Whales have always been the life-force of Angelus, a small town on the south coast of Western Australia. Their annual passing defines the rhythms of a life where little changes, and the town depends on their carcasses. So when the battle begins on the beaches outside the town, and when Queenie Cookson, a local girl, joins the Greenies to make amends for the crimes of her whaling ancestors, it can only throw everything into chaos.
The Turning
UNABRIDGED (10 hrs and 42 mins)
By Tim Winton
Narrated By Humphrey Bower, Caroline Lee
Overall
(17)
Performance
(9)
Story
(9)
Here are turnings of all kinds - changes of heart, nasty surprises, slow awakenings, sudden detours - where people struggle against the terrible weight of the past and challenge the lives they have made for themselves. Beautifully crafted, and as tender as they are confronting, these elegiac stories examine the darkness and frailty of ordinary people and celebrate the moments when the light shines through.
Karen says:
"It just got better and better"
Blueback
UNABRIDGED (1 hr and 27 mins)
By Tim Winton
Narrated By Stig Wemyss
Overall
(3)
Performance
(1)
Story
(1)
Abel Jackson loves to dive. He's a natural in the water. He can't remember a time when he couldn't use a mask and snorkel to glide down into the clear deep. Life is tough out at Longboat Bay. Every day the boy helps his mother earn their living from the sea and the land. It's hard work, but Abel has the bush and the sky and the bay to himself. Until the day he meets Blueback, the fish that changes his life. Blueback is about people learning from nature.
Diane Challenor says:
"Short but good ... enjoyed it"
Dirt Music
UNABRIDGED (11 hrs and 44 mins)
By Tim Winton
Narrated By Suzi Dougherty
Overall
(34)
Performance
(23)
Story
(26)
Georgie Jutland is a mess. At 40, with her career in ruins, she finds herself stranded in White Point with a fisherman she doesn't love and two kids whose dead mother she can never replace. Her days have fallen into domestic tedium and social isolation. Her nights are a blur of vodka and pointless loitering in cyberspace. Leached of all confidence, Georgie has lost her way; she barely recognizes herself.
Eva says:
"lively and moving story"
That Eye, the Sky
UNABRIDGED (4 hrs and 40 mins)
By Tim Winton
Narrated By Stig Wemyss
Overall
(1)
Performance
(1)
Story
(1)
Ort knows that the sky is watching. He knows what it means to watch. Things are terribly wrong. His father is withering away, his sister is consumed by hatred, his grandmother is all inside herself, and his mother, a flower-child of the 1960s, is brave but helpless. Then a strange man appears at their door. That Eye, the Sky is about love, about a boy's vision of the world beyond, about the blurry distinctions between the natural and the supernatural.
Cloudstreet
UNABRIDGED (12 hrs and 50 mins)
By Tim Winton
Narrated By Peter Hosking
Whispersync for Voice-ready
Overall
(109)
Performance
(61)
Story
(62)
Two rural families flee to the city and find themselves sharing a great, breathing, shuddering joint called Cloudstreet, where they begin their lives from scratch. For 20 years they roister and rankle, laugh and curse until the roof over their heads becomes a home for their hearts.
Jim says:
"Winton at his best"
Publisher's Summary
Night falls. In a lonely valley called the Sink, four people prepare for a quiet evening. Murray Jaccob sees a moving shadow in his orchard. Across the swamp, his neighbour Ronnie watches her lover leave and feels her baby roll inside her. And on the verandah of the Stubbses house, a small dog is torn screaming from its leash by something unseen. Nothing will ever be the same again.
"This is Winton at his most disciplined, most distilled - and its an unforgettable story, told with the simplicity that only a consummate artist can achieve." (Sun Herald)
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