PERFECT HAPPINESS

By Penelope Lively

Synopsis

Frances, happily married for many years, is suddenly plunged into mourning. Her celebrity husband, Steve, has died leaving her unprepared and vulnerable. At first she is completely submerged in her own loss until, shocked by the unexpected revelations and private sufferings of others, she is drawn agonizingly into life - not into perfect happiness but into the sunlight of new hope.

Sample Player

Narrator	Pauline Beale
Length	8hrs 30mins
Catalogue No.	13723
Publisher	Penguin; 1998

Other audiobooks by Penelope Lively

AMMONITES AND LEAPING FISH: A LIFE IN TIME

In this charming but powerful memoir, Penelope Lively reports from beyond the horizon of old age. She examines the tricks and truths of memory and looks back over a lifetime of reading and writing. And finally she looks at her identifying cargo of possessions - two ammonites, a cat, a pair of American ducks and a leaping fish sherd, amongst others.

BEYOND THE BLUE MOUNTAINS

A delightful collection of short stories from a master storyteller.

CITY OF THE MIND

An architect occupied with constructing a new future for London's Dockland comes to terms with his own destiny.

THE GHOST OF THOMAS KEMPE

James is fed up. His family has moved to a new cottage – with grounds that are great for excavations, and trees that are perfect for climbing – and stuff is happening. Stuff that is normally the kind of thing he does. But it's not him who's writing strange things on shopping lists and fences. It's not him who smashes bottles and pours tea in the Vicar's lap. It's a ghost – honestly. Thomas Kempe the 17th century apothecary has returned and he wants James to be his apprentice. No one else believes in ghosts. It's up to James to get rid of him. Or he'll have no pocket money or pudding ever again.

HEAT WAVE

Pauline is spending the summer at World's End, a cottage somewhere in the middle of England, with her daughter Teresa and baby grandson Luke. But she can only watch in dismay and anger as her daughter repeats her own mistakes in love. The heat and tension leads to a violent, startling climax.

THE HOUSE IN NORHAM GARDENS

No.40 Norham Gardens, Oxford, is the home of Clare Mayfield and her two aged aunts. Clare discovers a vividly painted shield in a junk room which her great-grandfather, an eminent anthropologist, brought back from New Guinea. She is determined to find out more about its strange tribal origins. But then dreams begin to haunt her - dreams of another country, another culture, and of shadowy people whom she feels are watching her. Who are they, and what do they want?

IN SEARCH OF A HOMELAND

Trojan warrior Aeneas flees burning Troy and seeks a new homeland for his people. His journey takes him over oceans and new lands where he encounters giants, monsters, gods and goddesses, in this retelling of a 2,000 year old epic.

LIFE IN THE GARDEN

Penelope Lively has always been a keen gardener. This is partly a memoir of her own life in gardens, such as her grandmother's garden in Somerset and the urban garden in the North London home she lives in today. It is also an engaging exploration of gardens in literature, from Paradise Lost to Alice in Wonderland, amongst others.

MAKING IT UP

In this fascinating work of fiction the author takes moments from her own life and looks at how things might have developed otherwise. What if she had become pregnant at eighteen, married someone else or taken a different career?

METAMORPHOSIS: SELECTED STORIES

Wry, compassionate, and glittering with wit, Penelope Lively's stories gets beneath the everyday to the beating heart of human experience. In intimate stories of growing up and growing old, chance encounters and life-long relationships, Lively explores with keen insight the ways that individuals can become tangled in history, and small acts ripple through the generations. From new and never-before-published stories to forgotten treasures,Metamorphosis showcases the very best from a literary master.

MOON TIGER

Claudia Hampton, a beautiful, famous writer, lies dying in hospital. But, as the nurses tend to her with quiet condescension, she is plotting her greatest work: 'a history of the world ... and in the process, my own'. Gradually she re-creates the rich mosaic of her life and times, conjuring up those she has known.

OLEANDER, JACARANDA

Penelope Lively provides snapshots of recollection of childhood in Egypt, during the 1930s in a land of canals, palm trees, mud-brick villages and water buffalo, under the ever-watchful eye of her nanny Lucy. Even the second world war did not disrupt her idyll which was finally shattered by adolescence and her parents' divorce.

PASSING ON

Helen is 52 and Edward 49 when their mother dies, ending her reign of terror and leaving them ill-equipped to deal with their lives. Timid, cautious and naive, Helen makes the charming Giles Carnaby, familiy solicitor, the object of a belated schoolgirl crush; while Edward, free to express his sexuality at last, finds it gets the better of him. Dorothy may be dead and buried, but her iron grip continues to hold them in its power.

THE PHOTOGRAPH

Whilst searching in a cupboard, Glyn finds a sealed envelope on which his wife had written 'Don't Open - Destroy'. Naturally Glyn decides to open the package and what he finds makes him question whether he ever knew his wife at all.

THE PURPLE SWAMP HEN AND OTHER STORIES (X Rated)

In this varied collection of short stories we hear of a bird and a servant girl in ancient Pompeii who cannot converse, but share a perfect understanding; a dream house that is hiding something sinister and an old woman doing her weekly supermarket shop with a secret past that no one could guess. X rated, contains offensive language and explicit sex.

SPIDERWEB

A much travelled anthropologist retires to a quiet Somerset hamlet. Here she finds that life is just as complex as in any other society she has encountered.

TREASURES OF TIME

Hugh Paxton was a very important archaeologist and highly influential man. The BBC want to make a documentary about him, but history has a habit of rearing its head. And as the film-makers take over the family home, and begin to delve into Hugh's life, there are unexpected upheavals along the way.