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Life Class

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Life Class

By: Pat Barker
Narrated by: Eve Webster, Finlay Robertson, Juliet Prague, Kieran Bew
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Summary

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of the first novel in Pat Barker's acclaimed 'Life Class' trilogy - an unforgettable story of art and war, from one of our greatest writers on war and the human heart

From the Booker Prize-winning and Women's Prize-shortlisted author of The Silence of the Girls

'Triumphant, inspiring, shattering' The Times

'Barker writes as brilliantly as ever... With great tenderness and insight she conveys a wartime world turned upside down' Independent on Sunday

'Masterly, gripping' Penelope Lively

'Extraordinarily powerful' Sunday Telegraph

Spring, 1914. The students at the Slade School of Art gather in Henry Tonks's studio for his life-drawing class. But for Paul Tarrant the class is troubling, underscoring his own uncertainty about making a mark on the world. When war breaks out and the army won't take Paul, he enlists in the Belgian Red Cross just as he and fellow student Elinor Brooke admit their feelings for one another. Amidst the devastation in Ypres, Paul comes to see the world anew - but have his experiences changed him completely?

The Life Class trilogy:
Life Class
Toby's Room
Noonday

 20th Century Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction Women's Fiction World War I Fiction War Student
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Critic reviews

Sharply written and elegantly constructed - breathtaking
A compelling read
Thoughtful, ambiguous and powerful
All stars
Most relevant
My Interest was Heightened from The Start, By The Setting, alongside The Descriptions of Characters and Their Varying Lifestyles as They Struggle to Hold on to Their Art, as The Heat of War Rises to Consume Them All! Even though The Book is Stark and Uncompromising, The Principals are Brought Out, Beautifully, on to The Page. I Did Feel The Ending was Rather Abrupt.

Dark-Intense-Painfully Tender

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Reading by several actors added depth to performance.

A fictionalised account of the wartime experiences of young artists with encounters with some historical figures.

I will have to catch other parts of the trilogy.

Life Class

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Thought provoking with regards to whether Art has a place in times of War. Some really unpleasant descriptions of working in a WWI field hospital and dealing with wounds and amputations.
Well read, But the author has relied on the technique of ‘news in letters’ to tell a lot of the action in part two.

Thought provoking

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first in second world war trilogy. characters brought vividly to life. well narrated. compelling story. highly recommended.

Pat Barker writing as good as ever

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Quite slow, different from her other novels. Not such likeable character's than in the regeneration trilogy.

Quite slow

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