The Chaperone cover art

The Chaperone

Preview

£0.00 for first 30 days

Try for £0.00
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

The Chaperone

By: Laura Moriarty
Narrated by: Elizabeth McGovern
Try for £0.00

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Confirm Purchase
Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.
Cancel

About this listen

The unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Laura Moriarty's The Chaperone, read by the actress Elizabeth McGovern, best-known for her role as Cora, Countess of Grantham, in the hit TV series Downton Abbey.

On a summer's day in 1922, Cora Carlisle boards a train from Wichita, Kansas, to New York City, leaving behind a marriage that's not as perfect as it seems and a past that she buried long ago.

She is charged with the care of a stunning young girl with a jet-black fringe and eyes wild and wise beyond her 15 years. This girl is hungry for stardom, and Cora is hungry for something she doesn't yet know.

Cora will be many things in her lifetime - an orphan, a mother, a wife, a mistress - but in New York she is a chaperone and her life is about to change. It is here, under the bright lights of Broadway, in a time when prohibition reigns and speakeasies with their forbidden whispers behind closed doors thrive, that Cora finds what she has been searching for. It is here, in a time when illicit thrills and daring glamour sizzle beneath the laws of propriety that her life truly begins. It is here that Cora and her charge, Louise Brooks, take their first steps towards their dreams.

©2012 Laura Moriarty (P)2012 Penguin Audio
Romance Marriage New York
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

Listeners also enjoyed...

The Memory of Us cover art
Laura Lamont's Life in Pictures cover art
Room of My Own cover art
A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty cover art
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes cover art
The Poisonwood Bible cover art
As Bright as Heaven cover art
The After Party cover art
The Da Vinci Code cover art
The Color Purple cover art
A Town Like Alice cover art
Virgins cover art
Wildflower Hill cover art
The Forgotten Garden cover art
A Prayer for Owen Meany cover art
The Valley of Amazement cover art

What listeners say about The Chaperone

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    34
  • 4 Stars
    26
  • 3 Stars
    11
  • 2 Stars
    2
  • 1 Stars
    1
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    27
  • 4 Stars
    14
  • 3 Stars
    2
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    1
Story
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    24
  • 4 Stars
    14
  • 3 Stars
    6
  • 2 Stars
    2
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Heartfelt memoir of 20th century .

A wonderful idea well researched and written. Pulling on your emotions without a soupcon of sugar. Along with a superb narration. Marvellous book.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

a great audio book

an unusual & uplifting story with a sympathetic main character and beautifully read-very enjoyable indeed

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

I was lost in this book: the narration is outstanding

This is an extraordinary book. It is utterly absorbing - I was transported. Above all Elizabeth McGovern's narration is exceptional - she acts it out in such a wonderful way and her voice is soothing and beguiling. This is a gripping and uplifting book - I was transported by the narration - I WISH she did more books! Really up there in the Juliet Stevenson league!! Cora is a wonderful character and her story is utterly unexpected and compelling - a perfect evocation all of time and place. I am recommending it to everyone....

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Brilliant

Lovely story. There were a couple of events in this book that I really wasn't expecting as I thought it would just be an easy book to listen to but there are a few surprises (good). I loved the main character and really didn't want this to end.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Breathtaking

Would you consider the audio edition of The Chaperone to be better than the print version?

I don't know, as I haven't read it.

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Chaperone?

The private moments between Cora and Joseph are so carefully and sensitively portrayed. Understated, but laiden with love and understanding.

Have you listened to any of Elizabeth McGovern’s other performances? How does this one compare?

No, but I will seek them out. Her reading is exquisite

Any additional comments?

Riveting listening, I hated having to put my ipod down.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

Enjoyable read!

This story has some good surprises and gives you a real feeling of the period the first half of the book is set in. I enjoyed the narration, each character really came to life. The only reason this isn't 5 out of 5 is because towards the end of the story it feels as if the author is rushing to an end.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

America 1926 Louise Brooks early years in New York

Fictional account of
Louise Brooks escape from the mid west to New York to train for the stage as a dancer.
Told by the middle aged chaperone who accompanies her to escape her unhappy marriage, she discovers love for the first time with a German immigrant who she dislikes on sight while revisiting the convent she was left in as an orphan.

Louise is determined to succeed and never return home and the chaperone does not want to either. She is on a mission to discover her origins from the convent and leaves happier with her new lover and lives happily ? ever after. . .in a new frame of mind with a freer attitude learned from Louise whose love of life, intelligence and energy sparkle; gives the chaperone courage to make demands at home and live her life the way she wants, instead of conforming to the narrow confines of housewifery and non sex life with her homosexual husband.

Fast, jazz hot, sweltering New York leaps off the page as does the slow pace of small town America where everyone knows your business. The book delves into black segregation on
Broadway and immigrant poverty, middle class hypocrisy, alcoholism, unhappy marriage and church.

I absolutely loved it.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars

Frothy nostalgic fun

This is excellently read by Elizabeth McGovern, immediately recognisable from Downton Abbey, whose warm southern cadences are easy to engage with. The story brings tobgether an eclectic cast of characters and doesn't fare well under too close examination in terms of plot credibility, but it is light-hearted fun and in the end a good yarn to entertain you whilst you drive, walk the dog or hang out the washing!

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Rivetting

A really good story. I couldn't put it down. Elizabeth McGovern narrated it really well. Recommended.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

insightful

What did you like most about The Chaperone?

the twists and turns and the way it evokes the ebbs and flows of progression through life.

Any additional comments?

I would have preferred to hear a little more of Cora's feistiness in an otherwise excellent performance.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful