Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

Preview
  • The Wanderers

  • By: Tim Pears
  • Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
  • Length: 8 hrs and 38 mins
  • 4.8 out of 5 stars (28 ratings)

£0.00 for first 30 days

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 Wanderers

By: Tim Pears
Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
Try for £0.00

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

Buy Now for £15.99

Buy Now for £15.99

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.

Summary

1912. Leo is on a journey. Aged 13 and banished from the secluded farm of his childhood, he travels through Devon, grazing on berries and sleeping in copses. Behind him lies the past, and before him the West Country, spread out like a tapestry. But a wanderer is never alone for long, and soon Leo is taken in by gypsies. Yet he knows he cannot linger and must forge on to Penzance.

Life on the estate continues as usual, yet nothing is as it was. Lottie’s father is distracted by the promise of new love, and Lottie is increasingly absorbed in the natural world. And of course, Leo is absent. How will the two young people ever find each other again?

©2018 Tim Pears (P)2018 Isis Publishing Ltd
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

Listeners also enjoyed...

The Redeemed cover art
Ill Will cover art
Landed cover art
I Can Jump Puddles cover art
The Untouchable cover art
The Grey Horse cover art
As the Earth Turns Silver cover art
World Made by Hand cover art
The Hurley Maker's Son cover art
Thieving Forest cover art
The Winemaker cover art
Beck cover art
An Untamed Land cover art
The Homesman cover art
Salt Creek cover art
An Irish Country Doctor cover art

What listeners say about The Wanderers

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    22
  • 4 Stars
    6
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    23
  • 4 Stars
    2
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    20
  • 4 Stars
    5
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 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

Compelling and vibrant

A wonderful narrator bringing to life book two of this evocative tale of the life of Leo and lotte. A look back into country life - if you live nature this is a perfect 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

Elegant, vivid, compelling - a keeper!

Mesmerising. Elegant wordsmithery, beautifully narrated; vividly captures a bygone West Country and evokes a compelling tale. A contemporary classic. Definitely a keeper.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

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

Lyrical and evocative

The Wanderers is the second novel in Tim Pears’s West Country trilogy. Like the first book, The Horseman, it was longlisted for The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction. (The author recently made it three out of three when the final book in the trilogy, The Redeemed, made the shortlist for the 2020 prize.) I listened to the audiobook version, superbly narrated by Jonathan Keeble, who really captured the rhythm of the writing and created distinct voices for the various characters.

The end of The Horseman saw young Leo leaving his home to head westward, filled with guilt that an innocent act should have resulted in dramatic consequences for his family. Penniless and without the means to sustain himself, he is rescued by a band of gypsies. There follows a wonderful section of the book in which Leo is introduced to gypsy culture and travels with the Orchard ‘tribe’. Once again, his bond with horses and his riding ability form a key part of the storyline. Learning that the gypsies do not intend to travel further westward, he parts company with them in a thrillingly opportunistic way. Once more Leo finds himself travelling alone, reliant on his own enterprise or the kindness of strangers to feed him and provide him with shelter.

Throughout the book, the author populates Leo’s journey with a wonderful cast of characters, such as the patriarch of the Orchard family and an old shepherd. Often he meets people living on the margins of society. For example, an ailing hermit, a veteran of the Boer War who senses the country is moving towards war once again.

During his travels Leo is educated in country ways such as the care of sheep, and how to forage and live off the land. These are described in realistic detail – in some cases, perhaps rather too realistic for those on the squeamish side! As in The Horseman, there are wonderful descriptions of the landscape through which Leo passes. The author vividly depicts a way of life that progresses at a very different pace to our own, one much more aligned with the seasons. Of course, the reader knows it’s a way of life that will shortly be changed forever by the coming of war.

Meanwhile, back on the estate, Lottie feels increasingly invisible as her father’s attention is diverted elsewhere. She fears being sent away from the estate and the countryside she loves so much and being unable to pursue her interest in nature and biology, not considered suitable subjects for a young lady in her position. She clings to the hope that Leo, the only person who seems to understand her passion for the natural world, will keep his promise to return.

The book ends at a turning point for Leo, and for the country. I’m looking forward to finding out what happens in The Redeemed, the final book in the trilogy, which will pick up Leo’s and Lottie’s story in 1916.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful