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 Reef cover art

The Reef

By: Edith Wharton
Narrated by: Kristen Underwood
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 £16.00

Buy Now for £16.00

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...

The Buccaneers cover art
The Glimpses of the Moon cover art
Old New York cover art
Roderick Hudson cover art
The Custom of the Country cover art
Ethan Frome cover art
The House of Mirth cover art
The Aspern Papers (BBC Radio 4 Book At Bedtime) cover art
The Odd Women cover art
Love and Mr Lewisham cover art
The Vicar of Bullhampton cover art
The Kellys and the O'Kellys cover art
The Aspern Papers cover art
Father cover art
The Golden Bowl cover art
The Leavenworth Case cover art

Summary

A challenge to the moral climate of the day, The Reef follows the fancies of George Darrow, a young diplomat en route from London to France, intent on proposing to the widowed Anna Leath. Unsettled by Anna's reticence, Darrow drifts into an affair with Sophy Viner, a charmingly naive and impecunious young woman whose relations with Darrow and Anna's family threaten his prospects for success.

The affair becomes the reef on which four lives are in danger of foundering: two of them innocent and two of them burdened with experience and tinged with desperation. This is a story of the drastic effects of a casual sexual betrayal and a clear-eyed assessment of the possibilities and limitations of human love.

(P)1995 Blackstone Audio Inc.

Critic reviews

"The novel...was most enthusiastically admired by Henry James, and one can see why, for it is most Jamesian....It marks the peak of her most brilliant period of creativity....And for us it is a chance to see what can be achieved in the pursuit of moral truths." (Anita Brookner)

What listeners say about The Reef

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    12
  • 4 Stars
    4
  • 3 Stars
    3
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    1
Performance
  • 3.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    2
  • 4 Stars
    3
  • 3 Stars
    2
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    1
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    4
  • 4 Stars
    1
  • 3 Stars
    2
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    1

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