man old enough to be her father, Nanzeen moves to London and cares for her family. But gradually she begins to question whether fate controls her or whether she has a hand in her own destiny. She discovers both the complexity that comes with free choice and the depth of her attachment to her husband, her daughters and her new world.

While Nanzeen journeys along her path of self-realization, her sister, Hasina, rushes headlong at her life. Woven through the novel, Hasina's letters from Dhaka recount a world of overwhelming adversity. Shaped, yet not bound, by their landscapes and memories, both sisters struggle to dream, and live, beyond the rules prescribed for them.

©2003 Monica Ali (P)2003 HighBridge Company Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction Women's Fiction World Literature Romance Destiny

Critic reviews

  • Audie Award Winner, Fiction (Abridged), 2004

"A humanely forgiving story about love...Brick Lane may be Ali's first novel, but it is written with a wisdom and skill that few other authors attain in a lifetime." (Sunday Times [London])
"Carefully observed and assured...its power residing in Ali's unsparing scrutiny of its hapless, hopeful protagonists." (Publishers Weekly)
"A splendid novel." (Atlantic Monthly)
"A sharp-witted tale...In Ali's subtle narration, Nazneen's mixture of traditionalism and adaptability, of acceptance and restlessness, emerges as a quiet strength." (The New Yorker)
All stars
Most relevant
I bought this audiobook to help with reading the book, so I was both confused and disappointed to see huge chunks of the original text missing in the recording. Narration is excellent though.

Captivating narration, but incomplete

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the narrator is absolutely brilliant. Wonderful Bengali accent, every character has a different voice and she reads ahead in the text and picks up on all the cues. Very expressive and great characterisation of every person in the story. every character is drawn with great detail and they are totally believable real people rather than just book characters.
I found the story very engrossing - following the life of a couple of immigrants from Bengal and their family. Half of the book is told from the point of view of a sister, Hasina, who is left behind in India, the other half from the viewpoint of the other sister, Nasreen, who marries a man living in England.
Halfway through the book, the plot takes an unlikely twist when Nasreen suddenly begins an affair with a young Bengali man. There is no description or mention of exactly how the affair begins; 1 minute she's taking in sewing from him, the next minute they're suddenly in bed together with no preliminary whatsoever. Apart from that the story is excellent. The reader is given a real taste of the racial tensions in the UK between whites and Bengalis.

Excellent immigrant tale

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Great listen. A very interesting insight into the everyday life of a Bangladeshi woman brought to make a life in the East End of London. Tragic and funny by turns, with several threads cleverly interwoven, I found myself fascinated by this story, not the sort of tales I normally enjoy.

Interesting view of Bangladeshi life in inhospitable London..

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The story takes place over decades, and is interestingly told. You learn large parts of the protagonist’s story through reflections in her sister’s letters. The characters are relatable, with most being a realistic blend of good and poor character traits.

Well told story

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