Small Island cover art

Small Island

 Preview

Audible Standard 30-day free trial

Try Standard free
Select 1 audiobook a month from our entire collection.
Listen to your selected audiobooks as long as you're a member.
Get unlimited access to bingeable podcasts.
Standard auto renews for £5.99 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Small Island

By: Andrea Levy
Narrated by: Andrea Levy
Try Standard free

£5.99 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for £18.89

Buy Now for £18.89

About this listen

 Small Island by bestselling author Andrea Levy won the Orange Prize for Fiction, as well as many other awards, including the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and the Whitbread. Now a major BBC drama starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Naomie Harris, its enduring appeal will captivate fans of Maya Angelou and Zadie Smith.

'A great read... honest, skilful, thoughtful and important' - Guardian


It is 1948, and England is recovering from a war. But at 21 Nevern Street, London, the conflict has only just begun. Queenie Bligh's neighbours do not approve when she agrees to take in Jamaican lodgers, but Queenie doesn't know when her husband will return, or if he will come back at all. What else can she do?

Gilbert Joseph was one of the several thousand Jamaican men who joined the RAF to fight against Hitler. Returning to England as a civilian he finds himself treated very differently. It's desperation that makes him remember a wartime friendship with Queenie and knock at her door.

Gilbert's wife Hortense, too, had longed to leave Jamaica and start a better life in England. But when she joins him she is shocked to find London shabby, decrepit, and far from the golden city of her dreams. Even Gilbert is not the man she thought he was...

(P)2015 Headline Publishing Group Ltd©2004 Andrea Levy 20th Century Caribbean Creators Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Veteran Creators World Literature England Funny Marriage Heartfelt Inspiring Thought-Provoking Witty Tear-jerking
All stars
Most relevant
Although this is fiction it held the truth about the attitudes and experience of people who came to help the mother country. It also highlighted the racist attitudes of a few British people after the war had ended. Men who were once good enough to fight for England were no longer welcome in peace time. It also makes you think about what is happening today with the Windrush generation who came to England as British and after a life time of service are told to leave.

Interesting

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Excellent story. Loved the fact that the author read it especially the use of the accents. I was not expecting that ending. I would thoroughly recommend this book particularly if you are interesting in social history.

Good read!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Loved it - one of my all time favourite Audible listens! Andrea Levy brought her already captivating story to life even more with her amazing narration, voices and accents. Such a gift! Small Island is a sobering, moving and at times funny story of how the five main characters’ lives intertwine (and remain forever connected) at a house in Earl’s Court in the 1940s.

One of my all time favourite listens

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I don't usually write reviews, and my preferred genre is usually thriller/whodunnits. However, this book was chosen due to the good reviews, and it doesn't disappoint. It's well written, with a good story, some humour and some very frustrating bits about how racist the Brits are/were around the time of the second world war. A really good listen. I think the fact that the writer is also the narrator, adds something to the listen.

Brilliant book, highly recommended

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

What did you like most about Small Island?

The characters, the sense of time and place and the virtuosity of the writing. All this is wonderfully expressed by Andrea Levy. Her narration is a joy.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Gilbert - in a literal sense a man for all seasons.

Which scene did you most enjoy?

I don't believe there is a dull scene in the entirety of the book.

If you made a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

The small island of the title of course relates to Britain in the post-war period as much as to Jamaica or any of the other islands in the Caribbean.

A pleasure from start to finish

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews