A Dark-Adapted Eye cover art

A Dark-Adapted Eye

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A Dark-Adapted Eye

By: Barbara Vine
Narrated by: Harriet Walter
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About this listen

Like most families, they had their secrets...

...and they hid them under a genteelly respectable veneer. No onlooker would guess that prim Vera Hillyard and her beautiful, adored younger sister, Eden, were locked in a dark and bitter combat over one of those secrets. England in the '50s was not kind to women who erred, so they had to use every means necessary to keep the truth hidden behind closed doors - even murder.

©1986 Kingsmarkham Enterprises Ltd (P)2014 Audible, Inc.
Amateur Sleuths Family Life Fiction Private Investigators Psychological Suspense Mystery Detective
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What listeners say about A Dark-Adapted Eye

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

very strange.

I listened to the whole book. very confusing. never got t grips with it

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

Such intricate family trees and detailed history.

Very complicated storyline that was difficult to follow. I gave up after Chapter 3, I never do that!

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

Beautifully written and read but how intense!

Tremendous performance by Harriet Walter. Barbara Vine writes beautifully. A deep and intense account of a family secret with a tragic ending.

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

a wonderful, skilled book.

The writing was superb as was the narration. This book puts very many modern stories to shame. I loved it.

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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

A Dark Adapted Eye

A spellbinding story of human emotions and follies which kept me enthralled from start to finish. Harriet Walter’s narration was superb! Thank you Audible!

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

Intriguing and unusual. Beautifully narrated.

A tale of family secrets and lies brought together by clever plotting and a first-rate narrator.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Tried hard to listen

Tried hard to keep going with the story but really it's very dreary so boring, sorry not for me! The reader was good though and did her best.

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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

Who doesn't love a family secret?

A Barbara Vine book I always meant to read but never did which is a shame as the gentle, detailed story telling belies a superb psychological thriller. Unlike more recent examples of the genre, this is no sensational quick fix but a crafted tale set in a by-gone era where societies attitudes were different to those of today.
The title's worth a mention - the 'dark-adapted eye' [one that has adjusted to darkness so that it's able to discern the shape of things] is that of Faith, the two main protagonist's niece, as she looks back upon her family's checkered history, to analyse it, unravel it's darkest secrets, that ultimately lead up to the murder of one aunt & the subsequent hanging of the other as set before the repeal of the death penalty.



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

Great storytelling

A thoughtfully written story from Barbara Vine with excellent narration by Harriet Walter. The story is complex and I thought it developed slowly- in fact I almost gave up due to the complicated nature of the timeline and the host of different characters.
However I’m glad I persevered and I became determined to find out who the victim was and why. I can’t say that I liked any of the characters much but that doesn’t detract from the story being a fascinating one.

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

Not her best novel

I have listened to a couple of previous novels and really enjoyed. However, i found that I couldn’t really care about the story or the characters, and was left unfulfilled by this book.

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