
The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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Saskia Maarleveld
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By:
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Emma Knight
About this listen
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK AS FEATURED ON TODAY
“Undeniably delicious.”—The New York Times
“A spellbinding debut about friendship, motherhood, first love, and the choices that bind us. . . I couldn't put it down!”—Carley Fortune, #1 New York Times bestselling author of This Summer Will Be Different
A witty, atmospheric, and brilliantly told novel that offers compelling portraits of womanhood, motherhood and female friendship, along with the irresistible intrigue surrounding an extraordinary British family
Arriving at the University of Edinburgh for her first term, Pen knows her divorced parents back in Canada are hiding something from her. She believes she’ll find the answer here in Scotland, where an old friend of her father’s—now a famous writer known as Lord Lennox—lives. When she is invited to spend the weekend at Lord Lennox’s centuries-old estate with his enveloping, fascinating family, Pen begins to unravel her parents’ secret, just as she’s falling in love for the first time . . .
As Pen experiences the sharp shock of adulthood, she comes to rely on herself for the first time in her life. A rich and rewarding novel of campus life, of sexual awakening, and ultimately, of the many ways women can become mothers in this world, The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus asks to what extent we need to look back in order to move forward.
©2025 Emma Knight (P)2025 Penguin AudioCritic reviews
”Undeniably delicious . . . . A tantalizing yet quietly touching debut about inheritance, emerging sexuality and what it truly means to come into one’s own.”—The New York Times
”A witty novel about navigating independence and complicated relationships.”—People
“An amazingly accomplished debut.”—Oprah Daily
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On a bright spring afternoon, Ciara Fay makes a split-second decision that will change everything. Grabbing an armful of clothes off the clothesline, she straps her two young daughters into her car and drives away. Head spinning, all she knows for certain is that home is no longer safe—and that this time, when she leaves, she must stay away. On the surface, she has a perfect life: her husband, Ryan, is a good provider, sometimes even kind and attentive, from a nice Irish family, and they have another baby on the way.
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Painful audio
- By Amazon Customer on 03-05-25
By: Roisín O'Donnell
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The Heart of Winter
- A Novel
- By: Jonathan Evison
- Narrated by: Kimberly Farr
- Length: 13 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Abe Winter and Ruth Warneke were never meant to be together—at least if you ask Ruth. Yet their catastrophic blind date in college evolved into a seventy-year marriage and a life on a farm on Bainbridge Island with their hens and beloved Labrador, Megs. Through the years, the Winters have fallen in and out of lockstep, and from their haunting losses and guarded secrets, a dependable partnership has been forged.
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Stereotypical characters, yawn
- By yo on 02-14-25
By: Jonathan Evison
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We All Live Here
- A Novel
- By: Jojo Moyes
- Narrated by: Jenna Coleman
- Length: 12 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Lila Kennedy has a lot on her plate. A broken marriage, two wayward daughters, a house that is falling apart, and an elderly stepfather who seems to have quietly moved in. Her career is in freefall and her love life is . . . complicated. So when her real dad—a man she has barely seen since he ran off to Hollywood thirty-five years ago—suddenly appears on her doorstep, it feels like the final straw. But it turns out even the family you thought you could never forgive might have something to teach you: about love, and what it actually means to be family.
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Sad
- By C. J. Kromminga on 02-12-25
By: Jojo Moyes
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Good Girl
- A Novel
- By: Aria Aber
- Narrated by: Mozhan Navabi
- Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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In Berlin’s artistic underground, where techno and drugs fill warehouses still pockmarked from the wars of the twentieth century, nineteen-year-old Nila at last finds her tribe. Born in Germany to Afghan parents, raised in public housing graffitied with swastikas, drawn to philosophy, photography, and sex, Nila has spent her adolescence disappointing her family while searching for her voice as a young woman and artist. Then in the haze of Berlin’s legendary nightlife, Nila meets Marlowe, an American writer whose fading literary celebrity opens her eyes to a life of freedom.
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The Realism
- By elizabeth on 02-20-25
By: Aria Aber
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Sworn
- The Vampire Legends - Book 1
- By: Emma Knight
- Narrated by: Kati Fredlund
- Length: 3 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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When her dad is transferred, Rachel Wood is uprooted from her home in Pennsylvania and forced to enter a new high school in 10th grade, in an affluent suburb in Westchester, New York. She finds herself in way over her head as she struggles to come to grips with meeting new friends, finding a boyfriend, avoiding the cliques of mean girls, and figuring out how to survive in such a hostile, new world.
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Teen Angst
- By Cathy Moore on 03-10-22
By: Emma Knight
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City of Night Birds
- A Novel
- By: Juhea Kim
- Narrated by: Amy Landon
- Length: 11 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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On a White Night in 2019, prima ballerina Natalia Leonova returns to St. Petersburg two years after a devastating accident that stalled her career. Once the most celebrated dancer of her generation, she now turns to pills and alcohol to numb the pain of her past. She is unmoored in her old city as the ghosts of her former life begin to resurface: her loving but difficult mother, her absentee father, and the two gifted dancers who led to her downfall. One of those dancers, Alexander, is the love of her life, who transformed both Natalia and her art.
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just boring
- By Dana on 12-13-24
By: Juhea Kim
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Good Dirt
- A Novel
- By: Charmaine Wilkerson
- Narrated by: January LaVoy
- Length: 11 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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When ten-year-old Ebby Freeman heard the gunshot, time stopped. And when she saw her brother, Baz, lying on the floor surrounded by the shattered pieces of a centuries-old jar, life as Ebby knew it shattered as well. The crime was never solved—and because the Freemans were one of the only Black families in a particularly well-to-do enclave of New England—the case has had an enduring, voyeuristic pull for the public. The last thing the Freemans want is another media frenzy splashing their family across the papers, but when Ebby's high profile romance falls apart, that's exactly what they get.
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Moments of brilliance
- By MyLastRomanceNovel on 03-01-25
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Life Hacks for a Little Alien
- By: Alice Franklin
- Narrated by: Sally Phillips
- Length: 7 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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“Climb up here, Little Alien. Sit next to me. I will tell you about life on this planet. I will tell you how it goes.” Before she thinks of herself as Little Alien, our narrator is only a lonely little girl living in southeast England, who doesn’t understand the world the way other children seem to. So when a late-night TV special introduces her to the mysterious Voynich Manuscript—an ancient tome written in an indecipherable language—Little Alien experiences something she hasn’t before: hope. Could there be others like her, who also feel like they’re from another planet?
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Little Alien
- By Amazon Customer on 03-26-25
By: Alice Franklin
What listeners say about The Life Cycle of the Common Octopus
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Jeri B
- 03-01-25
Boring. DNF.
OMG. Usually I can’t wait to get back to an audio book. This was SO BORING. I quit with 5 hours to go, and at 1.4 speed. Do yourself a favor. Don’t.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Linda K. Goff
- 03-12-25
Well written and excellent and performances by the narrators, but shallow story.
What was the point of the novel? The story was not worthy of a novel. Very weak premise.
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- elisabeth
- 01-16-25
Excellent writing
Beautifully narrated/ excellent writing/ detailed richly developed characters/ vivid descriptions of landscape and interiors/ lyrical musings on life’s many journeys and choices made
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- Melissa hinson
- 01-24-25
Get this wonderful book!!! Couldnt put it down!!!!
Whether or not you attended college- you have a history of your early adulthood- when youre away from your family, and trying to figure out who you are- this book will hit home with you. Its so great! The writing is so colorful and thorough!!!
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- Meredith G.
- 02-27-25
a beautiful story
a beautiful read. i will be thinking about this book and the characters for a long time
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- Kimberly D. Holmberg
- 01-10-25
Incredible writing!
I loved the study into friendships and family roles that aren’t always what they seem.
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- Amyen Evert
- 01-14-25
Gorgeous prose, women’s connections to themselves and each other, and fantastic narrator.
Gorgeous prose, memorable multi-dimensional characters (especially the female characters), intelligent without being didactic, and expressed what is to be a girl, woman, wife, mother through the lens of each character while making different choices. Their choices. I saved so many passages, and though the narration was exceptional (so much so that I want to listen to other novels due to her voice and voice acting skills) I also want to buy the novel and underline all of the sentences and pages that I loved. It will be full of yellow.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Margo H. Green
- 01-25-25
A wonderful book!
The characters and their stories are so well written. It’s a fascinating listen with an excellent narrator.
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- Hannah J Bean
- 04-06-25
Ugh
I wanted to like this.
It’s a good listen but left me wanting more.
I read it for book club and would suggest it to someone else.
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- Amazon Customer
- 02-13-25
More more more!!
Such an excellently told story. I couldn’t get enough and was left truly satisfied with that craving for more !!!! Highly recommend!
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