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The Wasp Factory
- Narrated by: Peter Kenny
- Length: 6 hrs and 12 mins
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The Wasp Factory
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Summary
The Wasp Factory is a bizarre, imaginative, disturbing, and darkly comic look into the mind of a child psychopath - one of the most infamous of contemporary Scottish novels.
"Two years after I killed Blyth, I murdered my young brother Paul, for quite different and more fundamental reasons than I'd disposed of Blyth, and then a year after that I did for my young cousin Esmerelda, more or less on a whim. That's my score to date. Three. I haven't killed anybody for years, and don't intend to ever again. It was just a stage that I was going through."
Enter - if you can bear it - the extraordinary private world of Frank, just 16, and unconventional, to say the least.
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Critic reviews
"One of the most brilliant first novels I have come across." (The Telegraph)
"One of the top 100 novels of the century." (The Independent)
"Brilliant...irresistible...compelling." (New York Times)
What listeners say about The Wasp Factory
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- nick
- 04-06-19
Both mesmerising and aweful
A remarkable book that both mesmerises and horrifies the listener.
Working on multiple levels it is both a physical and philosophical tale of deceit, destruction and rebirth.
And wasps.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Miss B Jackson
- 29-04-15
Shaking
It's not a novel I'll easily forget. The violence in it is very real and balanced by the voice of the narrator. I'm not sure I would've persevered if Peter Kelly's voice hadn't taken some of the edge off, and seemingly embodied the protagonist.
The rituals and the setting of the island remain riveting throughout.
If you've heard about it, give it a try. But don't expect to be bowled over by the ending and I think you'll have a better experience of it than I have.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 17-07-23
Just wow
Gripped from start to finish, beautifully written,beautifully performed, the nonchalant way the violence is described is horrifying and funny at the same time, this book will not be easily forgotten, Brilliant stuff
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Suzanne Leedham
- 10-08-24
Dark, disturbing but compelling
Deserves its modern classic status. Uncomfortable to read but thought provoking as all the best art should be.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Eric O.
- 07-11-24
Frenetic and stunning
The dark humor is infectious, the characters utterly compelling. A dark sharp study of nature and nurture.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Hm&Pd
- 09-09-19
thourally enjoyable!
loved it!
great story, not predictable. fantastically read I just couldn't stop listening. Highly recommend
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Kirsty
- 03-04-23
Disturbing
A highly disturbing book, however although I enjoyed the book and the performance I feel it would have enjoyed it more as a physical book than audiobook
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- WG
- 29-05-23
Fantastic
I read this book many years ago and loved it. The audiobook is brilliant. The narrator’s tone is just right for this twisted tale. Highly recommend.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- D. C. Newitt
- 18-10-23
very descriptive, weird, but not my thing
found the whole book a bit of a struggle to keep me interested. it's very descriptive, but it's an odd story, a delinquent young adult forms the centre of the story... but apart from describing his exceptional oddities and a plot twist, I wondered what the point of the whole story was for.
Excluding the long descriptional passages, I could summarise the whole book within a minute.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Julieiom
- 14-08-24
Really dark and brilliant and not for everyone
First page grabbed me and brought me in to a dark and terrible story .
It was so dark and just got darker.
I thought it was brilliant from the first to the last page.
Loved the narrator whose happy jaunty style against the dark story line made it fabulously edgy.
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