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The Rain Before It Falls

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The Rain Before It Falls

By: Jonathan Coe
Narrated by: Jenny Agutter
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About this listen

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of The Rain Before it Falls written by Jonathan Coe, read by Jenny Agutter.

'What I want you to have, Imogen, above all, is a sense of your own history; a sense of where you come from, and of the forces that made you.'

Rosamund lies dying in her remote Shropshire home. But before she does so, she has one last task: to put on tape not just her own story but the story of the young blind girl, her cousin's granddaughter, who turned up mysteriously at her party all those years ago. This is a story of generations, of the relationships within a family - and of what goes to make a child."

©2019 Jonathan Coe (P)2019 Penguin Audio Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction

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No spoilers here. I like being surprised by the books and audio-books that I add to my library. My choices are very largely speculative and I avoid reading reviews in advance. ‘The Rain Before it Falls’ I selected, liking the mysterious title. That was all it took. The Jonathan Coe of ‘The Rotters' Club’ was not in evidence. What I read into was a deeply involving novel of a mystery of photographs and relationships that prompt the key narrator to explain them and most especially to describe them. It is all so sensitively done, and fundamentally affecting. After listening to the novel, you almost have false visual memories of each of the photographs, so well does Coe describe them. There are surprises, some horrors and above all the magnetic pull of the narrative. It led to my biggest surprise in the novel, which prompted the idea of an epilogue. This is not a long audio-book, belying its importance. It is performed with unfailing sensitivity, understanding and truth by Jenny Agutter. Listeners will find that the combination of performer and novel are as if made for one another. On the strength of this audio-book I bought three hard-copies to gift to friends. It is just that kind of book, that you want others to experience.

Unexpected, Rich, Involving and Rewarding

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Jenny Agutter read this evocative novel beautifully and it is a neat device for telling a story. Unfortunately the editors have jumped the recordings in such a way that some of
the chapters start immediately at the end of the previous one so there’s no chance to draw breath I think if you recording something like this you need to get it right

Editing issues

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