Preview

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.

Cranford

By: Elizabeth Gaskell
Narrated by: Wanda McCaddon
Try for $0.00

$14.95/month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $14.61

Buy for $14.61

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

Cranford, Elizabeth Gaskell's best-known work, is a humorous account of a nineteenth-century English village dominated by a group of genteel but modestly circumstanced women. This is a community that runs on cooperation and gossip, at the very heart of which are the daughters of the former rector: Miss Deborah Jenkyns and her sister, Miss Matty. But domestic peace is constantly threatened in the form of financial disaster, imagined burglaries, tragic accidents, and the reappearance of long-lost relatives.

By eschewing the conventional marriage plot with its nubile heroines and focusing instead on a group of middle-aged and elderly spinsters, Gaskell does something highly unusual within the novel genre. Through her masterful management of the novel's tone, she underscores the value and dignity of single women's lives even as she causes us to laugh at her characters' foibles. Charles Dickens was the first of many readers to extol its wit and charm, and it has consistently been Gaskell's most popular work.

Public Domain (P)2010 Tantor
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

What listeners say about Cranford

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    170
  • 4 Stars
    100
  • 3 Stars
    53
  • 2 Stars
    21
  • 1 Stars
    7
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    195
  • 4 Stars
    80
  • 3 Stars
    24
  • 2 Stars
    8
  • 1 Stars
    1
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    149
  • 4 Stars
    82
  • 3 Stars
    54
  • 2 Stars
    17
  • 1 Stars
    7

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

Delightful

This is a lovely, cozy story and the narrator did a wonderful job. Definitely recommend.

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
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

A warm and funny book

A warm and funny book about a small town in Victorian England peopled with people we all know. Delightful!!

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

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

A Classic but…

I enjoyed other Elizabeth Gaskell novels Wives and Daughters, North and South and Ruth. But this is not my cup of tea, I appreciate a novel without the marriage plot but it makes me sad that for so many single women their lives were so limited. I am encouraged that society has broadened the opportunities for women and it was worth the read as a Gaskell fan.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

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

when you've run out of Austen

Mrs Gaskell will keep you going until it's time to reread. Charming, funny, tragic. Terrific narrator.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

2 people found this helpful

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

delightful

love this gem. a delightful, funny, heart warming, and tearful story about characters you come to care about. Elizabeth Gaskill's diamond.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

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

Wat 😶

I think this is the kind of book that is best read and not heard. I had a hard time following it. -well at least for me. I'm this way with Jane Austen and Dickens. Unless I already know the story, it's hard to understand the scene.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

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

Struggled to engage with narration

I stopped ‘listening’ half way through. The story is delightful and I’m contemplating paying for the version narrated by the actress Prunella Scales (sample is terrific). This version didn’t hold my attention. My mind kept drifting away. When I tried harder to concentrate on it I just got bored. It’s not bad. Just not for me.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

2 people found this helpful

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

Enjoyable, low-key, but enjoyable

Each chapter tells its story and expands the comforts of the community. Life is good in Cranford.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

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

Very good narrator

I didn’t have any issues with the narration. I thought the entire thing was just as it should be. I’m sure a polished actor would make it that much better but as it stands, it’s a perfectly fine piece.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

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

Read the reviews first! ;)

I was in a hurry to get into this book as I was in a deadline for bookgroup... if I'd understood it was originally written as vignettes for a serial column in a magazine I might not have been as confused. Having now discussed it, I will enjoy it much more the second time ;)

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

9 people found this helpful