Spies Audiobook By Michael Frayn cover art

Spies

Preview

Try for $0.00
Prime logo Prime members: New to Audible?
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Spies

By: Michael Frayn
Narrated by: Martin Jarvis
Try for $0.00

$14.95/month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $17.44

Buy for $17.44

Confirm purchase
Pay using card ending in
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.
Cancel

About this listen

In the quiet cul-de-sac where Keith and Stephen live, the only immediate signs of the Second World War are the blackouts at night and a single random bomb-site. But the two boys suspect that the ordinary houses in the Close and their inhabitants are not what they seem. As Keith, the leader, informs the trusting Stephen, the whole district is riddled with secret passages, hideaways for any number of murderers, unsung war heroes, and secret agents. Then one day Keith announces that the Germans have infiltrated his own family.©2002 Michael Frayn (P)2002, 2004 BBC Audiobooks Ltd Historical Fiction Fiction
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

Critic reviews

"A compelling story about secrecy and betrayal." (Booklist)

"As it plays out to a surprising denouement, this enigmatic melodrama will keep readers' attention firmly in hand." (Publishers Weekly)

"Martin Jarvis's performance is intelligent, precise, and brilliantly nuanced. He captures all of Frayn's sardonic humor, as well as his more serious moments of philosophizing." (AudioFile)

What listeners say about Spies

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    13
  • 4 Stars
    10
  • 3 Stars
    6
  • 2 Stars
    3
  • 1 Stars
    2
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    16
  • 4 Stars
    2
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    2
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    12
  • 4 Stars
    5
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    3

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

WWII home front story

This story is intelligent, suspenseful, poignant and told from one of the most genuine "child's points-of-view" I've ever read. The reader is terrific and his ability to differentiate the characters is amazing. He never sounds childish but invests the reading with a child's determination and earnestness. I loved it.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Wonderful listening

What made the experience of listening to Spies the most enjoyable?

This is a wonderful story, very well read.
It is the book that Ian McEwen wished he wrote!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Touching and interesting

Touching story, mostly recommended for listeners who appreciate plots surrounding civil life during World War II.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

What a beautiful piece of writing

What did you like best about this story?

What a beautiful piece of writing. The title is only slightly, wryly ironic as I found this to be a Rite Of Passage story, and a beautifully evoked one at that. To say that the bulk of the story is told in flashback would be to put it too crudely but technically speaking I suppose it it. It's as much about the excruciating nuances of the English class system, the general awkwardness of youth and the fallibility of memory itself as it is about the events themselves (a particular summer of WW2 era suburban England) , as observed once through the prism of the young Stephen and then again through the older, more bittersweet prism of the older Stephen. But this is no Waugh-esque cloying nostalgia, but something much more honest and real.

What does Martin Jarvis bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

I would listen to Martin Jarvis read the telephone book.
(Do we even have telephone books anymore?)

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars

Gave up

This is no Copenhagen, the brillant play by Frayn. The two boys are impossibly, endlessly and tediously credulous, while one of them, the narrator, is at the same time unbelievably perceptive about the little village (wonderfully depicted -- but the book needs more than that) and its humdrum people. Not much seemed to be happening half way through, though one see where it is all leading, and no children's imagination could be that overheated. The reader, however, kept me going that far; he is wonderful. But I still gave up.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

6 people found this helpful