Try free for 30 days
-
Undue Influence
- Narrated by: Diana Quick
- Length: 8 hrs and 8 mins
Failed to add items
Add to basket failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from Wish List failed.
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Buy Now for $22.78
No valid payment method on file.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Listeners also picked
-
The Bay of Angels
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Eleanor Bron
- Length: 7 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Moving between Nice and London, The Bay of Angels makes the point that not everyone needs conventional relationships to be happy. It relates the story of Zoe, whose life changes when her widowed mother marries a wealthy older man and moves to Nice.
-
Strangers
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Stephen Thorne
- Length: 6 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Paul Sturgis is a retired bank manager who lives alone in a dark little flat. He walks alone and dines alone, seeking out and taking pleasure in small exchanges with strangers: the cheerful Australian girl who cuts his hair, the lady at the dry cleaners. His only relative - and only acquaintance - is a widowed cousin by marriage, herself a virtual stranger, to whom he pays ritualistic visits on a Sunday afternoon.
-
-
Loneliness
- By Amazon customer on 20-03-2022
-
Leaving Home
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Joanna David
- Length: 5 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When cautious Emma Roberts goes to France to carry out research into 17th century garden design, she finds a reliable diversion from her studies in her unlikely new friend Francoise Desnoyers, in whose beautiful house she is welcomed as a guest. She is not too dazzled to ignore the tensions that exist between Francoise and her formidable mother, or between Mme. Desnoyers and her other guests. London recedes into the background as life in France becomes more significant in every respect.
-
A Friend from England
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Cherie Lunghi
- Length: 6 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Rachel becomes involved in the lives of the Livingstones it is with an acute appreciation of their home - beautifully furnished and richly decorated. They have won an undisclosed amount of money on the football pools. But rather than enjoy their new-found wealth, seem sadly resigned to it. They do, however, appear to take pleasure in the association between Rachel and their daughter Heather, seeing Rachel as a good influence. However, no one can foresee their own destiny.
-
Fraud
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Anna Massey
- Length: 7 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Anna Durrant is reported missing her friends seem unconcerned at her disappearance. After all, her life has been one of concealment. For years Anna submitted to the protective dependence of her mother, and even after Amy Durrant’s death she simply conformed to the expectations of others. Increasingly, Anna feels herself trapped by these expectations.
-
-
Quintessential Brookner
- By Fiona Heylan on 24-04-2016
-
A Closed Eye
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Prunella Scales
- Length: 8 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Born to elegant but frivolous parents, Harriet grows up ignored and unguided, and retains a curious innocence that neither her marriage to Freddie Lytton, nor her friendship with the beautiful Tessa can dispel. Freddie is far older than she is - a companion rather than a lover - and slightly disapproving of Tessa and her irresponsible, attractive husband, Jack. Yet all four are bound together: by their backgrounds, their children, by Harriet’s unspoken feelings for Jack and by the tragedy that lies in wait for all of them.
-
The Bay of Angels
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Eleanor Bron
- Length: 7 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Moving between Nice and London, The Bay of Angels makes the point that not everyone needs conventional relationships to be happy. It relates the story of Zoe, whose life changes when her widowed mother marries a wealthy older man and moves to Nice.
-
Strangers
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Stephen Thorne
- Length: 6 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Paul Sturgis is a retired bank manager who lives alone in a dark little flat. He walks alone and dines alone, seeking out and taking pleasure in small exchanges with strangers: the cheerful Australian girl who cuts his hair, the lady at the dry cleaners. His only relative - and only acquaintance - is a widowed cousin by marriage, herself a virtual stranger, to whom he pays ritualistic visits on a Sunday afternoon.
-
-
Loneliness
- By Amazon customer on 20-03-2022
-
Leaving Home
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Joanna David
- Length: 5 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When cautious Emma Roberts goes to France to carry out research into 17th century garden design, she finds a reliable diversion from her studies in her unlikely new friend Francoise Desnoyers, in whose beautiful house she is welcomed as a guest. She is not too dazzled to ignore the tensions that exist between Francoise and her formidable mother, or between Mme. Desnoyers and her other guests. London recedes into the background as life in France becomes more significant in every respect.
-
A Friend from England
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Cherie Lunghi
- Length: 6 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Rachel becomes involved in the lives of the Livingstones it is with an acute appreciation of their home - beautifully furnished and richly decorated. They have won an undisclosed amount of money on the football pools. But rather than enjoy their new-found wealth, seem sadly resigned to it. They do, however, appear to take pleasure in the association between Rachel and their daughter Heather, seeing Rachel as a good influence. However, no one can foresee their own destiny.
-
Fraud
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Anna Massey
- Length: 7 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Anna Durrant is reported missing her friends seem unconcerned at her disappearance. After all, her life has been one of concealment. For years Anna submitted to the protective dependence of her mother, and even after Amy Durrant’s death she simply conformed to the expectations of others. Increasingly, Anna feels herself trapped by these expectations.
-
-
Quintessential Brookner
- By Fiona Heylan on 24-04-2016
-
A Closed Eye
- By: Anita Brookner
- Narrated by: Prunella Scales
- Length: 8 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Born to elegant but frivolous parents, Harriet grows up ignored and unguided, and retains a curious innocence that neither her marriage to Freddie Lytton, nor her friendship with the beautiful Tessa can dispel. Freddie is far older than she is - a companion rather than a lover - and slightly disapproving of Tessa and her irresponsible, attractive husband, Jack. Yet all four are bound together: by their backgrounds, their children, by Harriet’s unspoken feelings for Jack and by the tragedy that lies in wait for all of them.
Publisher's Summary
Undue Influence is the 19th novel by Anita Brookner, the Booker Prize-winning author of Hotel du Lac.
Enigmatic Claire is 30 and lives alone. When she meets Martin Gibson, a faded scholar, she becomes inordinately interested. She is even more interested when she meets his wife, a far more spectacular personality. But the unexpected news of this woman's death releases emotions that were not entirely foreseen.
Anita Brookner was born in South London in 1928, the daughter of a Polish immigrant family. She trained as an art historian and worked at the Courtauld Institute of Art until her retirement in 1988. She published her first novel, A Start in Life, in 1981 and her 24th, Strangers, in 2009. As well as fiction, Anita Brookner has published a number of volumes of art criticism.
Critic Reviews
"Her technique as a novelist is so sure and so quietly commanding." (Hilary Mantel, Guardian)
"She is one of the great writers of contemporary fiction." (Literary Review)
More from the same
What listeners say about Undue Influence
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Kirsten Rose
- 14-11-2021
Precise, poignant, elegant
Austere and intelligent, this is in my opinion one of Anita Brookner's better books. It is written with powerful, concise prose by a mind whose apprehension of human nature is like a steel trap. The reading by Diana Quick is elegant and well articulated. Her reading achieves beautiful expressiveness without being so overt as to detract from the pure enjoyment of the prose. That's rare. I enjoyed this audiobook at least twenty times until many of the phrases (which often seemed to have a prescience relevant to my own life) were etched into my memory.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful