Our Father cover art

Our Father

Preview

£0.00 for first 30 days

Try for £0.00
Thousands of incredible audiobooks and podcasts to take wherever you go.
Immerse yourself in a world of storytelling with the Plus Catalogue - unlimited listening to thousands of select audiobooks, podcasts and Audible Originals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Our Father

By: Marilyn French
Narrated by: Marianne Fraulo
Try for £0.00

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically.

Buy Now for £21.99

Buy Now for £21.99

Confirm Purchase
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.
Cancel

About this listen

Famed presidential advisor Stephen Upton has suffered a stroke, and his four very different daughters gather in his perfectly appointed mansion outside Boston to await his death or recovery.

Elizabeth, cold and calculating, fights hard for every success and pays a high price; beautiful Mary has always needed a man to support her tastes, but time is catching up with her; Alex can't remember her childhood and wants to know why; and Ronnie, illegitimate and proud, refuses to acknowledge her feelings for the man they all love and hate.

In the weeks to come, they will learn one another's terrible secrets, and the astonishing truth about the life they might have shared.

Once again, Marilyn French has written an extraordinary novel of our times - a novel of family love and resentment, of sisterhood and fatherhood, of acceptance and rejection and the search for peace.

©1994 Belles-Lettres, Inc. (P)2013 Audible, Inc.
Family Life Women's Fiction
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

Critic reviews

"Should strike a chord with every woman who is willing to think honestly about the place of femaleness in the world." (Chicago Tribune)

What listeners say about Our Father

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    43
  • 4 Stars
    17
  • 3 Stars
    6
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    5
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    37
  • 4 Stars
    22
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    4
Story
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    34
  • 4 Stars
    13
  • 3 Stars
    12
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    3

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

Beautifully written, moving and intelligent

The narration is excellent and I found the story compelling and powerful. This felt like an important novel to read with fully developed characters.

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
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Our Father

Powerful and moving story. Excellently written and narrated. Trite as it seems, I feel like a better person after listening to this! Gave me a lot to think about in terms of my own relationships.

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

Slow but so good

The characters are interesting and the story is just a background to some very interesting thoughts about the feminine condition and racial discrimination. Really enjoyed this 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
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

What a clever storyteller!

Such strong messages told through the experiences of 4 very different women. Men didn’t come out of it so well. Maybe not all men, but the system - the patriarchy. The enduring power of such a state makes one quake at the very idea of working out a way to change it. The corruption runs so deep, the privilege and entitlement the very heartbeat of our western culture. Seems a very steep mountain …

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
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Superb narration and characters

I have never read a book from this author before but I would definitely look for more of her work.

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
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Very engaging

I kept trying to stop listening to this book. I felt I had no interest in the character's lifestyle, background etc. but I kept coming back to it. The characters gradually grew on me and I was interested in knowing more about them and listening to their thoughts, and the narratives about class, race, status and survival. This was a very long gently unfolding story that ultimately, and to my surprise I really enjoyed.

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

Intimate Brave Compelling Story

I loved this book. Well read. I could envisage each character and saw the surroundings as if I was there. Very thought provoking, interesting and informative. Five stars all the way.

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

Nice long story.

Good narration and interesting characters. Listened to it every night
in bed for a week.

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

I miss them all already!

Immersive, tremendous, great value listening. I loved the development of the women’s relationships; four sisters by different mothers, all bound together by terrible shared experience that has been buried deep but still seeping out awful damage. So very human and relatable the reveals are perfectly placed. Ronnie, Alexandra, Elizabeth and Mary I salute you! Now off to find more Marilyn French audible books. Excellent narration, addictive and hypnotic.

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
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

A hard story to listen to, beautifully written

I found this novel compelling and towards the end I found it really difficult to stop listening to it. I laughed, cried and cried. I liked the four main characters; each of them flawed in their own way. Some of their ideas made me mad, some irritated and some provoked reflection. I know this novel will stay in my mind for some time as I worry over its parts.
My only criticism is that the actor narrating often used the same voice, intonation and emotion for all the characters, which at times had me rewinding to be certain who was saying what.

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

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!