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Anthony Powell's universally acclaimed epic encompasses a four-volume panorama of twentieth century London. Hailed by Time as "brilliant literary comedy as well as a brilliant sketch of the times," A Dance to the Music of Time opens just after World War I. Amid the fever of the 1920s and the first chill of the 1930s, Nick Jenkins and his friends confront sex, society, business, and art.
Set amid the corrupt glamour and multiplying intrigues of Alexandria, Egypt, in the 1930s and 1940s, the novels of Durrell's Alexandria Quartet (of which this is the first) follow the shifting alliances - sexual, cultural and political - of a group of quite varied characters. In Justine, an English schoolmaster and struggling writer falls in love with a beautiful and mysterious Jewish woman who is married to a wealthy Egyptian.
First published in 1900, when Thomas Mann was 25, Buddenbrooks is a minutely imagined chronicle of four generations of a North German mercantile family - a work so true to life that it scandalized the author’s former neighbours in his native Lübeck.
Howards End is the story of the liberal Schlegel sisters and their struggle to come to terms with social class and their German heritage in Edwardian England. Their lives are intertwined with those of the wealthy and pragmatic Wilcox family and their country house, Howards End, as well as the lower-middle-class Basts. When Helen Schlegel and Paul Wilcox's brief romance ends badly the Schlegels hope to never see the Wilcoxes again.
First published in 1988 and described by Ali Smith as 'one of Muriel Spark's most liberating, and meditative novels' - A Far Cry from Kensington shows Muriel Spark at the mature height of her powers.The narrator is one Mrs. Hawkins. She writes from Italy, a far cry from Kensington indeed, taking us back to her threadbare years in postwar London. As a young, rather fat war-widow she spent her days working for a crazy, almost bankrupt publisher; and her nights offering advice from her boarding-house in South Kensington.
In the India of 1942, two rapes take place simultaneously - that of an English girl in Mayapore, and that of India by the British. In each, physical violence, racial animosity, the coercion of the weak by the strong all play their part, but playing a part too are love, affection, loyalty, and recognition that the last division of all to be overcome is the colour of the skin.
Anthony Powell's universally acclaimed epic encompasses a four-volume panorama of twentieth century London. Hailed by Time as "brilliant literary comedy as well as a brilliant sketch of the times," A Dance to the Music of Time opens just after World War I. Amid the fever of the 1920s and the first chill of the 1930s, Nick Jenkins and his friends confront sex, society, business, and art.
Set amid the corrupt glamour and multiplying intrigues of Alexandria, Egypt, in the 1930s and 1940s, the novels of Durrell's Alexandria Quartet (of which this is the first) follow the shifting alliances - sexual, cultural and political - of a group of quite varied characters. In Justine, an English schoolmaster and struggling writer falls in love with a beautiful and mysterious Jewish woman who is married to a wealthy Egyptian.
First published in 1900, when Thomas Mann was 25, Buddenbrooks is a minutely imagined chronicle of four generations of a North German mercantile family - a work so true to life that it scandalized the author’s former neighbours in his native Lübeck.
Howards End is the story of the liberal Schlegel sisters and their struggle to come to terms with social class and their German heritage in Edwardian England. Their lives are intertwined with those of the wealthy and pragmatic Wilcox family and their country house, Howards End, as well as the lower-middle-class Basts. When Helen Schlegel and Paul Wilcox's brief romance ends badly the Schlegels hope to never see the Wilcoxes again.
First published in 1988 and described by Ali Smith as 'one of Muriel Spark's most liberating, and meditative novels' - A Far Cry from Kensington shows Muriel Spark at the mature height of her powers.The narrator is one Mrs. Hawkins. She writes from Italy, a far cry from Kensington indeed, taking us back to her threadbare years in postwar London. As a young, rather fat war-widow she spent her days working for a crazy, almost bankrupt publisher; and her nights offering advice from her boarding-house in South Kensington.
In the India of 1942, two rapes take place simultaneously - that of an English girl in Mayapore, and that of India by the British. In each, physical violence, racial animosity, the coercion of the weak by the strong all play their part, but playing a part too are love, affection, loyalty, and recognition that the last division of all to be overcome is the colour of the skin.
Can You Forgive Her? is the first of the six in the Palliser series. Trollope inextricably binds together the issues of parliamentary election and marriage, of politics and privacy. The values and aspirations of the governing stratum of Victorian society are ruthlessly examined, and none remains unscathed. But above all Trollope focuses on the predicament of women. 'What should a woman do with her life?' asks Alice Vavasor of herself, and this theme is echoed by every other woman in the audiobook.
The Portrait of a Lady tells the compelling and ultimately tragic tale of a beautiful young American woman's encounter with European sophistication. Set principally in England and Italy, the story follows Isabel Archer's fortunes as a variety of admirers vie for her hand. Her choice will be crucial, and she is not wanting for advice, whether from the generous-spirited Ralph Touchett or the charming Madame Merle.
Random House presents the audiobook edition of The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock by Imogen Hermes Gowar, read by Juliet Stevenson. This voyage is special. It will change everything.... One September evening in 1785, the merchant Jonah Hancock hears urgent knocking on his front door. One of his captains is waiting eagerly on the step. He has sold Jonah's ship for what appears to be a mermaid.
The debut novel set in 17th-century Iceland by Sunday Times best-selling author and broadcaster Sally Magnusson. There is a true incident in Icelandic history little known outside their culture. In 1627, Barbary pirates raided an island off the Iceland coast - and abducted 250 inhabitants into slavery in Algiers. Among them was a pastor, his wife and their three children. The pastor was sent back on a failed mission to seek ransom and wrote an account of his adventures. But what happened to the islanders?
Dorothea Brooke is an ardent idealist who represses her vivacity and intelligence for the cold, theological pedant Casaubon. One man understands her true nature: the artist Will Ladislaw. But how can love triumph against her sense of duty and Casaubon’s mean spirit? Meanwhile, in the little world of Middlemarch, the broader world is mirrored: the world of politics, social change, and reforms, as well as betrayal, greed, blackmail, ambition, and disappointment.
Dr. Aziz is a young Muslim physician in the British Indian town of Chandrapore. One evening he comes across an English woman, Mrs. Moore, in the courtyard of a local mosque; she and her younger travelling companion Adela are disappointed by claustrophobic British colonial culture and wish to see something of the 'real' India. But when Aziz kindly offers to take them on a tour of the Marabar caves with his close friend Cyril Fielding, the trip results in a shocking accusation....
It's March 1934, and Josephine Tey is travelling from Scotland to London to celebrate what should be the triumphant final week of her celebrated play, Richard of Bordeaux. However, a seemingly senseless murder puts her reputation, and even her life, under threat.
Michael Henchard, drunk at a country fair, sells his wife and baby daughter for five guineas. The following day, in despair and remorse, he forswears alcohol and sets out to redeem himself. In time, he becomes a respected merchant and eventually the mayor of the town. But Fate is not to be so easily appeased, and Henchard finds his past actions resonate through and destroy his plans for the future.
The Girls of Slender Means is the third Muriel Spark audio release of 2012, following The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and The Complete Short Stories. It is 1945; a time of cultural and political change, and also one of slender means. Spark's evocative and sharply drawn novel focuses on a group of women living together in a hostel in Kensington who face new challenges in uncertain times. The novel is at once dramatic and character-based, and shows Muriel Spark at the height of her literary powers.
Is Alice here? Did she make it? Is she safe? In the chaos, in the night, it was impossible to say which of the four had asked after Alice's welfare. Later, when everything got worse, each would insist it had been them. Five women reluctantly pick up their backpacks and start walking along the muddy track. Only four come out the other side.
When war broke out in 1914, Somerset Maugham was dispatched by the British Secret Service to Switzerland under the guise of completing a play. Multilingual, knowledgeable about many European countries, and a celebrated writer, Maugham had the perfect cover, and the assignment appealed to his love of romance, and of the ridiculous. The stories collected in Ashenden are rooted in Maugham's own experiences as an agent, reflecting the ruthlessness and brutality of espionage, its intrigue and treachery, as well as its absurdity.
Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Mrs Osmond by John Banville, read by Amy Finegan. 'What was freedom, she thought, other than the right to exercise one's choices?' Isabel Osmond, a spirited, intelligent young heiress, flees to London after being betrayed by her husband, to be with her beloved cousin Ralph on his deathbed. After a sombre, silent existence at her husband's Roman palazzo, Isabel's daring escape to London reawakens her youthful quest for freedom and independence.
In this exotic landscape Harriet gets to know her new husband and to wonder at the complexity of the apparently simple man she had married.
Having both read Olivia Manning’s great trilogy and watched the TV adaptation (twice) I was somewhat wary of embarking on this reading, fearing that it might not accord with my own interpretation of the characters or those of the actors who portrayed them so well on the screen.
I need not have worried. As soon as she got into her stride Harriet Walter’s reading was quite brilliant and revealed many different aspects of the characters that I had not thought about.
Having finished the first volume it was with great impatience that I awaited my next monthly allocation. I have now listened to all three books and have no hesitation in recommending them either to new listeners or any of Miss Manning’s existing fans.
8 of 8 people found this review helpful
What did you like most about The Great Fortune?
This is an involving, atmospheric and intense account of a motley group of British and Romanian characters in Bucharest, watching, fearing, sensing the ever closer presence of the Germans in 1939/40. The book ends with the fall of France and the apparent impotence of the British Army to protect Europe and especially Bucharest and is notable for providing a brilliant portrait of this gilded and vulnerable city, its people, the buildings, the cafes and hotels. It centres around a newly married English couple and their friends, including a pathetic White Russian English eduated prince down on his luck who scrounges off anyone and everyone. Olivia Manning's brilliance lies her characterisation, including creating a potentially dislikeable herione with whom you continue to epmpathise.
What other book might you compare The Great Fortune to, and why?
It is the first of the Balkan trilogy by Olivia Manning following the couples' flight from Bucharest to, eventually, Cairo. In its scope and setting it could be compared to The Alexandria Quartet (Gerald Durrell) and even The Raj Quartet (Paul Scott) though both of these have the reputation of dealing with this period with more political intensity and psychologically insight. I'm not sure I agree with this view.
What does Harriet Walter bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you had only read the book?
It takes an actress of great range to portray the cast of characters covered by this book. She gives them all a distinct and recognisable voice. In particular she manages to portray both the bitchiness of Harriet, the heroine, as well as her more admirable qualities.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful
What did you like most about The Great Fortune?
I recently finished reading Olivia Manning's Balkan Trilogy, of which this is the first volume and found it to be absorbing and increasingly gripping as the story went on, a real page turner.
What was one of the most memorable moments of The Great Fortune?
Apart from the many very well drawn characters, prime amongst them being Guy Pringle, what I found most interesting were the vivid and memorable descriptions of the political and physical backdrop - you really get a feel for the time and place and the tremendous uncertainties which people must have experienced living in a foreign country close to the onset of war.
Which character – as performed by Harriet Walter – was your favourite?
Harriet Walter narrates all three volumes superbly. Her pace and timing are nigh-on perfect and she draws the characters - men and women - with a sure touch, particularly Guy Pringle, his long-suffering wife, Harriet, and the incomparable Prince Yakimov..
Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
As I said a real page turner. Indeed, listening to the trilogy inspired me to buy Olivia Manning's continuation of the tale of Guy and Harriet in the "Levant Trilogy" - alas book version - and I thoroughly enjoyed that too. She is a much under-rated writer.
Any additional comments?
Strongly recommended, particularly if you are interested in novels set in Europe just before the outbreak of the second world war.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
Harriet Walter does a brilliant job of making a favourite book (and TV series) even better. Guy Pringle is one of the most memorable and maddening characters in English literature - love him and hate him. I see the next book in the series has just been released. Hope you plan to publish all of them.
2 of 2 people found this review helpful
Beautifully read. The story was a slow burner for me - atmospheric and strangely compelling. I enjoyed it but would not rave about it. I may come back to the second book mainly because i am a fan of Harriet Walter's readings.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
Manning writes with assurance about this complicated early period of World War II . She clearly knew what she was writing about but besides her formidable understanding of that period of history the human interest is not lost and she writes convincingly about emotions, friendships and the complexities of a young marriage. I cannot wait to listen to the next part. Harriet Waters is an excellent narrator and handleds the various accents required of her pretty well. A slight criticism would be that on occasions she does not complete a word (ie plurals are pronounced as singulars) and allows her voice to drift away. Anyone not familiar with the English language might not know what the word is sometimes! That minor aspect apart I have not enjoyed such intelligent, insightful writing for a while besides learning about Romania and Britain during the War.
This narrator is very talented. She even does characters impersonating each other somewhat convincingly. It's pretty dramatic, as opposed to understated, but I'm very impressed.
The story and writing is wonderful, like Anthony Powell but with things happening. The author exhibits cool Olympian disdain for the characters so far. I haven't finished it yet.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful
What about Harriet Walter’s performance did you like?
I had picked up the Balkan Trilogy several times and never managed to get past the first few pages so I thought I'd try the audiobook and I was immediately hooked. Guy's cluelessness, Harriet's petulance, Yaki's pathetic Yaki-ness, is all perfectly rendered. Once hooked, I easily moved on to the second book without needing the audiobook. But for the third and final installment I returned to the audiobook as if meeting with old friends.
If you could take any character from The Great Fortune out to dinner, who would it be and why?
Poor Yaki--he always needs a meal. Although one worries buying him one meal would somehow bind you to him for life.
Any additional comments?
Like Tolkein's Lord off the Rings Trilogy, the books in The Balkan Trilogy don't really stand alone and need to be read as one long book.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful