Wolf Hall Audiobook By Hilary Mantel cover art

Wolf Hall

A Novel

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Wolf Hall

By: Hilary Mantel
Narrated by: Ben Miles
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This program is read by Ben Miles, who played Thomas Cromwell in the Royal Shakespeare Company adaptation of Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies.

Winner of the 2009 Man Booker Prize

Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction

A New York Times best seller

England in the 1520s is a heartbeat from disaster. If the king dies without a male heir, the country could be destroyed by civil war. Henry VIII wants to annul his marriage of 20 years and marry Anne Boleyn. The pope and most of Europe opposes him. Into this impasse steps Thomas Cromwell: a wholly original man, a charmer and a bully, both idealist and opportunist, astute in reading people, and implacable in his ambition. But Henry is volatile: one day tender, one day murderous. Cromwell helps him break the opposition, but what will be the price of his triumph?

In inimitable style, Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall is "a darkly brilliant reimagining of life under Henry VIII.... Magnificent." (The Boston Globe)

A Macmillan Audio production from Henry Holt and Company

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2009 Hilary Mantel (P)2020 Macmillan Audio Biographical Fiction Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction Renaissance Biography Heartfelt England War Middle Ages

Featured Article: The Best Historical Fiction Audiobooks


Often based on real people, events, and scenarios, historical fiction gives us the opportunity to learn about worlds and times we will never experience while introducing fascinating characters and stories set in their midst. Sometimes, the genre can even give us a peek into hidden storylines that routinely go unmentioned in traditional history books, showing us that those of ages past are perhaps not so different from ourselves.

Featured Article The Best Historical Fiction Audiobooks
Vivid Historical Detail • Complex Characters • Masterful Storytelling • Rich Language • Immersive Atmosphere
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The writing and the story is amazing but unfortunately I could here the reader/performer lick his lips, swallow and make throat notices through the entire book, it was off putting because it happened at a frequent and also jarring spots in the texts. I wish that had not been part of the performance, because it seemed like a device the reader used. I would definitely listen again but really hope they re-record this one!

Enjoyed this immensely but…

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Thoroughly researched, richly detailed, and never overdone in the writing, this was a great read start to finish. Mantel is more than equal to the insane challenge she undertook in chronicling this period of extraordinary intrigue in a way that really elevates the simple, banal humanness of an unbelievable number of figures from the history books. Her restraint is incredible - it would have been so easy to overdramatize any of these characters or events, but she masterfully permits each to speak for themselves through neatly recounted actions and a wealth of different perspectives captured in incisive, efficient dialogue. I cannot wait to read the next!

That said, I will be reading the next book. Despite high hopes for Ben Miles, who I usually love, I found the performance lacking sufficient nuance or emotion to distinguish the numerous characters weaving in and out of the story. While his voice was pleasant and pace energetic, he read almost every character with the same limited stiff upper-lipped emotional range, and, save for a few scattered accents and feminine affects, relied almost exclusively on a near constant lip-smacking and audible mouth-working to differentiate characters, eventually using the device completely indiscriminately, not only in dialogue but narration as well. The result is an at times tough to follow, misophonia-inducing listen that falls short of effectively carrying a work so fascinating in its own right it actually didn't need much vocal dressing. Although performing the multitude of characters in such a long read is unquestionably challenging, and it started off well, it seemed like he got bored and thirsty pretty quickly, making me wish for the end long before I reached it.

Great read, not my favorite Ben Miles performance

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Ben Miles is a revelation. His performance helped me keep the characters straight better than reading it on paper. Hilary Mantel is a wonder and will be dearly missed.

Excellent

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The book was interesting and I like the unique prospective by following Cromwell. However, if I had not been very familiar with the events of this time period I would have been lost and hated the story, so I would not recommend this book to someone that is not familiar with King Henry VIII story

Good

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Excellent in every way! Just make sure you have plenty of time to listen to it!

Simply amazing

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I was sitting in getting this book for a long time. Worried the subject would be quite dry, but boy was I wrong. The reading performance is top shelf and the writing is fantastic. I could hardly wait to get back to it and found myself annoyed when life I interrupted my listening. Wish I could hear it again for the first time!

Tremendous all around

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Enjoyed it all will follow the author on anything she writes

Great work done here

Jay Jay

Well done Hilary

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I love this story, and I even love the narrator - his voices, his accents... but there is no avoiding all of the noise coming from his mouth. I could only listen for short bursts before realizing that I didn't hear anything but mouth noises for the past few minutes and I'm getting angry. Can't this be edited, somehow???

Tough slog for someone with misophonia

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I love the Tudor period and am fascinated by the machinations of these people who had no trouble burning people, drawing and quartering, or severing the heads of “heretics”. And by heretics, I mean anyone who didn’t espouse the religion of the day (Catholicism or Protestantism)- depending upon who was the King or Queen at the time. Loved learning about Thomas Cromwell.

Interesting history of the folks behind the scenes

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I love English history! This book is very well written! The narrator, Ben Miles, is remarkable! I would recommend this audiobook especially because of Ben Miles! Loved it!

Truly outstanding narration!

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