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A Room Made of Leaves
- Narrated by: Valerie Bader
- Length: 9 hrs and 22 mins
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One Life
- My Mother's Story
- By: Kate Grenville
- Narrated by: Kate Grenville
- Length: 6 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Nance was a week short of her sixth birthday when she and Frank were roused out of bed in the dark and lifted into the buggy, squashed in with bedding, the cooking pots rattling around in the back, and her mother shouting back towards the house, 'Good-bye, Rothsay, I hope I never see you again!' When Kate Grenville’s mother died, she left behind many fragments of memoir. These were the starting point for One Life, the story of a woman whose life spanned a century of tumult and change.
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Not your usual tale of your mother
- By Stan on 07-09-2015
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The Bookbinder of Jericho
- By: Pip Williams
- Narrated by: Annabelle Tudor
- Length: 13 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In 1914, when the war draws the young men of Britain away to fight, it is the women who must keep the nation running. Two of those women are Peggy and Maude, twin sisters who work in the bindery at Oxford University Press in Jericho. Peggy is intelligent, ambitious and dreams of going to Oxford University, but for most of her life she has been told her job is to bind the books, not read them. Maude, meanwhile, wants nothing more than what she has. She is extraordinary but vulnerable. Peggy needs to watch over her.
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Powerful, perspective driven story
- By Jennifer on 06-04-2023
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The Secret River
- By: Kate Grenville
- Narrated by: Paul Blackwell
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In 1806 William Thornhill, a man of quick temper and deep feelings, is transported from the slums of London to New South Wales for the term of his natural life. With his wife, Sal, and their children he arrives in a harsh land he cannot understand. But the colony can turn a convict into a free man. Eight years later Thornhill sails up the Hawkesbury to claim 100 acres for himself. Aboriginal people already live on that river. And other recent arrivals - Thomas Blackwood, Smasher Sullivan, and Mrs Herring - are finding their own ways to respond to them.
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Wonderful vivid story telling!
- By Margaret on 10-10-2016
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The Bookshop of the Broken Hearted
- By: Robert Hillman
- Narrated by: Julian Pulvermacher
- Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Tom Hope doesn’t think he’s much of a farmer, but he’s doing his best. He can’t have been much of a husband to Trudy, either, judging by her sudden departure. It’s only when she returns, pregnant to someone else, that he discovers his surprising talent as a father. So when Trudy finds Jesus and takes little Peter away with her to join the holy rollers, Tom’s heart breaks all over again. Enter Hannah Babel, quixotic small-town bookseller: the second Jew, and the most vivid person, Tom has ever met. He dares to believe they could make each other happy.
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Might be the best audiologist I've ever listened t
- By Jenny T. on 26-03-2019
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Lessons in Chemistry
- By: Bonnie Garmus
- Narrated by: Miranda Raison
- Length: 11 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing. But it's the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute take a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans; the lonely, brilliant Nobel-prize-nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with—of all things—her mind. True chemistry results.
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Delightful book
- By Arathaw on 11-05-2022
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Once Upon a River
- By: Diane Setterfield
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 16 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
A dark midwinter’s night in an ancient inn on the Thames. The regulars are entertaining themselves by telling stories when the door bursts open on an injured stranger. In his arms is the drowned corpse of a little child. Hours later the dead girl stirs, takes a breath and returns to life. Is it a miracle? Is it magic? Or can it be explained by science? An exquisitely crafted multilayered mystery brimming with folklore, suspense and romance as well as with the urgent scientific curiosity of the Darwinian age.
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Brilliant. Wonderfully written and narrated.
- By Nola J Pearce on 06-02-2019
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One Life
- My Mother's Story
- By: Kate Grenville
- Narrated by: Kate Grenville
- Length: 6 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
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Performance
-
Story
Nance was a week short of her sixth birthday when she and Frank were roused out of bed in the dark and lifted into the buggy, squashed in with bedding, the cooking pots rattling around in the back, and her mother shouting back towards the house, 'Good-bye, Rothsay, I hope I never see you again!' When Kate Grenville’s mother died, she left behind many fragments of memoir. These were the starting point for One Life, the story of a woman whose life spanned a century of tumult and change.
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Not your usual tale of your mother
- By Stan on 07-09-2015
-
The Bookbinder of Jericho
- By: Pip Williams
- Narrated by: Annabelle Tudor
- Length: 13 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1914, when the war draws the young men of Britain away to fight, it is the women who must keep the nation running. Two of those women are Peggy and Maude, twin sisters who work in the bindery at Oxford University Press in Jericho. Peggy is intelligent, ambitious and dreams of going to Oxford University, but for most of her life she has been told her job is to bind the books, not read them. Maude, meanwhile, wants nothing more than what she has. She is extraordinary but vulnerable. Peggy needs to watch over her.
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Powerful, perspective driven story
- By Jennifer on 06-04-2023
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The Secret River
- By: Kate Grenville
- Narrated by: Paul Blackwell
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1806 William Thornhill, a man of quick temper and deep feelings, is transported from the slums of London to New South Wales for the term of his natural life. With his wife, Sal, and their children he arrives in a harsh land he cannot understand. But the colony can turn a convict into a free man. Eight years later Thornhill sails up the Hawkesbury to claim 100 acres for himself. Aboriginal people already live on that river. And other recent arrivals - Thomas Blackwood, Smasher Sullivan, and Mrs Herring - are finding their own ways to respond to them.
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Wonderful vivid story telling!
- By Margaret on 10-10-2016
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The Bookshop of the Broken Hearted
- By: Robert Hillman
- Narrated by: Julian Pulvermacher
- Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Tom Hope doesn’t think he’s much of a farmer, but he’s doing his best. He can’t have been much of a husband to Trudy, either, judging by her sudden departure. It’s only when she returns, pregnant to someone else, that he discovers his surprising talent as a father. So when Trudy finds Jesus and takes little Peter away with her to join the holy rollers, Tom’s heart breaks all over again. Enter Hannah Babel, quixotic small-town bookseller: the second Jew, and the most vivid person, Tom has ever met. He dares to believe they could make each other happy.
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Might be the best audiologist I've ever listened t
- By Jenny T. on 26-03-2019
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Lessons in Chemistry
- By: Bonnie Garmus
- Narrated by: Miranda Raison
- Length: 11 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
-
Story
Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing. But it's the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute take a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans; the lonely, brilliant Nobel-prize-nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with—of all things—her mind. True chemistry results.
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Delightful book
- By Arathaw on 11-05-2022
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Once Upon a River
- By: Diane Setterfield
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 16 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
-
Story
A dark midwinter’s night in an ancient inn on the Thames. The regulars are entertaining themselves by telling stories when the door bursts open on an injured stranger. In his arms is the drowned corpse of a little child. Hours later the dead girl stirs, takes a breath and returns to life. Is it a miracle? Is it magic? Or can it be explained by science? An exquisitely crafted multilayered mystery brimming with folklore, suspense and romance as well as with the urgent scientific curiosity of the Darwinian age.
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Brilliant. Wonderfully written and narrated.
- By Nola J Pearce on 06-02-2019
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Homecoming
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- Narrated by: Claire Foy
- Length: 17 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Adelaide Hills, Christmas Eve, 1959. At the end of a scorching hot day, a local deliveryman makes a terrible discovery. A police investigation is called, and the small town of Tambilla becomes embroiled in one of the most shocking and perplexing murder cases in the history of South Australia. Many years later and thousands of miles away, Jess is a journalist in search of a story. Having lived and worked in London for nearly two decades, she now finds herself laid off from her full-time job and struggling to make ends meet. Until a phone call out of nowhere summons her back to Sydney.
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Claire Foy Can’t Do Accents
- By Prufrock on 05-05-2023
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The Murmur of Bees
- By: Sofia Segovia, Simon Bruni - translator
- Narrated by: Xe Sands, Angelo Di Loreto
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From the day that old Nana Reja found a baby abandoned under a bridge, the life of a small Mexican town forever changed. Disfigured and covered in a blanket of bees, little Simonopio is for some locals the stuff of superstition, a child kissed by the devil. But he is welcomed by landowners Francisco and Beatriz Morales, who adopt him and care for him. As he grows up, Simonopio becomes a cause for wonder to the Morales family, because when the uncannily gifted child closes his eyes, he can see what no one else can - visions of all that’s yet to come, both beautiful and dangerous.
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Completely different
- By Janette J Ryan on 29-03-2021
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Wifedom
- Mrs Orwell's Invisible Life
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- Narrated by: Arianwen Parkes-Lockwood, Jane Slavin
- Length: 12 hrs and 39 mins
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Looking for wonder and some reprieve from the everyday, Anna Funder slips into the pages of her hero George Orwell. As she watches him create his writing self, she tries to remember her own... When she uncovers his forgotten wife, it's a revelation. Eileen O'Shaughnessy's literary brilliance shaped Orwell's work and her practical nous saved his life. But why - and how - was she written out of the story? Using newly discovered letters from Eileen to her best friend, Funder recreates the Orwell's marriage, through the Spanish Civil War and WWII in London.
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All praise for this monumental work
- By Win Jodell on 15-07-2023
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Horse
- By: Geraldine Brooks
- Narrated by: Graham Halstead, James Fouhey, Katherine Littrell, and others
- Length: 14 hrs and 6 mins
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A discarded painting in a roadside clean-up, forgotten bones in a research archive and Lexington, the greatest racehorse in US history. From these strands of fact, Geraldine Brooks weaves a sweeping story of spirit, obsession and injustice across American history. A gripping reckoning with the legacy of enslavement and racism in America, Horse is the latest masterpiece from a writer with a prodigious talent for bringing the past to life.
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Excellent read
- By Andrew J Alexander on 05-09-2022
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Lola in the Mirror
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- Narrated by: Victoria Graves
- Length: 13 hrs and 39 mins
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A girl and her mother have been on the run for sixteen years, from police and the monster they left in their kitchen with a knife in his throat. They've found themselves a home inside a van with four flat tyres parked in a scrapyard by the edge of the Brisbane River.
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Chapters out of order
- By Natalie Stirling on 12-10-2023
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Tom Lake
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- Unabridged
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In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.
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A sublime performance by the remarkable Streep. I was desperate for this never to finish. Please share another on Audible soon.
- By Christine Rowlands on 16-08-2023
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Beneath the Shadows
- By: Sara Foster
- Narrated by: Lorna Bennett
- Length: 9 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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When Grace’s husband, Adam, inherits an isolated North Yorkshire cottage, they leave the bustle of London behind to try a new life. A week later, Adam vanishes without a trace, leaving their baby daughter, Millie, in her stroller on the doorstep. The following year, Grace returns to the tiny village on the untamed heath. Everyone - the police, her parents, even her best friend and younger sister - is convinced that Adam left her. But Grace, unable to let go of her memories of their love and life together, cannot accept this explanation.
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Underwhelming
- By toni jackson on 12-02-2023
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Edenglassie
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- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
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When Mulanyin meets the beautiful Nita in Edenglassie, their saltwater people still outnumber the British. As colonial unrest peaks, Mulanyin dreams of taking his bride home to Yugambeh Country, but his plans for independence collide with white justice. Two centuries later, fiery activist Winona meets Dr Johnny. Together they care for obstinate centenarian Grannie Eddie, and sparks fly, but not always in the right direction. What nobody knows is how far the legacies of the past will reach into their modern lives.
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Compelling listening
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The Fireground
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- By: Dervla McTiernan
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- Length: 7 hrs and 55 mins
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Flynn was only a teenager when her parents were killed in a terrible accident. Too young to lose her parents, too young to take on responsibility for her younger sister Kaiya, too young to protect Kaiya from the harshness of their new lives in the following years. Desperate to help her sister, Flynn reaches out to Willa Tomlinson, a grief counsellor renowned for helping her patients cope with profound loss. Under Willa’s influence and care, Kaiya finally seems to turn a corner, joining the climate action collective that Willa leads.
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Dervla’s best book to date
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It's 1969, and a remote coastal town in Western Australia is poised to play a pivotal part in the moon landing. Radar technician Evan Johnson and his colleagues stare at a grainy screen, transfixed, as Armstrong takes that first small step.
I was in my cage, of course, unheard, underestimated, biscuit crumbs on my beak. But fate is a curious thing. For just as Evan's story is about to end, my story prepares to take flight.
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Quirky Ausie Tale
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People of the Book
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In 1996, Hanna Heath, a rare-book expert, is offered the job of a lifetime: analysis and conservation of the famed Sarajevo Haggadah, which has been rescued during the Bosnian war. Priceless and beautiful, the book is one of the earliest Jewish volumes ever to be illuminated with images. When Hanna discovers a series of artifacts in its ancient binding, she begins to unlock the book's mysteries. The reader is ushered into an exquisitely detailed past, tracing the book's journey from its salvation back to its creation.
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Interesting story, great story concept
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When married off aged 12 to an elderly farmer, Eleanor Cornfed, who's constantly told to seek redemption for her many sins, quickly realizes it won't matter what she says or does, God is not on her side—or any poor woman's for that matter.
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Absolutely delightful
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Publisher's Summary
What if Elizabeth Macarthur – wife of the notorious John Macarthur, wool baron in early Sydney – had written a shockingly frank secret memoir?
In her introduction Kate Grenville tells, tongue firmly in cheek, of discovering a long-hidden box containing that memoir. What follows is a playful dance of possibilities between the real and the invented.
Grenville's Elizabeth Macarthur is a passionate woman managing her complicated life-marriage to a ruthless bully, the impulses of her own heart and the search for power in a society that gave her none - with spirit, cunning and sly wit.
Her memoir reveals the dark underbelly of the polite world of Jane Austen. It explodes the stereotype of the women of the past - devoted and docile, accepting of their narrow choices. That was their public face - here's what one of them really thought.
At the heart of this book is one of the most toxic issues of our times – the seductive appeal of false stories. Beneath the surface of Elizabeth Macarthur's life and the violent colonial world she navigated are secrets and lies with the dangerous power to shape reality.
Critic Reviews
"There is no doubt Grenville is one of our greatest writers." (The Sunday Mail)
"Kate Grenville is a literary alchemist, turning the leaden shadow of the historical Elizabeth Macarthur into a luminescent, golden woman for our times. Intelligent, compassionate, strategic and dead sexy, Grenville’s Macarthur is an unforgettable character who makes us question everything we thought we knew about our colonial past. A polished gem of a novel by a writer who is as brave as she is insightful. I simply loved it." (Clare Wright)
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What listeners say about A Room Made of Leaves
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Rodney Wetherell
- 25-08-2020
Splendid imagining of a woman's life.
I listened to this book shortly after The Dickens Boy by Tom Keneally, and could compare and contrast the two approaches to historical characters based on limited material. Both books are superb and entertaining. There were more 'external events' in The Dickens Boy, whereas Kate Grenville lets us see events purely through the eyes of Elizabeth Macarthur. Any woman with the misfortune to have married John Macarthur would deserve our pity, but Elizabeth finds ways of living semi-independently with this obstreporous man, partly by striking up a relationship with Mr Dawes. And she learns to manipulate her husband, up to a point. Kate Grenville has told her story with great sensitivity and skill.
Reader Valerie Bader does a sterling job throughout.
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7 people found this helpful
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- Julie Orton
- 03-08-2020
Not what I was expecting
I love Kate’s books and pre purchased this one but I was expecting something very different. Her usual touch and sense of humour is completely missing as is her special ability to create Aussie characters that resonate in time.
This book instead is a previously unpublished autobiography very slightly edited. It’s missing massive parts of the history of MacArthur and ends really abruptly.
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7 people found this helpful
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- Mary-Lou O'Brien
- 11-09-2020
Wonderful storyline full of historic references
As they say behind every great man is a woman rolling and her eyes and that is exactly the relationship between Mr & Mrs Macarthur. Kate Grenville has truly brought this historical character to life. Whilst the stories are fictional, the telling of the first interactions with the local indigenous communities tells a tale that needs to be told, and with sensitivity to both sides and I hope this book allows Mrs Macarthur's story of survival, resilience and courage to be told far more broadly than ever before.
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5 people found this helpful
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- Amazon Customer
- 17-11-2021
So Wrong
How can you write a work of fiction about real people,real places and real events. The writer basically demonizes John while an adulterous Elizabeth can do no wrong. Much more balance needed.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Linda Hopkins
- 27-02-2021
Like being there ....
I loved this book. Beautifully written and beautifully read. Amazingly descriptive. A real page turner. I was sorry when it ended.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Amy Lay
- 18-10-2020
Intriguing and engaging speculative history
Australian colonial history is predominantly about men. Men’s actions, men’s voices, and much of the primary source material obscures the stories of colonial women. Their letters were not personal so much as acts of PR.
Kate Grenville’s novel asks the question of what would a women write about these times if she knew she would have no audience until some time in the unknowable future. As Elizabeth MacArthur, the wife of John MacArthur of rum rebellion fame, Grenville paints an engaging and satisfying picture of life in a hostile land with a husband who can only really be described as a dick. It is a warm, captivating concept that is well executed. I’d recommend listening to it while out in the Australian bush for an even more immersive experience.
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2 people found this helpful
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- David Tubbs
- 07-06-2021
great read
Beautiful insight into the life of one of Australia's formative women. Easy to listen to.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Andrew
- 10-04-2021
Disappointing
I didn’t enjoy this book but persevered with it. Although it is a work of fiction I think it fails in its aims. The sensibilities, political correctness and guilt of today seep through the text giving an unrealistic gaze on the perspectives of the time. The voice of John Macarthur and his relationship with Elizabeth seemed to lack authenticity. This was further exacerbated by the reader whose pace and pronunciation of words became annoying.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Maureen H Knight
- 26-12-2022
A malevolent strike at character and history.
I hold this story in contempt. If there was an urge to tell this tale, why choose characters who lived? Far better to attach fictional relationships and events to fictitious folk.
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- Anonymous User
- 01-12-2022
Enjoyable on so many levels
I truly loved the hours spent listening to this Kate Grenville audio book. In short, It felt like the most honest, personal account of life in the early establishment of this nation I have ever heard or read. Even if liberties have been taken in writing it, it is a beautifully written story and one so very believable.
I have already told many about this book. Last year I listened to Always Greener which I also loved, such is the talent of Kate Grenville to bring people of history “back to life”.
The reader, also very talented, is easy to listen to and very appropriate for the story.
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- Gordon
- 29-09-2020
Historical fiction
Thoroughly enjoyable historical fiction, based on the life of Elizabeth MacArthur. I would recommend this book!
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- Paula Beavan
- 02-08-2020
Exquisite
There isn’t much more to say. So well written and researched. Not to mention relatable.
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