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  • The Zone of Interest

  • By: Martin Amis
  • Narrated by: Sean Barrett
  • Length: 10 hrs
  • 4.0 out of 5 stars (146 ratings)
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The Zone of Interest cover art

The Zone of Interest

By: Martin Amis
Narrated by: Sean Barrett
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Summary

What happens when we discover who we really are? And how do we come to terms with it? Can we even meet each other's eye, after we have seen who we really are? Fearless and original, The Zone of Interest is a violently dark love story set against a backdrop of unadulterated evil, and a vivid journey into the depths and contradictions of the human soul.

©2014 Martin Amis (P)2014 W F Howes Ltd

Critic reviews

Praise for the author:
"An electrifying writer who likes to shock his fans and share his sharply contemporary concerns... Amis is a maddening master you need to read - the best of his generation" ( Mail on Sunday)

What listeners say about The Zone of Interest

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Amis I wish I had your mind

Excellent book true Amis
This is obviously a sad & grim subject matter
Though the Nazis are made to look grotesque ( as if they could look anything else!)
It's also wickedly funny in places
7 chapters each told from the perspective of ......
1 young blonde blue eye nazi who's uncle is Martin Boorman ( spelling)
2 a camp kamandant a repulsive man
3 a Jewish man who is forced to help in the final solution
The narration is great
Best book this year and I fly through books

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7 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

A stench you will never forget

This is a difficult read/listen. Not only because of the subject matter, but also the structure of the book (narrated by three characters) requires your full attention to ensure you are keeping track. In addition a love story set in a concentration camp is a brave move, especially as the protagonists are the Kommandant's wife and a very active member of the Nazi war machine. Martin Amis doesn't shirk from describing the horrors and deprived behaviour, however it is the poignant moments, such as a small girl taking charge of her baby brother before being murdered, that will stay with you forever. Dare I say there is even some dry humour, for example the Kommandant's pathetic attempt to maintain authority while sporting two black eyes of dubious origin. Above all there is the visceral description of the overwhelming smell of rotting flesh and of Berlin, described as a city with halitosis. One again Martin Amis maintains his reputation as one of our leading writers and the narrator does full justice to the material.

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

A disappointment

I struggled to finish this. I found the story disjointed. The settings ran together and it seemed to take paragraphs to catch up to who was saying what and why. Too often was a thought left unsaid or said in too roundabout a manner. This can create interesting reading oifdone well but here it just leaves you feeling disconnected from the story. Extremely frustrating to have the story switch languages, to French of German, for phrases and expressions key to the story with no translation. The performance only exacerbated the cloudy writing style. Not nearly enough to distinguish the characters. Overall I found myself bored and frustrated.

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3 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
  • T
  • 16-03-15

Dark and compelling

A deeply dark story set in and around a Nazi death camp. The grotesque nature of life, where the everyday "job" is mass murder, is not for the squeamish. And yet, and yet....

Martin Amis has written a remarkable and compelling novel about a subject beyond most people's imaginings. This audiobook version is brilliantly read by Sean Barrett. Highly recommended..

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3 people found this helpful

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

What a listen!

I read the outline of the book so know what to expect to a certain degree, but I receive so much more. Sean Barrett opened his reading with the title and his voice alone manage to send a shiver down my Spain. The German and French paragraphs were mastered perfectly well by Mr Berrett. I grew up in Israel, I met many old ladies with numbers tattooed on the inside of their forearm, As young people we were thought to forgive but not to forget and yet this book has shown me just how much I had forgotten.
Thank you Martin Amis for a book that should really replace Madame Bovery on the school reading list.

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2 people found this helpful

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

Challenging

An exploration of the dark side of human nature, scattered with moments of love and humanity.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Grim

This is a tough listen. Expertly told, wonderfully narrated, a hideously real tale from within a nazi death camp. Despite the painful images, you really must persevere with the story. I told myself it was important not to flinch from truth...but I feel scarred by this book.

You have to grit your teeth and get through it.

I don't think I am any closer to understanding why or how, but I feel I know more of the what.

There is no humour here. You will not be soft soaped.

Listen. Learn. Don't let it happen again.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Martin Amis at his masterly best

Scenes of atrocity are rendered all the more nightmarish by the author’s matter of fact delivery,the interweaving of laugh out loud satire and the moments of heartbreaking pathos. Superbly narrated. Highly recommended.

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1 person found this helpful

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

I have to read the book now...

I always listen to books in the car and it was impossible to follow this story properly because of the reading style of the narrator: slightly mumbling and trailing off at the end of sentences. I will listen again under better circumstances.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Superb reading of distressingly entertaining novel

I recommend this book very highly. Amis & Barrett are both on tremendous form.

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1 person found this helpful