Prime logo Prime members: New to Audible?
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.
Twain's End  By  cover art

Twain's End

By: Lynn Cullen
Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
Try for $0.00

$14.95/month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $17.99

Buy for $17.99

Pay using card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.

Publisher's summary

From the best-selling and highly acclaimed author of the "page-turning tale" (Library Journal) Mrs. Poe comes a fictionalized imagining of the personal life of America's most iconic writer: Mark Twain.

In March of 1909, Mark Twain cheerfully blessed the wedding of his private secretary, Isabel V. Lyon, and his business manager, Ralph Ashcroft. One month later he fired both. He proceeded to write a ferocious 429-page rant about the pair, calling Isabel "a liar, a forger, a thief, a hypocrite, a drunkard, a sneak, a humbug, a traitor, a conspirator, a filthy-minded and salacious slut pining for seduction". Twain and his daughter, Clara Clemens, then slandered Isabel in the newspapers, erasing her nearly seven years of devoted service to their family. How did Lyon go from being the beloved secretary who ran Twain's life to a woman he was determined to destroy?

In Twain's End, Lynn Cullen reimagines the tangled relationships between Twain, Lyon, and Ashcroft as well as the little-known love triangle between Helen Keller; her teacher, Anne Sullivan Macy; and Anne's husband, John Macy, which comes to light during their visit to Twain's Connecticut home in 1909. Add to the party a furious Clara Clemens, smarting from her own failed love affair, and carefully kept veneers shatter.

Based on Isabel Lyon's extant diary, Twain's writings and letters, and events in Twain's boyhood that may have altered his ability to love, Twain's End explores this real-life tale of doomed love.

©2015 Lynn Cullen (P)2015 Simon & Schuster

What listeners say about Twain's End

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    11
  • 4 Stars
    8
  • 3 Stars
    8
  • 2 Stars
    3
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    14
  • 4 Stars
    6
  • 3 Stars
    4
  • 2 Stars
    3
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    10
  • 4 Stars
    5
  • 3 Stars
    7
  • 2 Stars
    4
  • 1 Stars
    0

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

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Peeking in the window

The featured woman is Samuel Clemens' secretary, Isabel V. Lyon. I enjoyed the opportunity to peek in the window on the people who visited Clemens at his various homes, especially Helen Keller. The love triangles were lovingly fleshed out. The descriptions of the places, people, interiors of homes, gowns, and activities were well done.

The narration was pleasing to hear. The different voices were distinct enough to follow along effortlessly.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Nasty Guy

If what Lynn Cullen wrote about Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) in her historical fiction is anywhere close to the real person, he was an awful narcissistic creature and it is not clear to me why a woman 30 years his junior would fall in love with him. I enjoyed the historic details of the people, places and clothes of the early 1900s.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful