Shrines of Gaiety
A Novel
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $23.40
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Jason Watkins
-
By:
-
Kate Atkinson
About this listen
NATIONAL BESTSELLER
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
The #1 internationally bestselling, award-winning author of Life after Life transports us to the dazzling London of the Roaring Twenties in a whirlwind tale of corruption, seduction and debts that have come due.
1926, and in a country still recovering from the Great War, London has become the focus for a delirious new nightlife. In the clubs of Soho, peers of the realm rub shoulders with starlets, foreign dignitaries with gangsters and girls sell dances for a shilling a time.
The notorious queen of this glittering world is Nellie Coker, ruthless but also ambitious to advance her six children, including the enigmatic eldest, Niven, whose character has been forged in the crucible of the Somme. But success breeds enemies, and Nellie's empire faces threats from without and within. For beneath the dazzle of Soho's gaiety, there is a dark underbelly, a world in which it is all too easy to become lost.
With her unique Dickensian flair, Kate Atkinson gives us a window in a vanished world. Slyly funny, brilliantly observant and ingeniously plotted, Shrines of Gaiety showcases the myriad talents that have made Atkinson one of the most lauded writers of our time.
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Homecoming
- By: Kate Morton
- Narrated by: Claire Foy
- Length: 17 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Adelaide Hills, Christmas Eve, 1959. At the end of a scorching hot day, a local deliveryman makes a terrible discovery. A police investigation is called, and the small town of Tambilla becomes embroiled in one of the most shocking and perplexing murder cases in the history of South Australia. Many years later and thousands of miles away, Jess is a journalist in search of a story. Having lived and worked in London for nearly two decades, she now finds herself laid off from her full-time job and struggling to make ends meet. Until a phone call out of nowhere summons her back to Sydney.
-
-
Loved the compelling audiobook version!
- By Melissas Bookshelf on 04-07-23
By: Kate Morton
-
Behind the Scenes at the Museum
- A Novel
- By: Kate Atkinson
- Narrated by: Pearl Hewitt
- Length: 12 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ruby Lennox begins narrating her life at the moment of conception, and from there takes us on a whirlwind tour of the 20th century as seen through the eyes of an English girl determined to learn about her family and its secrets.
-
-
Another Kate Atkinson multi-generational story
- By Satisfied Customer on 11-08-18
By: Kate Atkinson
-
The Women of Chateau Lafayette
- By: Stephanie Dray
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert, Emma Bering, Rachel L. Jacobs
- Length: 23 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An epic saga from New York Times best-selling author Stephanie Dray based on the true story of an extraordinary castle in the heart of France and the remarkable women bound by its legacy.
-
-
An absolute masterpiece of a book!
- By Kindle Customer on 05-15-21
By: Stephanie Dray
-
Normal Rules Don't Apply
- Stories
- By: Kate Atkinson
- Narrated by: Paterson Joseph
- Length: 5 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A dazzling collection of eleven interconnected stories from the bestselling, award-winning author of Shrines of Gaiety and Life After Life, with everything that listeners love about her novels—the inventiveness, the verbal felicity, the sharp observations on human nature, and the deeply satisfying emotional wallop.
-
-
Playful jigsaw puzzle of stories
- By ReallyNelie on 02-24-24
By: Kate Atkinson
-
Case Histories
- A Novel
- By: Kate Atkinson
- Narrated by: Susan Jameson
- Length: 10 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Case One: A little girl goes missing in the night. Case Two: A beautiful young office worker falls victim to a maniac's apparently random attack. Case Three: A new mother finds herself trapped in a hell of her own making - with a very needy baby and a very demanding husband - until a fit of rage creates a grisly, bloody escape.
-
-
Trippy book
- By mary on 01-20-09
By: Kate Atkinson
-
Life After Life
- A Novel
- By: Kate Atkinson
- Narrated by: Fenella Woolgar
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On a cold and snowy night in 1910, Ursula Todd is born to an English banker and his wife. She dies before she can draw her first breath. On that same cold and snowy night, Ursula Todd is born, lets out a lusty wail, and embarks upon a life that will be, to say the least, unusual. For as she grows, she also dies, repeatedly, in a variety of ways, while the young century marches on towards its second cataclysmic world war.
-
-
Strange & Fascinating
- By Sara on 11-02-15
By: Kate Atkinson
-
Homecoming
- By: Kate Morton
- Narrated by: Claire Foy
- Length: 17 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Adelaide Hills, Christmas Eve, 1959. At the end of a scorching hot day, a local deliveryman makes a terrible discovery. A police investigation is called, and the small town of Tambilla becomes embroiled in one of the most shocking and perplexing murder cases in the history of South Australia. Many years later and thousands of miles away, Jess is a journalist in search of a story. Having lived and worked in London for nearly two decades, she now finds herself laid off from her full-time job and struggling to make ends meet. Until a phone call out of nowhere summons her back to Sydney.
-
-
Loved the compelling audiobook version!
- By Melissas Bookshelf on 04-07-23
By: Kate Morton
-
Behind the Scenes at the Museum
- A Novel
- By: Kate Atkinson
- Narrated by: Pearl Hewitt
- Length: 12 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ruby Lennox begins narrating her life at the moment of conception, and from there takes us on a whirlwind tour of the 20th century as seen through the eyes of an English girl determined to learn about her family and its secrets.
-
-
Another Kate Atkinson multi-generational story
- By Satisfied Customer on 11-08-18
By: Kate Atkinson
-
The Women of Chateau Lafayette
- By: Stephanie Dray
- Narrated by: Tavia Gilbert, Emma Bering, Rachel L. Jacobs
- Length: 23 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An epic saga from New York Times best-selling author Stephanie Dray based on the true story of an extraordinary castle in the heart of France and the remarkable women bound by its legacy.
-
-
An absolute masterpiece of a book!
- By Kindle Customer on 05-15-21
By: Stephanie Dray
-
Normal Rules Don't Apply
- Stories
- By: Kate Atkinson
- Narrated by: Paterson Joseph
- Length: 5 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A dazzling collection of eleven interconnected stories from the bestselling, award-winning author of Shrines of Gaiety and Life After Life, with everything that listeners love about her novels—the inventiveness, the verbal felicity, the sharp observations on human nature, and the deeply satisfying emotional wallop.
-
-
Playful jigsaw puzzle of stories
- By ReallyNelie on 02-24-24
By: Kate Atkinson
-
Case Histories
- A Novel
- By: Kate Atkinson
- Narrated by: Susan Jameson
- Length: 10 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Case One: A little girl goes missing in the night. Case Two: A beautiful young office worker falls victim to a maniac's apparently random attack. Case Three: A new mother finds herself trapped in a hell of her own making - with a very needy baby and a very demanding husband - until a fit of rage creates a grisly, bloody escape.
-
-
Trippy book
- By mary on 01-20-09
By: Kate Atkinson
-
Life After Life
- A Novel
- By: Kate Atkinson
- Narrated by: Fenella Woolgar
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On a cold and snowy night in 1910, Ursula Todd is born to an English banker and his wife. She dies before she can draw her first breath. On that same cold and snowy night, Ursula Todd is born, lets out a lusty wail, and embarks upon a life that will be, to say the least, unusual. For as she grows, she also dies, repeatedly, in a variety of ways, while the young century marches on towards its second cataclysmic world war.
-
-
Strange & Fascinating
- By Sara on 11-02-15
By: Kate Atkinson
-
Transcription
- A Novel
- By: Kate Atkinson
- Narrated by: Fenella Woolgar
- Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1940, 18-year-old Juliet Armstrong is reluctantly recruited into the world of espionage. Sent to an obscure department of MI5 tasked with monitoring the comings and goings of British Fascist sympathizers, she discovers the work to be by turns both tedious and terrifying. But after the war has ended, she presumes the events of those years have been relegated to the past forever. Ten years later, now a radio producer at the BBC, Juliet is unexpectedly confronted by figures from her past. A different war is being fought now, but Juliet finds herself once more under threat.
-
-
A very satisfying two days!
- By Frances on 09-30-18
By: Kate Atkinson
-
The House at Riverton
- By: Kate Morton
- Narrated by: Emilia Fox
- Length: 20 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Summer 1924. On the eve of a glittering Society party, by the lake of a grand English country house, a young poet takes his life. The only witnesses, sisters Hannah and Emmeline Hartford, will never speak to each other again. Winter 1999. Grace Bradley, 98, one-time housemaid of Riverton Manor, is visited by a young director making a film about the poet’s suicide. Ghosts awaken and memories, long consigned to the dark reaches of Grace’s mind, begin to sneak back through the cracks. A shocking secret threatens to emerge – something history has forgotten but Grace never could.
-
-
Pleasantly surprised!
- By amber on 05-30-23
By: Kate Morton
-
The Cuckoo's Calling
- By: Robert Galbraith
- Narrated by: Robert Glenister
- Length: 15 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After losing his leg to a land mine in Afghanistan, Cormoran Strike is barely scraping by as a private investigator. Strike is down to one client, creditors are calling, and after a breakup with his longtime girlfriend, he’s living in his office. Then John Bristow walks through his door with a shocking story: His sister, the legendary supermodel Lula Landry - known to her friends as the Cuckoo - famously fell to her death a few months earlier.
-
-
Unbelievable debut mystery set in London
- By Tracey on 05-26-13
By: Robert Galbraith
-
Tom Lake
- A Novel
- By: Ann Patchett
- Narrated by: Meryl Streep
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.
-
-
So incredibly boring
- By Rhonda Morrison on 08-05-23
By: Ann Patchett
-
The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store
- A Novel
- By: James McBride
- Narrated by: Dominic Hoffman
- Length: 12 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1972, when workers in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, were digging the foundations for a new development, the last thing they expected to find was a skeleton at the bottom of a well. Who the skeleton was and how it got there were two of the long-held secrets kept by the residents of Chicken Hill, the dilapidated neighborhood where immigrant Jews and African Americans lived side by side and shared ambitions and sorrows. Chicken Hill was where Moshe and Chona Ludlow lived when Moshe integrated his theater and where Chona ran the Heaven & Earth Grocery Store.
-
-
Multiple Stories Obfuscate Narrative
- By Stephnsea on 08-12-23
By: James McBride
-
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
- By: John Boyne
- Narrated by: Michael Maloney
- Length: 4 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The story of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is very difficult to describe. Usually we give some information about the audiobook, but in this case we think that would spoil the listening. We think it's important that you start to listen without knowing what it is about.
-
-
Absolutely Phenomenal!!!
- By Jensophie on 05-04-09
By: John Boyne
-
London
- The Novel
- By: Edward Rutherfurd
- Narrated by: Andrew Wincott
- Length: 49 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Here is Edward Rutherfurd's classic novel of London, a glorious pageant spanning 2,000 years. He brings this vibrant city's long and noble history alive through the ever-shifting fortunes, fates, and intrigues of half-a-dozen families, from the age of Julius Caesar to the 20th century. Generation after generation, these families embody the passion, struggle, wealth, and verve of the greatest city in the world.
-
-
Do NOT buy on Audible
- By Diane Vanek on 06-19-18
-
What's Left of Me Is Yours
- A Novel
- By: Stephanie Scott
- Narrated by: Janet Song, Emily Woo Zeller
- Length: 11 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Japan, a covert industry has grown up around the wakaresaseya (literally "breaker-upper"), a person hired by one spouse to seduce the other in order to gain the advantage in divorce proceedings. When Satō hires Kaitarō, a wakaresaseya agent, to have an affair with his wife, Rina, he assumes it will be an easy case.
-
-
Excellent book
- By William Michael Dunn on 07-06-20
By: Stephanie Scott
-
The Book of Form and Emptiness
- A Novel
- By: Ruth Ozeki
- Narrated by: Kerry Shale, Ruth Ozeki
- Length: 18 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One year after the death of his beloved musician father, thirteen-year-old Benny Oh begins to hear voices. The voices belong to the things in his house—a sneaker, a broken Christmas ornament, a piece of wilted lettuce. Although Benny doesn't understand what these things are saying, he can sense their emotional tone; some are pleasant, a gentle hum or coo, but others are snide, angry and full of pain. When his mother, Annabelle, develops a hoarding problem, the voices grow more clamorous.
-
-
Good narrator, terrible voices
- By Geonn Cannon on 09-23-21
By: Ruth Ozeki
-
A Million Things
- By: Emily Spurr
- Narrated by: Zenia Starr
- Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For as long as Rae can remember, it's been her and Mum, and their dog, Splinter; a small, deliberately unremarkable family. They have their walks, their cooking routines, their home. Sometimes Mum disappears for a while to clear her head, but Rae is okay with this because Mum always comes back. So, when Rae wakes to Splinter's nose in her face, the back door open, and no Mum, she does as she’s always done and carries on. She tends to the house, goes to school, walks Splinter, and minds her own business - all the while pushing down the truth she isn't ready to face.
-
-
Beautiful and heartbreaking
- By Amazon Customer on 09-04-21
By: Emily Spurr
-
The Sweet Hereafter
- By: Russell Banks
- Narrated by: Dawn Harvey, Chris Andrew Ciulla, Dominic Hoffman, and others
- Length: 8 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Sweet Hereafter, Russell Banks tells a story that begins with a school bus accident. Using four different narrators, Banks creates a small-town morality play that addresses one of life's most agonizing questions: When the worst thing happens, who do you blame?
-
-
Read the book, see the movie
- By RueRue on 11-24-20
By: Russell Banks
-
Our Hideous Progeny
- A Novel
- By: C.E. McGill
- Narrated by: Florence Howard
- Length: 12 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The 1850s are a time of discovery, and London is ablaze with the latest scientific theories and debates, especially when a spectacular new exhibition of dinosaur sculptures opens at the Crystal Palace. Mary is keen to make her name in this world of science alongside her geologist husband, Henry—but despite her sharp mind and sharper tongue, without wealth and connections their options are limited.
-
-
Incredible
- By M on 07-19-23
By: C.E. McGill
Critic reviews
"Breathtaking. . . . A sprawling kaleidoscope of a novel—both giddy and glamorous, despite being rooted in squalor and violence. It's an impressive feat, one which Atkinson achieves with seeming effortlessness. . . . Shrines of Gaiety is truly a buffet of dark delights, all of it handled with Atkinson's light, deft touch." —Toronto Star
"I will read anything this woman writes. Kate Atkinson is simply one of the best writers working today, anywhere in the world. . . . She's a global treasure. . . . [Shrines of Gaiety] is set during Jazz Age London, in all its fizzy madness and desperation of the new, the better, the hustle. Atkinson has a magician's ability to switch a reader's mood within a few paragraphs, and as dark as her stories can get, within them always shines a beacon of humanity." —Gillian Flynn
"A sprawling picaresque. . . . Atkinson vividly conjures the post-Great War London of a century ago. . . . [A] tangible warmth suffuses her storytelling. . . . She remains a keenly sympathetic observer of human foibles, one who can sketch a character in one quicksilver sentence. . . . Light refreshment; a cocktail of fizz and melancholy, generously poured." —The New York Times
Related to this topic
-
Daughters of Eden
- By: Charlotte Bingham
- Narrated by: Kim Hicks
- Length: 13 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Daughters of Eden focuses on the lives and fortunes of four very different young women at the outbreak of the Second World War. Marjorie, left at a boarding school by her emigrating mother; plain Poppy, pushed into marriage with a mean-spirited aristocrat; Kate, despised by her father, but determined to prove herself; and man-mad Lily, who turns out to be the bravest of them all. That all of them are chosen to work undercover for the espionage unit at Eden Park is a surprise, not least to them.
-
-
An amazing book everyone should read.
- By XX on 09-11-05
-
Season of Darkness
- By: Maureen Jennings
- Narrated by: Tom Craig
- Length: 10 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Following the disastrous retreat of the British army from Dunkirk in 1940, England is plunged into a state of fear. The threat of a German invasion is real, and many German Nationals are interned in camps across the country. One such camp is on the ancient moor land of Prees Heath, near the small town of Whitchurch in Shropshire, where Tom Tyler is the sole detective inspector. Young women from all walks of life have joined the Land Army, to help desperate farmers keep the country fed. Then one turns up dead.
-
-
much better than average historical detective
- By connie on 09-30-12
By: Maureen Jennings
-
The Blind Assassin
- By: Margaret Atwood
- Narrated by: Margot Dionne
- Length: 18 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For the past twenty-five years, Margaret Atwood has written works of striking originality and imagination. In The Blind Assassin, she stretches the limits of her accomplishments as never before, creating a novel that is entertaining and profoundly serious. The novel opens with these simple, resonant words: "Ten days after the war ended, my sister drove a car off the bridge." They are spoken by Iris, whose terse account of her sister Laura's death in 1945 is followed by an inquest report proclaiming the death accidental.
-
-
Good book, TERRIBLE audio!
- By Whitney on 04-27-09
By: Margaret Atwood
-
Pietr the Latvian
- Inspector Maigret, Book 1
- By: Georges Simenon, David Bellos - translator
- Narrated by: Gareth Armstrong
- Length: 3 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The first audiobook which appeared in Georges Simenon's famous Maigret series, in a gripping new translation by David Bellos.Inevitably Maigret was a hostile presence in the Majestic. He constituted a kind of foreign body that the hotel's atmosphere could not assimilate. Not that he looked like a cartoon policeman. He didn't have a moustache and he didn't wear heavy boots. His clothes were well cut and made of fairly light worsted. He shaved every day and looked after his hands. But his frame was proletarian. He was a big, bony man.
-
-
Long live Maigret
- By Adeliese Baumann on 11-19-14
By: Georges Simenon, and others
-
Staying On
- By: Paul Scott
- Narrated by: Paul Shelley
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Tusker and Lily Smalley stayed on in India. Given the chance to return ‘home’ when Tusker, once a Colonel in the British Army, retired, they chose instead to remain in the small hill town of Pankot, with its eccentric inhabitants and archaic rituals left over from the days of the Empire. Only the tyranny of their imposing landlady threatens to upset the quiet rhythm of their days.
-
-
A Pleasant Meander
- By Ian C Robertson on 09-22-14
By: Paul Scott
-
The Man with a Load of Mischief
- A Richard Jury Novel, Book 1
- By: Martha Grimes
- Narrated by: Steve West
- Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the Man with a Load of Mischief, they found the dead body stuck in a keg of beer. At the Jack and Hammer, another body was stuck out on the beam of the pub’s sign, replacing the mechanical man who kept the time. Two pubs. Two murders. One Scotland Yard inspector called in to help. Detective Chief Inspector Richard Jury arrives in Long Piddleton and finds everyone in the postcard village looking outside of town for the killer - except for one Melrose Plant....
-
-
Love this series, but FYI
- By DCinMI on 03-29-14
By: Martha Grimes
-
Daughters of Eden
- By: Charlotte Bingham
- Narrated by: Kim Hicks
- Length: 13 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Daughters of Eden focuses on the lives and fortunes of four very different young women at the outbreak of the Second World War. Marjorie, left at a boarding school by her emigrating mother; plain Poppy, pushed into marriage with a mean-spirited aristocrat; Kate, despised by her father, but determined to prove herself; and man-mad Lily, who turns out to be the bravest of them all. That all of them are chosen to work undercover for the espionage unit at Eden Park is a surprise, not least to them.
-
-
An amazing book everyone should read.
- By XX on 09-11-05
-
Season of Darkness
- By: Maureen Jennings
- Narrated by: Tom Craig
- Length: 10 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Following the disastrous retreat of the British army from Dunkirk in 1940, England is plunged into a state of fear. The threat of a German invasion is real, and many German Nationals are interned in camps across the country. One such camp is on the ancient moor land of Prees Heath, near the small town of Whitchurch in Shropshire, where Tom Tyler is the sole detective inspector. Young women from all walks of life have joined the Land Army, to help desperate farmers keep the country fed. Then one turns up dead.
-
-
much better than average historical detective
- By connie on 09-30-12
By: Maureen Jennings
-
The Blind Assassin
- By: Margaret Atwood
- Narrated by: Margot Dionne
- Length: 18 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For the past twenty-five years, Margaret Atwood has written works of striking originality and imagination. In The Blind Assassin, she stretches the limits of her accomplishments as never before, creating a novel that is entertaining and profoundly serious. The novel opens with these simple, resonant words: "Ten days after the war ended, my sister drove a car off the bridge." They are spoken by Iris, whose terse account of her sister Laura's death in 1945 is followed by an inquest report proclaiming the death accidental.
-
-
Good book, TERRIBLE audio!
- By Whitney on 04-27-09
By: Margaret Atwood
-
Pietr the Latvian
- Inspector Maigret, Book 1
- By: Georges Simenon, David Bellos - translator
- Narrated by: Gareth Armstrong
- Length: 3 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The first audiobook which appeared in Georges Simenon's famous Maigret series, in a gripping new translation by David Bellos.Inevitably Maigret was a hostile presence in the Majestic. He constituted a kind of foreign body that the hotel's atmosphere could not assimilate. Not that he looked like a cartoon policeman. He didn't have a moustache and he didn't wear heavy boots. His clothes were well cut and made of fairly light worsted. He shaved every day and looked after his hands. But his frame was proletarian. He was a big, bony man.
-
-
Long live Maigret
- By Adeliese Baumann on 11-19-14
By: Georges Simenon, and others
-
Staying On
- By: Paul Scott
- Narrated by: Paul Shelley
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Tusker and Lily Smalley stayed on in India. Given the chance to return ‘home’ when Tusker, once a Colonel in the British Army, retired, they chose instead to remain in the small hill town of Pankot, with its eccentric inhabitants and archaic rituals left over from the days of the Empire. Only the tyranny of their imposing landlady threatens to upset the quiet rhythm of their days.
-
-
A Pleasant Meander
- By Ian C Robertson on 09-22-14
By: Paul Scott
-
The Man with a Load of Mischief
- A Richard Jury Novel, Book 1
- By: Martha Grimes
- Narrated by: Steve West
- Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the Man with a Load of Mischief, they found the dead body stuck in a keg of beer. At the Jack and Hammer, another body was stuck out on the beam of the pub’s sign, replacing the mechanical man who kept the time. Two pubs. Two murders. One Scotland Yard inspector called in to help. Detective Chief Inspector Richard Jury arrives in Long Piddleton and finds everyone in the postcard village looking outside of town for the killer - except for one Melrose Plant....
-
-
Love this series, but FYI
- By DCinMI on 03-29-14
By: Martha Grimes
-
Goodnight from London
- A Novel
- By: Jennifer Robson
- Narrated by: Saskia Maarleveld
- Length: 9 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the summer of 1940, ambitious young American journalist Ruby Sutton gets her big break: the chance to report on the European war as a staff writer for Picture Weekly newsmagazine in London. She jumps at the chance, for it's an opportunity not only to prove herself, but also to start fresh in a city and country that know nothing of her humble origins. But life in besieged Britain tests Ruby in ways she never imagined.
-
-
Light story
- By Bev Holdgate on 08-10-17
By: Jennifer Robson
-
After the War Is Over
- A Novel
- By: Jennifer Robson
- Narrated by: Lucy Rayner
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After four years as a military nurse, Charlotte Brown is ready to leave behind the devastation of the Great War. The daughter of a vicar, she has always been determined to dedicate her life to helping others. Moving to busy Liverpool, she throws herself into her work with those most in need, only tearing herself away for the lively dinners she enjoys with the women at her boardinghouse.
-
-
More romance than history
- By RueRue on 08-17-16
By: Jennifer Robson
-
Oscar Wilde and a Death of No Importance
- By: Gyles Brandreth
- Narrated by: Bill Wallis
- Length: 10 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
London, 1889. Oscar Wilde, celebrated poet, wit, playwright, and raconteur is the literary sensation of his age. All Europe lies at his feet. Yet when he chances across the naked corpse of sixteen-year-old Billy Wood, posed by candlelight in a dark stifling attic room, he cannot ignore the brutal murder. With the help of fellow author Arthur Conan Doyle he sets out to solve the crime - but it is Wilde's unparalleled access to all degrees of late Victorian life, from society drawing rooms to the underclass, that will prove the decisive factor in their investigation....
-
-
needs glue
- By connie on 11-13-11
By: Gyles Brandreth
-
Murphy's Law
- By: Rhys Bowen
- Narrated by: Nicola Barber
- Length: 7 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Molly Murphy always knew she'd end up in trouble, just as her mother predicted. So, when she commits murder in self-defense, she flees her cherished Ireland, under cover of a false identity, for the anonymous shores of late 19th-century America. When she arrives in New York and sees the welcoming promise of freedom in the Statue of Liberty, Molly begins to breathe easier. But when a man is murdered on Ellis Island, a man Molly was seen arguing with, she becomes a prime suspect in the crime.
-
-
Cream Puff Read
- By Jan on 12-19-13
By: Rhys Bowen
-
The Fire Rose
- By: Mercedes Lackey
- Narrated by: Kate Black-Regan
- Length: 13 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Accepting employment as a governess after hard times hit her family, medieval scholar Rosalind Hawkins is surprised when she learns that her mysterious employer has no children and only wants her to read to him through a speaking tube.
-
-
Great story, poorly presented
- By Che on 02-26-10
By: Mercedes Lackey
-
Mrs Queen Takes the Train
- By: William Kuhn
- Narrated by: Simon Prebble
- Length: 9 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
An absolute delight of a debut novel by William Kuhn - author of Reading Jackie: Her Autobiography in Books - Mrs Queen Takes the Train wittily imagines the kerfuffle that transpires when a bored Queen Elizabeth strolls out of the palace in search of a little fun, leaving behind a desperate team of courtiers who must find the missing Windsor before a national scandal erupts.
-
-
Can't believe how much I loved this story
- By analyzethis on 03-10-13
By: William Kuhn
-
The Postcard
- By: Leah Fleming
- Narrated by: Elaine Claxton
- Length: 13 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
2002, Australia. When Melissa discovers a postcard addressed to 'Desmond' among her recently deceased father's effects, she is determined to discover this person's identity and his relationship to her father. She soon embarks on a journey that will take her across oceans and into the past...
-
-
Meh
- By Summer Layne on 03-06-15
By: Leah Fleming
-
Maisie Dobbs
- Maisie Dobbs, Book 1
- By: Jacqueline Winspear
- Narrated by: Orlagh Cassidy
- Length: 9 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Maisie Dobbs got her start as a maid in an aristocratic London household when she was thirteen. Her employer, suffragette Lady Rowan Compton, soon became her patron, taking the remarkably bright youngster under her wing. Lady Rowan’s friend, Maurice Blanche, often retained as an investigator by the European elite, recognized Maisie’s intuitive gifts. The outbreak of war changed everything. Ten years after the Armistice, in the spring of 1929, Maisie sets out on her own as a private investigator, one who has learned that coincidences are meaningful, and truth elusive.
-
-
All ‘round tip top
- By nancy M on 01-10-23
-
Lights Out Liverpool
- By: Maureen Lee
- Narrated by: Maggie Ollerenshaw
- Length: 13 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As Britain stands alone against a monstrous enemy, the inhabitants of Pearl Street face hardship and heartbreak with courage and humour. The war touches each of them in a different way: for Annie Poulson, a widow, it means never-ending worry when her twin boys are called up and sent to France; Sheila Reilly's husband, Cal, faces the terror of U-Boat attacks; Eileen Costello is liberated from a bitter, loveless marriage when her husband is sent to Egypt.
-
-
Wonderful
- By Tansy Adderley on 10-03-18
By: Maureen Lee
-
The Mayfair Bookshop
- A Novel of Nancy Mitford and the Pursuit of Happiness
- By: Eliza Knight
- Narrated by: Ann Marie Gideon
- Length: 11 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
1938: She was one of the six sparkling Mitford sisters, known for her stinging quips, stylish dress, and bright green eyes. But Nancy Mitford’s seemingly dazzling life was really one of turmoil: with a perpetually unfaithful and broke husband, two Nazi sympathizer sisters, and her hopes of motherhood dashed forever. With war imminent, Nancy finds respite by taking a job at the Heywood Hill Bookshop in Mayfair, hoping to make ends meet, and discovers a new life.
-
-
Perfectly Voices, Upliftingly Fun
- By Syd Young on 04-15-22
By: Eliza Knight
-
The Perfume Collector
- A Novel
- By: Kathleen Tessaro
- Narrated by: Heather Wilds
- Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
London, 1955: Grace Monroe is a fortunate young woman. Despite her sheltered upbringing in Oxford, her recent marriage has thrust her into the heart of London's most refined and ambitious social circles. Then one evening a letter arrives from France that will change everything. Grace has received an inheritance. There's only one problem: she has never heard of her benefactor, the mysterious Eva d'Orsey. Told by invoking the three distinctive perfumes she inspired, Eva d'Orsey's story weaves through the decades, from 1920s New York to Monte Carlo, Paris, and London.
-
-
Unbearable Narration
- By D McKay on 08-05-15
By: Kathleen Tessaro
-
Call the Midwife
- A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times
- By: Jennifer Worth
- Narrated by: Nicola Barber
- Length: 12 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the age of 22, Jennifer Worth left her comfortable home to move into a convent and become a midwife in postwar London’s East End slums. The colorful characters she met while delivering babies all over London - from the plucky, warm-hearted nuns with whom she lived to the woman with 24 children who couldn't speak English to the prostitutes and dockers of the city’s seedier side - illuminate a fascinating time in history.
-
-
The best book I've listened to this year
- By Richard on 06-12-13
By: Jennifer Worth
What listeners say about Shrines of Gaiety
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Anonymous User
- 02-27-23
A One-Man Play in Your Head
Loved Jason Watkins’ performance, and a performance it was! I began to read this novel myself and lost interest but Watkins brought it to life. Perfect adaptation to a talking book.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!