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The Dinner (Unabridged) [Audio Download]

by Herman Koch (Author), Clive Mantle (Narrator)

3.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (162 customer reviews)

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Product details

Audio Download
Listening Length: 8 hours and 57 minutes
Program Type: Audiobook
Version: Unabridged
Publisher: AudioGO Ltd
Audible.co.uk Release Date: 2 Aug 2012
Language: English
ASIN: B008RZMNDM

Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (162 customer reviews)

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Product Description

Shortlisted for: International Author of the Year - Specsavers National Book Awards 2012

A summer's evening in Amsterdam and two couples meet at a fashionable restaurant. Between mouthfuls of food and over the polite scrapings of cutlery, the conversation remains a gentle hum of polite discourse - the banality of work, the triviality of holidays. But behind the empty words, terrible things need to be said, and with every forced smile and every new course, the knives are being sharpened. Each couple has a fifteen-year-old son.

The two boys are united by their accountability for a single horrific act; an act that has triggered a police investigation and shattered the comfortable insulated worlds of their families. As the dinner reaches its culinary climax, the conversation finally touches on their children, and as civility and friendship disintegrates, each couple show just how far they are prepared to go to protect those they love.

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Customer Reviews

3.6 out of 5 stars

3.6 out of 5 stars

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

45 of 50 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars The Dinner 5 Aug 2012

By Moonlit TOP 1000 REVIEWER VINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

The Dinner has already sold over a million copies in Europe and it is easy to see why. This is a novel with a compelling narrative, easy to read but with a dark heart to it. It will be loved by book groups because there is plenty to discuss here.

It starts off in a fairly light-hearted way with the narrator, Paul Lohman and his wife Claire, on their way to dinner with Paul's brother Serge and his wife Babette. Paul is dryly humorous about his brother's choice of restaurant, the sort of place where people have to book three months in advance, and throughout the book we are treated to descriptions of the pretentious food they are served (the sort of restaurant where food has a provenance: 'the crayfish are dressed in a vinaigrette of estragon and baby green onions ... and these are chanterelles from the Vosges'). But this is no ordinary dinner party. There is a family crisis which they have to discuss. Both couples have a fifteen year old son and both couples know that their sons have been involved in a horrific act of violence which has been caught on CCTV and shown on national TV. The Lohmans have to decide what they are going to do about this and naturally there are differences of opinion.

As the novel progresses we are given snippets of information about the past and gradually it becomes clear that Paul is an unreliable narrator. This ensures that we never quite know where our sympathies should lie (other than with the victim of the boys' crime, of course).

Koch has said that he got the idea for the book from a similar incident of violence in Spain (where he now lives). What shocked people most was that the boys involved in the crime came from stable middle class families and it set him thinking 'what if ...'. On its own this idea would have been quite a good idea for a novel but Koch's characterisation of the Lohman brothers lifts it to another level and the startling climax will get the book groups going. Recommended.

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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars The Dinner 17 Mar 2013

By L Leeson

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

Books are very much down to individual tastes but I'm afraid that this was not my cup of tea. A bit depressing and none of the characters are particularly likeable. Others may enjoy it but not for me.

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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Weird 23 Jan 2013

By Hoots

Format:Kindle Edition

This book is wholly unrealistic. Full of disturbing and psychopathic behaviour, it is very different from the light-hearted impression created by the title and cover. It does not stand up to any scrutiny and so one is left feeling that this is about the authors fantasy violence rather than a serious story to grip ones attention.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

2.0 out of 5 stars Very strange style of writing

I really didn't enjoy this book at all; I always read a book right through to the end just in case it all comes together by the final page .... unfortunately this one didn't. Read more

Published 16 hours ago by Sunnydaze

1.0 out of 5 stars Nice idea, but very poorly realised

I read... Well I'm not going to tell you what it is called as I think that always spoils reviews. I could tell you what I thought of it but then maybe not, I think that would be... Read more

Published 2 days ago by Rick D Moore