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Ancestry

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Ancestry

By: Simon Mawer
Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
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About this listen

The past is another country and we are all its exiles. Banished forever, we look back in fascination and wonder at this mysterious land. Who were the people who populated it?

Almost two hundred years ago, Abraham, an illiterate urchin, scavenges on a Suffolk beach and dreams of running away to sea... Naomi, a seventeen-year-old seamstress, sits primly in a second class carriage on the train from Sussex to London and imagines a new life in the big city... George, a private soldier of the 50th Regiment of Foot, marries his Irish bride, Annie, in the cathedral in Manchester and together they face married life under arms. Now these people exist only in the bare bones of registers and census lists but they were once real enough. They lived, loved, felt joy and fear, and ultimately died. But who were they? And what indissoluble thread binds them together?

Simon Mawer's compelling and original novel puts flesh on our ancestors' bones to bring them to life and give them voice. He has created stories that are gripping and heart-breaking, from the squalor and vitality of Dickensian London to the excitement of seafaring in the last days of sail and the horror of the trenches of the Crimea. There is birth and death; there is love, both open and legal but also hidden and illicit. Yet the thread that connects these disparate figures is something that they cannot have known—the unbreakable bond of family.

©2022 Simon Mawer (P)2022 W. F. Howes Ltd
Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction England
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Critic reviews

"Simon Mawer is a truly great contemporary writer...his stories are richly rewarding." (Simon Schama)

What listeners say about Ancestry

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Fascinating family history

Really enjoyed this book. It was very well narrated and had me on the edge of my seat several times.

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Highly Recommended!!!

I didn’t want this book to end. It’s something a little different and we’ll worth the read.

Be great if it could be make into a tv program.

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History

An engrossing story of Simon Mawer’s ancestry imaginatively fleshed out from documents and censuses. Gets bogged down a bit in Crimea war but a real eye opener of life in the army of the middle of the 19th century. Also the plight of the soldiers wives.

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Simply Brilliant

I think this book was on the suggested list, based on something I had previously listened to and, as I have read another of Simon Mawer’s books and enjoyed it (an actual book, not audio - The Girl Who Fell From The Sky), decided to give it a go.
It was absolutely brilliant! I loved every bit of it. Real people, real events, a biography of sorts, it could have been as dull as a shopping list but Simon Mawer has drawn it all together by imagining the bits - conversations, looks and gestures….- that the official documents leave out to create a wonderful story of his own family tree. I don’t know if this would have worked for me as an actual book, quite possibly it would, but it was undoubtedly brought wonderfully to life by the fabulous narration of Jonathan Keeble (worthy of 6 stars at least!) What a narrator! I shall be looking for more of his work on Audible for sure.
I can’t recommend this book highly enough and I am so pleased that I found it.

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People brought to life

Amazing story telling of ordinary people from a family tree brought to life again. Their hardships, the twists and turns of their life, the difficult choices they had to make in a very judgemental world, where being poor was seen as their own choice and crime, and their survival. Thank you for sharing their stories with us.

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Really gripping Story

Excellent

This is my first Simon Mawer book
And I intend listening to everything he has done .

It’s a fantastic intelligent story and I can’t recommend it highly enough.

Very well written and the narration is excellent too .

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Compelling

Loved the facts mixed with supposition. Brilliantly imagined using scant facts. I will definitely read Simon Mawer again.

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cleverly written with imagination and footnotes

Comprising two stories from two family lines, it comes together at the end in a photo that binds them. For anyone who has wished to flesh out the story between the documentary evidence and trace the origins of family lore, this book is for you. Gives good ideas for how ship logs and army diaries can be used to be set against evidence from home to tell the tale from the home front. You can feel the absence of the menfolk as their wives and children survive to ultimately create the author. It was a calming narrative cleverly written with imagination and footnotes. Reminded me of Radio 4’s 1WW Home Front docusoap.

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    4 out of 5 stars

Great story of fact and fiction

This is my first book by Simon Mawer & I was attracted by the title & the story. I can definitely say it was a book that once I had started, i looked forward to finishing it.
The story line from the first moment grabbed my attention and it was like that throughout especially all the research that was carried out and the Epilogue confirmed the family connection.
Would definitely recommend this book

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Really interesting

An original and fascinating listen - the combination of history and the imaginative rendering past tells all our stories as well as that of the Mawer family.

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