The School of Night
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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Robert Petkoff
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By:
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Louis Bayard
About this listen
From Louis Bayard, an ancient mystery, a lost letter, and a timeless love unleash a long-buried web of intrigue that spans four centuries
In the late sixteenth century, five brilliant scholars gather under the cloak of darkness to discuss God, politics, astronomy, and the black arts. Known as the School of Night, they meet in secret to avoid the wrath of Queen Elizabeth. But one of the men, Thomas Harriot, has secrets of his own, secrets he shares with one person only: the servant woman he loves.
In modern-day Washington, D.C., disgraced Elizabethan scholar Henry Cavendish has been hired by the ruthless antiquities collector Bernard Styles to find a missing letter. The letter dates from the 1600s and was stolen by Henry's close friend, Alonzo Wax. Now Wax is dead and Styles wants the letter back.
But the letter is an object of interest to others, too. It may be the clue to a hidden treasure; it may contain the long-sought formula for alchemy; it most certainly will prove the existence of the group of men whom Shakespeare dubbed the School of Night but about whom little is known. Joining Henry in his search for the letter is Clarissa Dale, a mysterious woman who suffers from visions that only Henry can understand. In short order, Henry finds himself stumbling through a secretive world of ancient perils, caught up in a deadly plot, and ensnared in the tragic legacy of a forgotten genius.
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Editorial reviews
In The School of Night, author Louis Bayard weaves together two stories with similar themes love, death, and the search for something of value but very different characters and settings: Elizabethan scholar Henry Cavendish in present-day Washington, D.C., and scientist Thomas Harriot in London during the reign of King James I. While the two men trade off narration duties, reader Robert Petkoff brings both Henry and Thomas and all of their associates into brilliant focus.
After Henry’s friend Alonzo Wax commits suicide, a collector asks Henry to help him retrieve an antique letter that was in Wax’s possession. The letter could break open the secrets of the ancient School of Night, a hush-hush meeting of the minds that allowed scholars to discuss religion, politics, and other taboo subjects without the Court discovering them, and could also lead to a long-lost buried treasure. Henry agrees to help, and finds himself in cahoots with Clarissa Dale another one of Alonzo’s friends who has been having visions that may be connected to the mysterious School. In the parallel story, Thomas (one of the members of the School of Night) is falling in love with his servant girl, a young woman with a passion for alchemy, while the plague makes its way steadily toward London.
Petkoff creates two distinct narrators for the book, giving both Henry and Thomas their own careful accents, emotional depth, and individual personalities, while illustrating the emotions that remain a constant from generation to generation love, ambition, fear, and grief. And while the story’s twists and turns don’t always come as a shock, it’s Petkoff’s expert performance that allows the intrigue and drama to span several centuries and bring the story to its emotional ending. Blythe Copeland
Critic reviews
“Fascinating…A few codes and cryptograms are all you need to get caught up in an enigmatic mystery like The School of Night.” —The New York Times Book Review
“Exhilarating…Bayard adds twist after satisfying twist... At its heart, The School of Night illuminates a glimpse into legend, assuring readers that this ancient classroom offered a curriculum heavy on secrets.” —The Washington Post
“Rich and rewarding...Mr. Bayard writes seamless prose and conjures the past with credibility.” —The Wall Street Journal
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Story
Mad scientists have never had it so tough. In super-hero comics, graphic novels, films, TV series, video games, and even works of what may be fiction, they are besieged by those who stand against them, devoid of sympathy for their irrational, megalomaniacal impulses to rule, destroy, or otherwise dominate the world as we know it. It’s just not fair. So those of us who are so twisted and sick that we love mad scientists have created this guide.
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HAND DANCING
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 05-30-15
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Stories
- All-New Tales
- By: Neil Gaiman - author/editor, Al Sarrantonio - editor, Joe Hill, and others
- Narrated by: Anne Bobby, Jonathan Davis, Katherine Kellgren, and others
- Length: 18 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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The best stories pull readers in and keep them turning the pages, eager to discover more—to find the answer to the question: "And then what happened?" The true hallmark of great literature is great imagination, and as Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio prove with this outstanding collection, when it comes to great fiction, all genres are equal.
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Something for Everyone
- By Nicole on 05-24-17
By: Neil Gaiman - author/editor, and others
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A Most Extraordinary Pursuit
- By: Juliana Gray
- Narrated by: Nicola Barber
- Length: 11 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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February, 1906. As the personal secretary of the recently departed duke of Olympia - and a woman of scrupulous character - Miss Emmeline Rose Truelove never expected her duties to involve steaming through the Mediterranean on a private yacht, under the prodigal eye of one Lord Silverton, the most charmingly corrupt bachelor in London. But here they are, improperly bound on a quest to find the duke's enigmatic heir, current whereabouts unknown. Maximilian Haywood was last seen at an archaeological dig on the island of Crete.
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This Book Would Have Been A Hot Mess...
- By Alexis on 10-06-16
By: Juliana Gray
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The Book of Magic
- By: Gardner Dozois - editor, Scott Lynch, Elizabeth Bear, and others
- Narrated by: Karissa Vacker, Sile Bermingham, Maxwell Caulfield, and others
- Length: 24 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Hot on the heels of Gardner Dozois's acclaimed anthology The Book of Swords comes this companion volume devoted to magic. How could it be otherwise? For every Frodo, there is a Gandalf... and a Saruman. For every Dorothy, a Glinda... and a Wicked Witch of the West. What would Harry Potter be without Albus Dumbledore... and Severus Snape? Figures of wisdom and power, possessing arcane, often forbidden knowledge, wizards and sorcerers are shaped - or misshaped - by the potent magic they seek to wield.
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some stinkers mostly good
- By M.T. on 12-11-18
By: Gardner Dozois - editor, and others
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The Monstrumologist
- By: Rick Yancey
- Narrated by: Steven Boyer
- Length: 11 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Dr. Warthrop is a scientist who tracks and studies real-life monsters. Assisted by his 12-year-old apprentice, Will Henry, Dr. Warthrop discovers a pod of Anthropophagi and launches a hunt to destroy the foul beasts.
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Reader Be Warned
- By Eddie on 01-25-15
By: Rick Yancey
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Tea with the Black Dragon
- Black Dragon, Book 1
- By: R. A. MacAvoy
- Narrated by: Megan Hayes
- Length: 5 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Martha Macnamara knows that her daughter, Elizabeth, is in trouble; she just doesn't know what kind. Mysterious phone calls from San Francisco at odd hours of the night are the only contact she has had with Elizabeth for years. Now, Elizabeth has sent her a plane ticket and reserved a room for her at San Francisco's most luxurious hotel. Yet she has not tried to contact Martha since she arrived, leaving her lonely, confused, and a little bit worried. Into the story steps Mayland Long, a distinguished-looking and wealthy Chinese man who lives at the hotel and is drawn to Martha's good nature and ability to pinpoint the truth of a matter.
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My favorite dragon book
- By Ellenaeddy on 08-08-15
By: R. A. MacAvoy
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Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories
- By: Kelly Link - editor, Gavin J. Grant - editor
- Narrated by: Sarah Coomes, Nico Evers-Swindell, Shannon McManus, and others
- Length: 12 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Imagine an alternate universe where romance and technology reign. Where tinkerers and dreamers craft and recraft a world of automatons, ornate clockworks, calculating machines, and other marvels that. Where scientists and schoolgirls, fair folk and Romans, intergalactic bandits, and intrepid orphans - decked out in corsets, clockwerk suits, and tall black boots - solve dastardly crimes, escape from monstrous predicaments, consult oracles, and hover over volcanoes in steam-powered airships.
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MMMM, Orca Bacon
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 09-14-13
By: Kelly Link - editor, and others
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Haunted Ground
- By: Erin Hart
- Narrated by: Jennifer McMahon
- Length: 12 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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When farmers cutting turf in an Irish peat bog make a grisly discovery, the perfectly intact body of a young woman with long red hair, archaeologist Cormac O'Callaghan and pathologist Nora Gavin are thrown together by their shared scientific interest in human remains. Because of the preservative effect of the bog, it is difficult to tell whether the body has lain there for two decades, two centuries, or two millennia.
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Mysteries old and mysteries new
- By Linda on 11-25-03
By: Erin Hart
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Angelmaker
- By: Nick Harkaway
- Narrated by: Daniel Weyman
- Length: 18 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Joe Spork repairs clocks, a far cry from his late father, a flashy London gangster. But when Joe fixes one particularly unusual device, his life is suddenly upended. Joe's client, Edie Banister, is more than just a kindly old lady - she's a former superspy. And the device? It's a 1950s doomsday machine. And having triggered it, Joe now faces the wrath of both the government and a diabolical South Asian dictator, Edie's old arch-nemesis.
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A cure for the modern cynic
- By Maine Colonial 🌲 on 08-28-12
By: Nick Harkaway
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Instruments of Darkness
- A Novel
- By: Imogen Robertson
- Narrated by: Wanda McCaddon
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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In the year 1780, Harriet Westerman, the willful mistress of a country manor in Sussex, finds a dead man on her grounds with a ring bearing the crest of Thornleigh Hall in his pocket. Not one to be bound by convention or to shy away from adventure, she recruits a reclusive local anatomist named Gabriel Crowther to help her find the murderer, and historical suspense's newest investigative duo is born.
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Not The Best, But Not Too Bad...
- By MJ on 01-13-13
By: Imogen Robertson
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The Damnation Game
- By: Clive Barker
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 16 hrs
- Unabridged
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Marty Strauss, a gambling addict recently released from prison, is hired to be the personal bodyguard of Joseph Whitehead, one of the wealthiest men in the world. The job proves more complicated and dangerous than he thought, however, as Marty soon gets caught up in a series of supernatural events involving Whitehead, his daughter (who is a heroin addict), and a devilish man named Mamoulian, with whom Whitehead made a Faustian bargain many years earlier, during World War II.
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Damned If You Do
- By Wag The Fox on 04-05-14
By: Clive Barker
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Lost in Translation
- By: Nicole Mones
- Narrated by: Angela Lin
- Length: 14 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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A novel of searing intelligence and startling originality, Lost in Translation heralds the debut of a unique new voice on the literary landscape. Nicole Mones creates an unforgettable story of love and desire, of family ties and human conflict, and of one woman's struggle to lose herself in a foreign land - only to discover her home, her heart, herself.
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Absolutely fascinating!
- By Brendan on 10-16-10
By: Nicole Mones
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The Secrets She Carried
- By: Barbara Davis
- Narrated by: Tiffany Morgan
- Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Though Peak Plantation has been in her family for generations, Leslie Nichols can't wait to rid herself of the farm left to her by her estranged grandmother Maggie. But Leslie isn't the only one with a claim to Peak. Jay Davenport, Peak's reclusive caretaker, has his own reasons for holding onto the land bequeathed to him by Leslie's grandmother. Before she died, Maggie hinted at a terrible secret surrounding Adele Laveau, a lady's maid who came to Peak during the 1930s and died under mysterious circumstances.
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Best book of the year
- By Joanne Tailele on 10-08-18
By: Barbara Davis
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Darling Jim
- A Novel
- By: Christian Moerk
- Narrated by: Stephen Hoye, Justine Eyre
- Length: 10 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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When two sisters and their aunt are found dead in their suburban Dublin home, it seems that the secret behind their untimely demise will never be known. But then Niall, a young mailman, finds a mysterious diary in the post office's dead-letter bin. From beyond the grave, Fiona Walsh shares the most tragic love story he's ever heard---and her tale has only just begun.
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Great Story
- By Book Worm on 05-28-09
By: Christian Moerk
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Mr. Fox
- A Novel
- By: Helen Oyeyemi
- Narrated by: Carol Boyd
- Length: 8 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Fairy-tale romances end with a wedding and the fairy tales don't get complicated. In this book, celebrated writer Mr. Fox can't stop himself from killing off the heroines of his novels, and neither can his wife, Daphne. It's not until Mary, his muse, comes to life and transforms him from author into subject that his story begins to unfold differently....
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A Great Novel, just Poor for Audio
- By James A. Dittes on 08-13-16
By: Helen Oyeyemi
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Made me dislike the former Pres
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It's the Christmas season, and Mr. Timothy Cratchit, not the pious child the world thought he was, has just buried his father. He's also struggling to bury his past as a cripple and shed his financial ties to his benevolent "Uncle" Ebenezer by losing himself in the thick of London's underbelly. He boards at a brothel in exchange for teaching the mistress how to read and spends his nights dredging the Thames for dead bodies and the treasures in their pockets.
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New Favorite!!
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In September of 1892, Oscar Wilde and his family retreated to the idyllic Norfolk countryside for a holiday. His wife, Constance, has every reason to be happy: two beautiful sons, a stellar reputation as an advocate for progressive causes, and a delightfully charming and affectionate husband and father, who is perhaps the most famous man in England. But as an assortment of houseguests arrive, including an aristocratic young wannabe poet named Lord Alfred Douglas, Constance gradually—and then all at once—comes to see that her husband's heart is elsewhere.
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Another Great Bayard Historical Fiction Classic
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Courting Mr. Lincoln
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When Mary Todd meets Abraham Lincoln in Springfield in the winter of 1840, he is on no one's shortlist to be president. Rough and reticent, he's a country lawyer lacking money and manners, living above a dry goods shop, but with a gift for oratory. Mary, a quick, self-possessed debutante with a tireless interest in debates and elections, at first finds him an enigma. "I can only hope," she tells his roommate, the handsome, charming Joshua Speed, "that his waters being so very still, they also run deep."
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Very Entertaining
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Could not get through it
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Another Great Bayard Historical Fiction Classic
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What listeners say about The School of Night
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
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- Christopher Yates
- 04-18-23
Good, but not great
A bit formulaic and at times uninteresting, but enough mystery and historical flourish that it made me want to finish. Glad I did. A good story, but not great. The performance was very good. Made the characters seem more than one-dimensional.
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- Vanessa W
- 01-28-23
Great story by an excellent author
Overall, great story that follows this author’s overall method. After reading previous books, I am always excited for the plot twist at the end
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- The Rev. Craig
- 04-10-11
Excellent 2 period piece.
Okay. I loved The Black Tower so I scooped this one up. I won't give a synopsis. I never do.
I gave the School of Night 4 stars because it has all the best of suspense thriller, yet comes up a bit short. You can't rate a book in half stars, but I'd give it 4 1/2 . The action takes place in the present day and 400 years or so in the past. The Elizabethan/Jacobean part was excellent and complete. The modern part wasn't as finished as that. The denouement needed a bit more of an episodic lead up and the ending felt contrived - it also needed more lead up. It was there, but shallow.
HOWEVER - if you liked The Black Tower or Ghostwalk by Rebecca Stott you will certainly enjoy this book.
I thought it thin in the places I mentioned, but overall it is a great listen and I couldn't put it down.
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14 people found this helpful
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- Calliope
- 05-31-17
A disappointed fan
I really enjoyed the other Louis Bayard books I've listened to, but this one was a real disappointment. The story was muddied and the characters not terribly interesting.....all in all, it wasn't up to the quality that I had come to expect from Bayard given my earlier experiences.
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3 people found this helpful