AuthorGraham Norton
NarratorThe Author
Duration8h 45m
CategoriesAdult Fiction, Novels
PublisherHodder & Stoughton
VersionUnabridged
Compelling new novel of stigma and secrecy from Sunday Times best seller.
It is 1987, and a small Irish community is preparing for the wedding of two of its young inhabitants. They're barely adults, not so long out of school and still part of the same set of friends they've grown up with. As the friends head home from the beach that last night before the wedding, there is a car accident. Three survive the crash, but three are killed. And the reverberations are felt throughout the small town.
Connor, the young driver of the car, lives. But staying among the angry and the mourning is almost as hard as living with the shame and so he leaves the only place he knows for another life.
Travelling first to Liverpool, then London, by the noughties he has made a home - of sorts - for himself in New York.
The city provides shelter and possibility for the displaced, somewhere Connor can forget his past and forge a new life.
But the secrets, the unspoken longings and regrets that have come to haunt those left behind will not be silenced. And before long, Connor will have to meet his past.
Summer At the Comfort Food Cafe
Author: Debbie Johnson
Author Debbie Johnson
Narrator Dawn Murphy
Duration 9h 50m
The Comfort Food Cafe is perched on a windswept clifftop at what feels like the edge of the world, serving up the most delicious cream teas, beautifully baked breads and carefully crafted cupcakes. For tourists and locals alike, the ramshackle cafe overlooking the beach is a beacon of laughter, companionship and security - a place like no other, a...
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Author: Celeste Ng
Author Celeste Ng
Narrator Cassandra Campbell
Duration 10h 8m
Lydia is the favourite child of Marilyn and James Lee; a girl who inherited her mother's bright blue eyes and her father's jet-black hair. When Lydia's body is found in the local lake, James is consumed by guilt, and Marilyn, devastated and vengeful, is determined to hold someone accountable. But it's the youngest in the family - Hannah - who may b...
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Author: Graham Norton
Author Graham Norton
Narrator Graham Norton
Duration 7h 30m
Duneen is a quiet place, far enough from the big towns to have kept its own rhythms. Its residents include castdown policeman PJ who lives a lonely, uneventful life punctuated only by the next meal - until now; the beautiful and mysterious family of three spinster sisters each with their own secrets and sorrows; and of course, the town's gossip who...
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Author: Tsitsi Dangarembga
Author Tsitsi Dangarembga
Narrator Adenrele Ojo
Duration 11h 32m
Anxious about her prospects after leaving a stagnant job, Tambudzai finds herself living in a run-down youth hostel in downtown Harare. For reasons that include her grim financial prospects and her age, she moves to a widow's boarding house and eventually finds work as a biology teacher. But at every turn in her attempt to make a life for herself,...
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Author: Brandon Taylor
Author Brandon Taylor
Narrator Kevin R. Free
Duration 9h 25m
Almost everything about Wallace is at odds with the Midwestern university town where he is working uneasily toward a biochem degree. An introverted young man from Alabama, black and queer, he has left behind his family without escaping the long shadows of his childhood. For reasons of self-preservation, Wallace has enforced a wary distance even wit...
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Author: Douglas Stuart
Author Douglas Stuart
Narrator Angus King
Duration 17h 41m
This is the unforgettable story of young Hugh "Shuggie" Bain, a sweet and lonely boy who spends his 1980s childhood in run-down public housing in Glasgow, Scotland. Thatcher's policies have put husbands and sons out of work, and the city's notorious drugs epidemic is waiting in the wings. Shuggie's mother Agnes walks a wayward path: she is Shuggie'...
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Author: Curtis Sittenfield
Author Curtis Sittenfield
Narrator Carrington Macduffie
Duration 13h 58m
'Awfully opinionated for a girl' is what they call Hillary as she grows up in her Chicago suburb. Smart, diligent, and a bit plain, that's the general consensus. Then Hillary goes to college, and her star rises. At Yale Law School, she continues to be a leader- and catches the eye of driven, handsome and charismatic Bill. But when he asks her to ma...
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Author: Graham Norton
Author Graham Norton
Narrator The Author
Duration 8h 44m
Carol is a divorced teacher living in a small town in Ireland, her only son now grown. A second chance at love brings her unexpected connection and belonging. The new relationship sparks local speculation: what does a woman like her see in a man like that? What happened to his wife who abandoned them all those years ago? But the gossip only serves...
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Author: Graham Norton
Author Graham Norton
Narrator The Author
Duration 1h 37m
A new novel from the acclaimed author and broadcaster as part of Quick Reads 2022 and World Book Night. Helen is a retired teacher living on the Irish coast. She enjoys the peace and quiet—despite the burden of Margaret, her unpleasant sister. Margaret arrived three years ago for a short holiday but somehow managed to stay and worm her way in...
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Author: Graham Norton
Author Graham Norton
Narrator The Author
Duration 9h 6m
Always on the periphery, looking on, young Frankie Howe was never quite sure enough of herself to take centre stage - after all, life had already judged her harshly. Now old, Frankie finds it easier to forget the life that came before. Then Damian, a young Irish carer, arrives at her London flat, there to keep an eye on her as she recovers from a f...
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