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The Lady and the Unicorn

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The Lady and the Unicorn

By: Tracy Chevalier
Narrated by: Cornelius Garrett
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Jean Le Viste, a 15th-century nobleman close to the King, hires an ambitious artist to design six tapestries celebrating his rising status at Court. A talented miniaturist, Nicolas des Innocents overcomes his surprise at being offered this commission when he catches sight of his patron's sumptuous daughter, Claude. His pursuit of her pulls him unwittingly into the web of fragile relationships between husband and wife, parents and children, lovers and servants.

©2003 Tracy Chevalier (P)2004 BBC Audiobooks Ltd Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Historical Fiction Literary Fiction Romance Middle Ages Marriage
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Critic reviews

"The story she weaves is as lush as the tapestries she describes, and her colorful characters leap off the page. A romantic, beautiful book. ( Booklist)
"The genuine drama Chevalier orchestrates as the weavers race to complete the tapestries, and the deft way she herself weaves together each separate story strand, results in a work of genuine power and beauty." ( Publishers Weekly)
All stars
Most relevant
Not her best work
A little disappointing
The performance was excellent
It was okay
I may return it

No as good as the others

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The male narrator is truly awful at reading passages from the perspective of non-male characters. He sounds like a pantomime dame, or someone from a Carry On film. All oo-er missus-y when describing how a young woman reacts to the male lead. It was truly cringe worthy and I couldn’t finish the book. I may try reading it as the story itself was engaging, just couldn’t get past the narrator. Ugh.

Truly awful narration, couldn’t listen

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Great narration. Amusing story about the tapestries.
Some names and terms differ between book and Audible.

Excellent book

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Tracy Chevalier gives a lot of interesting insight into the Unicorn tapestries and how they were designed and created. The story itself is rather thin . The artist Nicolas is a contemptible character . The characters are very one dimensional and serve to add a fictional element to the historical content .
The whole thing was spoiled by the narration. Some of the characters sounded like the old women in Monty Python sketches and Nicolas a revolting old roué. It really detracted from the story for me. It's a tribute to the author that I listened to the end .

Spoiled by narration

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Beautifully written, excellently narrated.
I love how Tracey Chevalier's characters are so real and flawed, but you love each one of them, in a way.
If you love historical fiction and the middle ages especially, this book is for you

Loved every minute

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