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The Dark Flood Rises
- A Novel
- Narrated by: Anna Bentinck
- Length: 13 hrs and 21 mins
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Publisher's summary
Francesca Stubbs has a very full life. A highly regarded expert on housing for the elderly who is herself getting on in age, she drives restlessly round England.
Amid the professional conferences she attends, she fits in visits to old friends, brings home-cooked dinners to her ex-husband, texts her son, who is grieving over the sudden death of his girlfriend, and drops in on her daughter, a quirky young woman who lives in a floodplain in the West Country.
This dark and glittering novel moves back and forth between an interconnected group of family and friends in England and a seemingly idyllic expat community in the Canary Islands, where we also observe the flow of immigrants from an increasingly war-torn Middle East.
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In the spirit of Zoë Heller’s Notes on a Scandal and Tom Perrotta’s Mrs. Fletcher, an explosive and thought-provoking novel about the far-reaching repercussions of an illicit relationship between a young girl and a man 20 years her senior. Masterfully told from three diverse viewpoints - victim, perpetrator, and witness - Putney is a subtle and enormously powerful novel about consent, agency, and what we tell ourselves to justify what we do, and what others do to us.
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One of the greatest stories of all time!
- By Valarie on 06-17-20
By: Sofka Zinovieff
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Late in the Day
- A Novel
- By: Tessa Hadley
- Narrated by: Abigail Thaw
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Alexandr and Christine and Zachary and Lydia have been friends since they first met in their 20s. Thirty years later, Alex and Christine are spending a leisurely summer’s evening at home when they receive a call from a distraught Lydia: She is at the hospital. Zach is dead. In the wake of this profound loss, the three friends find themselves unmoored; all agree that Zach, with his generous, grounded spirit, was the irreplaceable one they couldn’t afford to lose. Inconsolable, Lydia moves in with Alex and Christine. The loss warps their relationships.
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It's all in the performance
- By RueRue on 02-08-19
By: Tessa Hadley
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The Night Ocean
- By: Paul La Farge
- Narrated by: Elisabeth Rodgers
- Length: 13 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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Marina Willett, MD, has a problem. Her husband, Charlie, has become obsessed with H. P. Lovecraft, in particular with one episode in the legendary horror writer's life: In the summer of 1934, the "old gent" lived for two months with a gay teenage fan named Robert Barlow, at Barlow's family home in central Florida. What were the two of them up to? Were they friends - or something more? Just when Charlie thinks he's solved the puzzle, a new scandal erupts, and he disappears.
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Frustratingly Uneven Due to Clumsy Plot Structure
- By Adam on 06-15-17
By: Paul La Farge
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Street Without a Name
- Childhood and Other Misadventures in Bulgaria
- By: Kapka Kassabova
- Narrated by: Emily Gray
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Kassabova was born in Sofia, Bulgaria, and grew up under the drab, muddy, gray mantle of one of communism’s most mindlessly authoritarian regimes. Escaping with her family as soon as possible after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, she lived in Britain, New Zealand, and Argentina, and several other places. But when Bulgaria was formally inducted to the European Union she decided it was time to return to the home she had spent most of her life trying to escape. What she found was a country languishing under the strain of transition. This two-part memoir of Kapka’s childhood and return explains life on the other side of the Iron Curtain.
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Good start, but ended up not liking the author
- By Giselle on 11-02-21
By: Kapka Kassabova
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How It All Began
- By: Penelope Lively
- Narrated by: Katherine Kellgren
- Length: 7 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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When Charlotte Rainsford, a retired schoolteacher, is accosted by a petty thief on a London street, the consequences ripple across the lives of acquaintances and strangers alike. A marriage unravels after an illicit love affair is revealed through an errant cell phone message; a posh yet financially strapped interior designer meets a business partner who might prove too good to be true.
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Wonderful and beautifully written
- By Molly-o on 02-15-12
By: Penelope Lively
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Clara Callan
- By: Richard B. Wright
- Narrated by: Anne Twomey, Joanna P. Adler
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Abridged
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Two sisters, small-town Ontario, 1934. Canadian author Richard Wright tells their story, from the ordinary to the extraoridinary with an eye for the commonplace and poignant sense of the larger undercurrents that change people's lives.
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charming intimate refreshing
- By L on 09-10-04
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The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
- A Novel
- By: Deborah Moggach
- Narrated by: Juliet Mills
- Length: 11 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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When Ravi Kapoor, an overworked London doctor, reaches the breaking point with his difficult father-in-law, he asks his wife: “Can’t we just send him away somewhere? Somewhere far, far away.” His prayer is seemingly answered when Ravi’s entrepreneurial cousin sets up a retirement home in India, hoping to re-create in Bangalore an elegant lost corner of England. Several retirees are enticed by the promise of indulgent living at a bargain price, but upon arriving, they are dismayed to find that restoration of the once sophisiticated hotel has stalled....
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Screenwriters Changed it for the Better
- By Carole T. on 06-05-12
By: Deborah Moggach
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The Museum of Innocence
- By: Orhan Pamuk, Maureen Freely (translator)
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 20 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Kemal, scion of one of the city's wealthiest families, is about to become engaged to Sibel, daughter of another prominent family, when he encounters Füsun, a beautiful shopgirl and a distant relation. Once the long-lost cousins violate the code of virginity, a rift begins to open between Kemal and the world of the Westernized Istanbul bourgeosie - a world, as he lovingly describes it, with opulent parties and clubs, society gossip, picnics, and mansions on the Bosphorus, infused with the melancholy of decay.
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one of the very best I've ever heard
- By Rebecca Lindroos on 03-06-10
By: Orhan Pamuk, and others
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Grief Cottage
- By: Gail Godwin
- Narrated by: Jacob York
- Length: 9 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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The haunting tale of a desolate cottage, and the hair-thin junction between this life and the next, from best-selling National Book Award finalist Gail Godwin. After his mother's death, 11-year-old Marcus is sent to live on a small South Carolina island with his great aunt, a reclusive painter with a haunted past. Aunt Charlotte, otherwise a woman of few words, points out a ruined cottage, telling Marcus she had visited it regularly after she'd moved there 30 years ago because it matched the ruin of her own life.
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Character story or ghost story ?
- By RueRue on 12-18-17
By: Gail Godwin
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Wait for Me!
- Memoirs
- By: Deborah Mitford Duchess of Devonshire
- Narrated by: Anne Flosnik
- Length: 14 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Deborah Mitford, Duchess of Devonshire, is the youngest of the famously witty brood that includes the writers Jessica and Nancy, who wrote when Deborah was born, "How disgusting of the poor darling to go and be a girl." Deborah's effervescent memoir chronicles her remarkable life, from an eccentric but happy childhood in the Oxfordshire countryside, to tea with Adolf Hitler and her controversially political sister Unity in 1937, to her marriage to the second son of the Duke of Devonshire.
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The last of the Mitford Sisters
- By Irene on 01-11-11
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The Red-Haired Woman
- A Novel
- By: Orhan Pamuk
- Narrated by: John Lee, Katharine Lee McEwan
- Length: 7 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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On the outskirts of a town 30 miles from Istanbul, a master well digger and his young apprentice are hired to find water on a barren plain. As they struggle in the summer heat, excavating without luck meter by meter, the two will develop a filial bond neither has known before - not the poor middle-aged bachelor nor the middle-class boy whose father disappeared after being arrested for politically subversive activities. The pair will come to depend on each other and exchange stories reflecting disparate views of the world.
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Drags On
- By T. Conrad on 10-25-17
By: Orhan Pamuk
What listeners say about The Dark Flood Rises
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Elizabeth W
- 06-25-24
A lyrical, expansive exploration of aging
Fran Stubbs, the book’s aging protagonist, is both relatable and exemplary in her no nonsense determination. I personally appreciate Drabble’s gentle — and not-so-gentle —prodding of the fundamental existential questions around living a life of meaning as one ages. Drabble’s skillfully weaves together the personal and the global existential crises of our times.
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- robin
- 01-03-18
A gentle telling
Of a aging woman and her life and relationships. The story is simple and relatable and the narration matches so well. I think this book will appeal to women over 55. I don’t usually make an age recommendation, but it seems appropriate here.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Sara
- 03-22-17
Life Observed By An Exceptional Writer
I love Margaret Drabble's writing and looked forward to the release of this latest title. Then unfortunately I read a terrible review of the book in the Sunday New York Times. The review sounded like an eighth grade book report riddled with plot spoilers and lists of what happens in the form of "and then"....followed by many more "and thens". You know the stuff--simply written I think to prove the reviewer had read the book. It all sounded so dreadful and depressing that I crossed the title off my "to be read" book list thinking I'd skip it. When it was released here on audible I wavered and decided to ignore the review and take the plunge. Gosh I'm really glad that I did.
This book is so thought provoking, so beautifully written, so expansive that I find it difficult to decide just where to start with this review. Filled with the contradictions, the conflicts and the complexity of everyday life the book presents an incredibly wide angled view. Using a web of connected characters Drabble teases apart the thorny topics of life lived, youth, aging and death. She uses the book to look at choices, decisions and random chance--really the vagaries of life. The improbability of how each life changes, develops over time and intertwines with others are key themes. In addition, hard life lessons and concepts of responsibility for ourselves and others are explored.
Just in case this all sounds too heavy handed be aware the book is also filled with beauty, art, color, friendship and family. There are wonderful descriptions of England and of the volcanic beauty of the Canary Islands. I was swept up by the characters, their histories, their thoughts and experiences. Drabble does a fantastic job of musing about all these deep concepts through her characters---adeptly using their actions and thoughts as vehicles. To me, the book wasn't preachy or lecturing. There are no quick and easy answers offered.
This to me is fiction at its best. Thoughtful, intelligent and written by a master. Simply fantastic and not to be missed. Be sure to put your thinking cap on first though--Drabble expects the reader to do a good bit of the work here. Trust me it's worth it. Extraordinary and superb.
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42 people found this helpful
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- Bruce Rerek
- 06-29-17
The Dark Flood Rises
Dame Drabble's work is a rare work of serious literature. She successfully wove narrative, history, and the mute subject of the gradual decline into death. I was often so moved by her unblinking descriptions of the indifference of existence that I had to place the book down and process emotions I had pushed away so deeply. She unflinchingly informs us that our sensibilities and connections to loved ones is so tenuous, but not without loving-kindness, concern, and humor. It has been a long time since I have read a book of such gravitas yet rendered like finding a cache of letters from one's grandparents.
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5 people found this helpful
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- J. L. Mahood
- 02-16-18
Very well written and insightful
This book delves into aging and death. Not the most cheerful book bei so well written. Good for a group to read together.
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1 person found this helpful
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- WellwithWood
- 01-25-18
View of Aging?
Narrator good; story dark, depressing; not a view of aging that projects hope or fulfillment.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Lori K.
- 04-14-17
Like a piano piece that evokes sentiments
I'm drawn to books with older protagonists lately, so when I saw this, I had to listen. While it is all about death and dying, it is not at all depressing. Poignant at times, but not gloomy. There were a lot of characters to keep track of, and I think listening makes that harder, but that didn't really matter so much. The main character of the book was really death and the many ways in which people think about it, fear it, welcome it, prepare for it, etc. I'd never heard of Margaret Drabble before. I'll be checking out more of her books. Narrator was excellent!
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12 people found this helpful
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- Ken Sailor
- 07-19-17
Thoughtful, Helpful, Entertaining
I loved this book. The perfect read for those of us over 60. Forces one to think dark thoughts we like to avoid.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Doggy Bird
- 09-28-23
EXCELLENT BOOK, NARRATOR and LISTENING EXPERIENCE
I have been listening to about 6 books a month this year for various reasons and this is one of the best audiobooks I have heard all year. First of all I am a HUGE fan of Margaret Drabble whose books I have been collecting for decades waiting for the opportunity to read them since few are available in audio. Finally having time to actually sit and hold a book in my hands this year I began with the Radiant Way and then The Needle's Eye. I hadn't planned to read one of her later novels so early in my journey as the Dark Flood Rises but when I came upon this audiobook I decided to give it a try and couldn't stop for the next three days! The narrator - Anna Bentinck - has a wonderful sense of the characters and really does a great job of pronouncing foreign words as well. The combination for this particular book is perfect as it is about a group of characters who are experiencing different aspects of aging in a few different locales and economic situations but are mostly very literate, cultured, and highly educated. Thus they use a lot of foreign words and even poetry in other languages and this can trip up narrators and interrupt the pace of a novel. I'm usually very picky about accents and was very impressed by Ms. Bentinck whose reading of this book leaves it at the very top of my list of audiobooks this year. The book itself is so well written and so compassionate - but it is not an easy or a jaunty book. It's about the complications of aging and death. But it is BEAUTIFUL and beautifully written and conceived. And now it is beautifully narrated as well. I tremendously enjoyed every minute of listening to it.
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- Silverthorne
- 06-04-17
A Work of Genius
This is a magical book, its magic rising from the genius of Margaret Drabble. Here she addresses the event that dares not speak its name in the trash heap of American culture--death. This is not a book for everyone: it's literature, with a rich vocabulary and numerous references to other writers, times, books, music, and art. Nothing much happens by way of plot, but the characters are complex, rich, and deeply drawn. And the portrayal of the ending of days, for the individual and the planet itself, is incomparable in its interweaving. A book for grownups, flawlessly narrated in just the right voice, an experience of the novel not to be missed.
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7 people found this helpful