After the Party

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Listen to a sample

What to expect

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of After the Party by Cressida Connolly, read by Kristin Atherton.

'I always wanted to be friends with both my sisters. Perhaps that was the source, really, of all the troubles of my life...'

It is the summer of 1938 and Phyllis Forrester has returned to England after years abroad. Moving into her sister's grand country house, she soon finds herself entangled in a new world of idealistic beliefs and seemingly innocent friendships. Fevered talk of another war infiltrates their small, privileged circle, giving way to a thrilling solution: a great and charismatic leader, who will restore England to its former glory.

At a party hosted by her new friends, Phyllis lets down her guard for a single moment, with devastating consequences. Years later, Phyllis, alone and embittered, recounts the dramatic events which led to her imprisonment and changed the course of her life forever.

'Wonderfully subtle and compelling' Linda Grant


'Uncanny, evocative, atmospheric' Sunday Times

'Connolly is a terrifically subtle writer... [she] slyly sweeps her readers into the period drama as tensions tauten between families and social classes' Daily Telegraph

'Wonderful, tragicomic... beautifully researched' The Times

Critics Review

  • Profound and moving and completely original, with a storyline that is completely satisfying. It’ll be one of those novels that stays in my mind forever… it’s a work of art

    Craig Brown
  • I finished it in two days flat and I’ve never read anything quite like it. Everything about the book rings true, politically, psychologically, and in period detail, from the sunny beginnings to the grim end

    Hilary Spurling
  • A wonderfully subtle and interesting account of the Mosley women, with a compelling voice

    Linda Grant
  • Wonderful, tragicomic… beautifully researched

    The Times
  • One of the best books published this year

    The Lady
  • Uncanny, evocative…. Connolly skilfully sets scenes in pared yet atmospheric prose

    Sunday Times

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