How It All Began Audiobook By Penelope Lively cover art

How It All Began

A Novel

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When Charlotte is mugged and breaks her hip, her daughter, Rose, cannot accompany her employer, Lord Peters, to Manchester, which means his niece, Marion, has to go instead, which means she sends a text to her lover which is intercepted by his wife, which is…just the beginning of the ensuing chain of life-altering events.

In this engaging, utterly absorbing and brilliantly told novel, Penelope Lively shows us how one random event can cause marriages to fracture and heal themselves, opportunities to appear and disappear, lovers who might never have met to find each other, and entire lives to become irrevocably changed.

©2011 Penelope Lively (P)2012 Isis Publishing Ltd Literary Fiction Marriage Fiction Genre Fiction

Critic reviews

" Whatever your age, How It All Began is a splendid tonic." ( Telegraph)
"A sublime storyteller." ( Guardian)
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Most relevant
To begin with Anna Bentinck could read the telephone directory and I would probably listen more than once.Her reading is nothing short of extraordinary. 10**********.
This is the first book that I have read written by Penelope Lively.
I know it’s a cliché but I really couldn’t put it down. Anton learning to read,Rose’s husband trying to mend things. Henry reminding me of Mr Cazabon in George Eliot’s Middlemarch.This disparate group of characters leapt off the page. I was deeply moved and will probably listen to it again.

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