Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

Offer ends May 1st, 2024 11:59PM GMT. Terms and conditions apply.
£7.99/month after 3 months. Renews automatically.
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.
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.
The Liar's Dictionary cover art

The Liar's Dictionary

By: Eley Williams
Narrated by: Kristin Atherton,Jon Glover
Get this deal Try for £0.00

Pay £99p/month. After 3 months pay £7.99/month. Renews automatically. See terms for eligibility.

£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.

Listeners also enjoyed...

Attrib. cover art
The Dictator’s Muse cover art
Four Thousand Days cover art
The Eighth Life cover art
I Stopped Time cover art
When You Find Me cover art
I Am Not Raymond Wallace cover art
The Misadventures of Margaret Finch cover art
Cages cover art
The Killings at Badger’s Drift cover art
The Count of Monte Cristo cover art
Tell Me Lies cover art
Mortal Mischief cover art
Debt of Bones cover art
The Alice Network cover art
Spellbreaker cover art

Summary

Brought to you by Penguin. 

mountweazel, noun: a fake entry deliberately inserted into a dictionary or work of reference. Often used as a safeguard against copyright infringement.

In the final year of the 19th century, Peter Winceworth has reached the letter S, toiling away for the much-anticipated and multi-volume Swansby’s New Encyclopaedic Dictionary. Overwhelmed at his desk and increasingly uneasy that his colleagues are attempting to corral language and regiment facts, Winceworth feels compelled to assert some sense of individual purpose and exercise artistic freedom, so he begins inserting unauthorised, fictitious entries into the dictionary.  

In the present day, young intern Mallory is tasked with uncovering these mountweazels as the text of the dictionary is digitised for modern consumers. Through the words and their definitions she finds she has access to their creator’s motivations, hopes and desires. More pressingly, she must also field daily threatening anonymous phone calls. Is a suggested change to the dictionary’s definition of marriage (n.) really that controversial? What power does Mallory have when it comes to words and knowing how to tell the truth? And does the caller really intend for the Swansby’s staff to ‘burn in hell’? 

As their two narratives combine, Winceworth and Mallory must discover how to negotiate the complexities of an often nonsensical, untrustworthy, hoax-strewn and undefinable life. 

The Liar’s Dictionary explores themes of trust and creativity, naming the unnameable and it celebrates the rigidity, fragility and absurdity of language. It is an exhilarating debut novel from a formidably brilliant young writer. 

©2020 Eley Williams (P)2020 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

"This tale of lexical intrigues is an absolute joy to [listen to]! It’s gloriously inventive and playful, but with just the right amount of heart." (Lucy Scholes)

More from the same

What listeners say about The Liar's Dictionary

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    20
  • 4 Stars
    15
  • 3 Stars
    6
  • 2 Stars
    3
  • 1 Stars
    3
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    26
  • 4 Stars
    10
  • 3 Stars
    2
  • 2 Stars
    3
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    21
  • 4 Stars
    7
  • 3 Stars
    6
  • 2 Stars
    5
  • 1 Stars
    3

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

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

2 parallel stories set around a dictionary

The first story is set in Victorian times when lexicographers were setting up the dictionary, story 2 in modern era during its decline. An odd charming book, with the 2 stories linked across time by words and their meanings.

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
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

What a load of Codswallop

I do like words and was looking forward to this book, a recommendation to our book club. My goodness! I've not read such a load of tripe in a long time. To top it all, the person who recommended it missed our bookclub meeting when it got a unanimous thumbs down by all the members.
The story was wishy-washy at best, and conspicuous by its absence mostly! The dictionary quotes had no relevance or tie-in to the 'story'.
Either my whole book club missed the point as it was so cleverly written, or the author missed a trick here to write a really strong story, and tie it into dictionary quotes. But sadly, for us both were very wide of the mark.
I'd give it a wide birth, life is too short. Stick to reading the actual dictionary!

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

Get your dictionary out!

Full of obscure and new words... You will need your dictionary to make the most of this book! A wonderful little story of two timeliness that interweave. Wonderfully narrated as you are taken into the world of dictionary formation and will have you questioning the process of defining words!
Wonderfully funny and captivating!

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!