A Brief History of Seven Killings Audiobook By Marlon James cover art

A Brief History of Seven Killings

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A Brief History of Seven Killings

By: Marlon James
Narrated by: Robertson Dean, Cherise Boothe, Dwight Bacquie, Ryan Anderson, Johnathan McClain, Robert Younis, Thom Rivera
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Winner, The Man Booker Prize, 2015

On December 3, 1976, just before the Jamaican general election and two days before Bob Marley was to play the Smile Jamaica Concert, gunmen stormed his house, machine guns blazing. The attack nearly killed the Reggae superstar, his wife, and his manager, and injured several others. Marley would go on to perform at the free concert on December 5, but he left the country the next day, not to return for two years.

Deftly spanning decades and continents and peopled with a wide range of characters - assassins, journalists, drug dealers, and even ghosts - A Brief History of Seven Killings is the fictional exploration of that dangerous and unstable time and its bloody aftermath, from the streets and slums of Kingston in the 1970s, to the crack wars in 1980s New York, to a radically altered Jamaica in the 1990s. Brilliantly inventive and stunningly ambitious, this novel is a revealing modern epic that will secure Marlon James' place among the great literary talents of his generation.

©2014 Marlon James. Recorded by arrangement with Penguin Books. (P)2014 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books Caribbean Creators Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction World Literature Caribbean Funny Heartfelt New York Jamaican History

Editor's Pick

Historical fiction at its best
"I wish I could write something as genius as this story. It’s a long one, and it’s a deep dive, but it is so masterfully crafted and engrossing that it goes by a lot quicker than you’d think. Plus the multicast narration really brings this novel to life."
—Aaron S., Audible Editor

Complex Characters • Powerful Storytelling • Outstanding Voice Acting • Historical Depth • Cultural Richness

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How could the performance have been better?

The performance detracts from a good book. The people reading have very fake Jamaican accents and its very distracting and sounds foolish. This problem is detrimental to an otherwise great book.

Read the hard copy book. The performance sucks

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This book is basically about an immersion into some Jamaican culture. It's a very good character study, and each chapter is told from one of about 10 main characters points of view. But, it really drags on. There is very little plot. It's a good listen, well performed. But seriously, this could have been a five hour book and I'd have gotten just as much out of it.

Nothing Brief About It

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This is probably one of the best audio book I have ever listened too. I kind of got stuck on it and listened to it 3 times and each time gleaned a bit more understanding of Jamaica and the life of the people there back in the 70's. A bit more understanding of the "Singer" Bob Marley and his music. The narration was phenomenal... The description of some of the deaths was so well done that you almost felt as if it was happening right in front of you.! Truly a book that has to be listened to as opposed to read.This writer is so wonderful that I can't get enough of him. I had to listen to another one of his books which was very good as well, but this is probably one of the best book I've ever listened too and I am an avid reader since age ten there is not a time that I'm not reading something...so with 100's and 100's of books under my belt this one will be added to my top 3 favorite books of all time.

Phenomenal

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Really fantastic book made even better by a superb audiobook. The characters being read by different actors made it very enjoyable. All the actors were really good and added to the incredible story.

Fantastic book and audiobook

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This book is violent enough to make me blanche more than once, and yet compelling. I read it for many weeks, as I could develop an appetite for more, and throughout twine a number of storylines and unforgettable characters that together forever change my ideas about Jamaica, it's blackness and my own seemingly endless whiteness. A grand ride.
As an aside, I read this as I do many books, flipping back and forth from the book to the audio book. The performances in this audio book go beyond the usual idea of excellence, for their having an unmistakably deep rehearsal calendar behind them that better befits a big budget film. These actors have both the intricacies of their varied accents - out to the heaviest patois, as well as very well directed acting. The only thing holding me back from recommending the vocalised work over the printed one is that the writing of the dialect is beautiful too, and it is fun to read in the face of some struggle, until the accents 'pop' in your mind, and you are hearing voices from the text. Not reading. Wonderful work. Deserving of its prize. Has much-in its scope and feel- in common with other Man-Booker prize winning works I have also liked.

Deserving, so deserving. Violent, epic, glorious.

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