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The Luminaries
- Narrated by: Mark Meadows
- Length: 29 hrs and 15 mins
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The Luminaries
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Publisher's Summary
Longlisted – Baileys Women’s Prize 2014
Man Booker Prize, Fiction, 2013
Canadian Governor General's Literary Award, 2013.
It is 1866 and Walter Moody has come to make his fortune upon the New Zealand goldfields. On arrival, he stumbles across a tense gathering of 12 local men, who have met in secret to discuss a series of unsolved crimes. A wealthy man has vanished, a whore has tried to end her life, and an enormous fortune has been discovered in the home of a luckless drunk. Moody is soon drawn into the mystery: a network of fates and fortunes that is as complex and exquisitely patterned as the night sky.
The Luminaries is an extraordinary piece of fiction. Written in pitch-perfect historical register, richly evoking a mid-19th-century world of shipping and banking and goldrush boom and bust, it is also a ghost story, and a gripping mystery. It is a thrilling achievement for someone still in her mid-20s, and will confirm for critics and listeners that Catton is one of the brightest stars in the international writing firmament.
Eleanor Catton was born in 1985 in Canada and raised in New Zealand. She completed an MA in Creative Writing at Victoria University in 2007 and won the Adam Prize in Creative Writing for The Rehearsal. She was the recipient of the 2008 Glenn Schaeffer Fellowship to study for a year at the prestigious Iowa Writers' Workshop in the US and went on to hold a position as Adjunct Professor of Creative Writing there, teaching Creative Writing and Popular Culture. Eleanor won a 2010 New Generation Award. She now lives in Wellington, New Zealand.
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What the critics say
"The Luminaries is an impressive novel, captivating, intense and full of surprises." (Times Literary Supplement)
"The Luminaries is a breathtakingly ambitious 800-page mystery with a plot as complex and a cast as motley as any 19th-century doorstopper. That Catton's absorbing, hugely elaborate novel is at its heart so simple is a great part of its charm. Catton's playful and increasingly virtuosic denouement arrives at a conclusion that is as beautiful as it is triumphant." (Daily Mail)
"It is awesomely - even bewilderingly - intricate. There's an immaculate finish to Catton's prose, which is no mean feat in a novel that lives or dies by its handling of period dialogue. It's more than 800 pages long but the reward for your stamina is a double-dealing world of skullduggery traced in rare complexity. Those Booker judges will have wrists of steel if it makes the shortlist, as it fully deserves." (Evening Standard)
What listeners say about The Luminaries
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Lisa v.
- 2021-09-28
Long and disjointed…
This was an interesting story about a murder mystery in 1865 New Zealand. The plot was very interesting. I liked the historical contrast, the rich character development and the plot. However while overall I enjoyed the story, I found it to be unnecessarily complicated.
The author jumps from character to character at different points in time in an attempt to present the story fractured and then sew it together in the end. While I often enjoy this narrative trick, in this case I found it to be very difficult to follow. There were many characters to keep track of and then to jump from place to place and from time to time made it burdensome for the listener. Really I think the same could have been achieved in fewer pages with less jumping around.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- alexandra e noga
- 2018-07-23
LOOOONG book
I usually like this type of novel, but for some reason I just found it a bit dull. When I read reviews about the 'written book' it sounded slightly more interesting as there was some 'visual' aspect to titles and length of chapters that may have slightly added to the book. Catton's language is lovely, but I just found it a bit uninteresting
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Joanne
- 2023-01-13
very good book. it is rich with history of the gol
I enjoyed this book. It is rich with a history of the gold rush, the men and women who worked to move the gold around the world.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- CraftyDom
- 2022-02-08
Intricate Plot
Once you get acquainted with the many characters, the story becomes rich and intriguing. It has it all: a sex worker, a politician, a villainess sea captain, a preacher, a wealthy young man, a New Zealand aboriginal, a Brit who sails to New Zealand to make his fortune during the Gold rush ,the China Man and many more. Intelligent writing. Loved it.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- William
- 2018-12-25
A very good ghost/historical/murder mystery/story.
Well worth the time to listen to the book, know the characters and invest in the convoluted story line.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
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Performance3 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- nikki
- 2018-09-18
complicated story
too many characters with complicated stories intertwined. it could have been said in less words.
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Overall1 out of 5 stars
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Performance1 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 2018-04-18
Feels scattered
Struggled to listen to this at all. Hard to listen to on audio, can't follow the story
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall1 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story1 out of 5 stars
- Carol Farr
- 2023-07-03
Cannot believe an editor approved this publication
I was looking forward to listening to this title as I had listen to the authors other title and it was exceptionally well done. The story was hard to follow so many characters coming in any time with no sense of continuity, the chapter headings are very annoying. I am still wondering why the author chose that method. The book was hard to follow, disjointed, and a big disappointment. I wish I could get my money back. The reader did a very good job..
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