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A Ladder to the Sky

A Novel

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A Ladder to the Sky

Auteur(s): John Boyne
Narrateur(s): Richard E. Grant, Richard Cordery, Nina Sosanya, Laurence Kennedy
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À propos de cet audio

 “A satire of writerly ambition wrapped in a psychological thriller . . . An homage to Patricia Highsmith, Oscar Wilde and Edgar Allan Poe, but its execution is entirely Boyne’s own.”—Ron Charles, The Washington Post

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST AND MINNEAPOLIS STAR TRIBUNE

Maurice Swift is handsome, charming, and hungry for fame. The one thing he doesn’t have is talent—but he’s not about to let a detail like that stand in his way. After all, a would-be writer can find stories anywhere. They don’t need to be his own.

Working as a waiter in a West Berlin hotel in 1988, Maurice engineers the perfect opportunity: a chance encounter with celebrated novelist Erich Ackermann. He quickly ingratiates himself with the powerful – but desperately lonely – older man, teasing out of Erich a terrible, long-held secret about his activities during the war. Perfect material for Maurice’s first novel.

Once Maurice has had a taste of literary fame, he knows he can stop at nothing in pursuit of that high. Moving from the Amalfi Coast, where he matches wits with Gore Vidal, to Manhattan and London, Maurice hones his talent for deceit and manipulation, preying on the talented and vulnerable in his cold-blooded climb to the top. But the higher he climbs, the further he has to fall. . . .

Sweeping across the late twentieth century, A Ladder to the Sky is a fascinating portrait of a relentlessly immoral man, a tour de force of storytelling, and the next great novel from an acclaimed literary virtuoso.

Praise for A Ladder to the Sky

“Boyne's mastery of perspective, last seen in The Heart's Invisible Furies, works beautifully here. . . . Boyne understands that it's far more interesting and satisfying for a reader to see that narcissist in action than to be told a catchall phrase. Each step Maurice Swift takes skyward reveals a new layer of calumny he's willing to engage in, and the desperation behind it . . . so dark it seems almost impossible to enjoy reading A Ladder to the Sky as much as you definitely will enjoy reading it.”—NPR

“Delicious . . . spins out over several decades with thrilling unpredictability, following Maurice as he masters the art of co-opting the stories of others in increasingly dubious ways. And while the book reads as a thriller with a body count that would make Highsmith proud, it is also an exploration of morality and art: Where is the line between inspiration and thievery? To whom does a story belong?”—Vanity Fair Fiction de genre Fiction littéraire Psychologique Fiction Spirituel Sincère Angleterre

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Ce que les critiques en disent

“Maurice has the heart of a sniper . . . marvelously engaging, barbed and witty.”—The New York Times Book Review

“A darkly funny novel that races like a beating heart.”—People

“Maurice Swift may not be much of a novelist, but he inhabits a literary tradition going to back to Patricia Highsmith. Boyne’s protagonist is Tom Ripley as literary climber. . . . Boyne’s novel is about high literature but has lower, juicier ambitions, at which it wildly succeeds.”—Vulture

"For Patricia Highsmith fans, thriller aficionados, writers, publishers, literary wannabees, scoundrel sympathizers, John Boyne offers the perfect entertainment for dark winter days.”—Boston Globe

“A taut and gripping novel . . . as craftily written as Swift himself.”—Esquire

“It’s dark, it’s funny, it’s the most unusual read I had this year….You will read it like that. Highly recommend it.”—Harlan Coben, NBC Today Show holiday gift picks

"A Talented Mr. Ripley-esque novel of greed and deceit."—New York Post

“John Boyne’s new novel charts the rise and fall of an antihero cut from the same cloth as Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley…. Darkly comic and deliciously vicious, this mesmerizing portrait of a ruthless psychopath explores artistic endeavor, creative ambition and ‘whether our stories belong to us at all.’” – Minneapolis Star Tribune

"A Ladder to the Sky is clever, chilling and beautifully paced; a study of inner corrosion that Patricia Highsmith herself could not have done better... wickedly astute.”—The Times (London)

"Maurice Swift is a literary Tom Ripley . . . a first-class page turner.”—The Guardian

"A deliciously dark tale of ambition, seduction and literary theft . . . compelling and terrifying . . . powerful and intensely unsettling . . . in Maurice Swift, Boyne has given us an unforgettable protagonist, dangerous and irresistible in equal measure. The result is an ingeniously conceived novel that confirms Boyne as one of the most assured writers of his generation.”—The Observer

“Are novelists, by definition, monsters?  John Boyne raises this provocative possibility in “A Ladder to the Sky… A deft plotter, Boyne has fun with the idea that vampiring is simply part of what novelists do, and he implicates readers in their acts of thievery-as-creation by making us like despicable Maurice, almost against our will.”—Minneapolis Star Tribune
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Les plus pertinents
I really enjoyed the primary narrator's English accent. It sounded great and was nice to listen to. The novel dives into some saucy adult scenes that I would not have initially suspected when reading the book description provided by the publisher, but I found it to be an interesting audio experience! I thought that I would make a note of the brief flashes of adult content in case anyone is contemplating purchasing this title as a gift for an underage individual or anyone else who is sensitive to this type of material.

Quality Voice

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I was in a situation where I had to listen for about five hours (I was driving by myself). It took me about three hours in to get interested. The whole novel is about writers — not my favorite subjects. I like it when writers describe more diverse social milieus. Also it opens with hours of homosexual obsession. I suppose this would interest others. But once it lurches out of that, the novel gets more complicated and offers some surprises. The ending is more drawn out and clever than I’d prefer. Not as good as Since We Fell or Something in the Water, but worth listening to.

Worth Waiting For

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My initial slightly bored response was colored by Erich and his obsessive lust for Maurice which droned on a bit but as the story evolved I understood why this was so important in the set up for later events. Maurice fulfills most of the criteria for psychopathy and is a truly brilliant and loathsome fictional creation, one wonders if Mr Boyne really has come across writers like this in his career. The use of different narrators (reliable or otherwise) for the different parts of the story is refreshing with the best one left for last. Richard E. Grant puts in a showstopper for the final quarter as only he can: wonderful drunken ramblings and deranged delusional fantasies of his own (Maurice's) pure genius. I enjoyed imagining how Gore Vidal would have really responded to a Yorkshire accent if he ever came across one. The scene where the fictional Gore puts Maurice in his place was a beautifully crafted piece of writing. A very clever and revealing novel about the bitchy dog-eat-dog world of publishing fiction.

Lacking a moral compass

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Wow! When I first saw the amount of voice actors in this I was surprised - I’m usually a one voice kind of auidobooker, but this book blew me away. Each voice is its own character and narrates its perspective rather than there being a dialogue – which is what I initially thought was going to be the case. The way that the talent was able to convey such a multitude of characters while still feeling individual from each other was astounding. I don’t think I would have liked this book nearly as much as I did if it weren’t for the voice talent.

Amazing voice talent

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The story was quite different than expected. I enjoyed this writers very much and will check out his other books. Although he seems to weigh heavily on homosexuality in his work I have noticed.

Excellent. couldn’t put it down

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