The Second Sleep Audiobook By Robert Harris cover art

The Second Sleep

A novel

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The Second Sleep

By: Robert Harris
Narrated by: Roy McMillan
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About this listen

From the internationally best-selling author of Fatherland and the Cicero Trilogy - a chilling and dark new thriller unlike anything Robert Harris has done before.

1468. A young priest, Christopher Fairfax, arrives in a remote Exmoor village to conduct the funeral of his predecessor. The land around is strewn with ancient artifacts - coins, fragments of glass, human bones - which the old parson used to collect. Did his obsession with the past lead to his death?

Fairfax becomes determined to discover the truth. Over the course of the next six days, everything he believes - about himself, his faith, and the history of his world - will be tested to destruction.

©2019 Robert Harris (P)2019 Random House Audio
Historical Mystery Political Spies & Politics Suspense Thriller & Suspense Espionage Fiction

Critic reviews

“It should be enough that Robert Harris, in his earlier books, makes the lives of Cicero and Caesar even more fascinating, and brings to vivid life the citizens of ancient Rome and 1930’s Munich. With The Second Sleep he cracks open The Time To Come, making his new book a barnburner, leaving the reader wanting only one thing: more, please.” (Tom Hanks)

“In the tradition of A Canticle for Leibowitz, Harris presents an extraordinary and terrifyingly plausible vision of a post-technological future, a novel that’s at once an adventure story and a meditation on truth and faith. You’ll never look at your iPhone in quite the same way again.” (Emily St. John Mandel, author of Station Eleven)

“Ingenious.... The historical thriller hinges on an apocalyptic event and induces a shiver of dread in our present times.... When Harris is at his best - and here he is - he writes with a skill and ingenuity that few other novelists can match. In this case, the usual page-turning pleasures are joined by something else: a sense that, through his historical-futuristic setting, Harris has found a unique vantage point to comment on the present.” (William Skidelsky, The Financial Times)

What listeners say about The Second Sleep

Highly rated for:

Intriguing Premise Thought-provoking Story Excellent Narration Believable World-building Captivating Performance
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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Wasn't expecting the twists (No spoilers here)

Harris is probably best known for his well-crafted historical novels such as Munich, Pompeii, and The Cicero Trilogy. In Second Sleep, he exploits his skills with this genre, but with twists that, frankly, I never saw coming. Despite its Medieval setting, the book moves at an astonishing pace in a land of faith and inquisitions. With two of his very different books, Fatherland (my first introduction to his work) and Conclave, this ranks among my top three favourites from this dynamic writer.

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Love Robert Harris—not this time

Stick to his Cicero trilogy. This is a flat, limping read with a premise that could be interesting if there were characters to care about.

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    5 out of 5 stars
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Interesting

One reviewer was right, the end was foreshadowed and a bit obvious. Still worth listening to.

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

The shape of things to come? Seems likely to me.

Spoiler Alert: For those who have not read any reviews of this book, best to stop now.
For the others who know that the book is set some 800 years in the future: I can only say that the author has written a very believable book about what may happened when a society that is completely reliant upon technology for every day commerce deals with the fact that the technology fails for even a short time (e.g, four to five days).
The author makes a brief mention about the use of a bit coin technology to finance the world's economy. What happens to this ephemeral means of exchange if electric power is lost? A local grocery store near my home allows small deposits of coins to be converted into bit coins. To me this seems like a precursor of the tech bust of the early 2000.
The author, as always, conveys a sense of reality in his novels. The narrator makes the book come alive.
(As a precursor to ``The Second Sleep'' I recommend the novel ``Moon of the Crusted Snow' by Waubeshig Rice. Available on Audible. The book illustrates what the impact of failing ``modern conveniences'' (e.g. electricity, grocery deliveries, etc.) would have on a society that has only had these ``luxuries" for one or two generations. (Again, an excellent author coupled with captivating narration.)

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    2 out of 5 stars

Good Premise & Build Up. Crappy ending

Everything about the book was great except the ending. The minor cliches are ‘common storyteling tropes’ were well executed but it all fell apart at the end. Will not be reading author’s other works

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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

interesting future

Intesting take on rise of civiixzation after a collapse and speculation on how that might occur. As noted by others there is an abrupt ending which aswers some questions but is unsatisfying. Appears being made into limited series and will be inertesting to see if the story is altered for a more conclusive ending as was done in another similar genre story Station 11.

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

The story line had such promise.

The premise of the story was good...quite thought provoking...but ultimately the story didn't thrill.not recommended

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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Very good story, very weak ending

Robert Harris always knows how to tell a gripping story. The characters are good. The situations are interesting and the story is thought-provoking. However, the ending of this particular novel is not quite up to his standards. It feels unresolved. Otherwise, I enjoyed the novel very much, the narrator is very good and it really held my interest. A shame about the ending.

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    4 out of 5 stars

Ended too quickly with unresolved mysteries

This is a fun book with an excellent reading performance. a few of the major events seem to happen too hurriedly rapid; personality changes happening unnaturally quick . The ending was rather abrupt with some storylines unresolved, have the sense there will be a sequel.

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Well Crafted Story

Rather hedonistic in nature. We are left at the end to wonder—was there really a more advanced society that was destroyed by their own technologies? Given the ill stated circumstances under which we live at the present moment e.g., the Putin invasion of Ukraine and the authoritarian cloud that hampers Republican thinking, I fear we will destroy life as it was possible without the lowest heathens who selfishly lust after power!

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