Precipice, Robert Harris
Precipice, Robert Harris
125 Rating(s)
List: $28.99 | Sale: $20.29
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Precipice
A Novel

Author: Robert Harris

Narrator: Samuel West

Unabridged: 12 hr 25 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Harper

Published: 09/17/2024


Synopsis

“Robert Harris is, simply put, masterful.”—Karin SlaughterA spellbinding novel of passion, intrigue, and betrayal set in England in the months leading to the Great War from the bestselling author of Act of Oblivion, Fatherland, The Ghostwriter, and Conclave.Summer 1914. A world on the brink of catastrophe.In London, twenty-six-year-old Venetia Stanley—aristocratic, clever, bored, reckless—is part of a fast group of upper-crust bohemians and socialites known as “The Coterie.” She’s also engaged in a clandestine love affair with the Prime Minister, H. H. Asquith, a man more than twice her age. He writes to her obsessively, sharing the most sensitive matters of state.As Asquith reluctantly leads the country into war with Germany, a young intelligence officer with Scotland Yard is assigned to investigate a leak of top-secret documents. Suddenly, what was a sexual intrigue becomes a matter of national security that could topple the British government—and will alter the course of political history.An unrivaled master of seamlessly weaving fact and fiction, Precipice is another electrifying thriller from the brilliant imagination of Robert Harris.

About Robert Harris

Robert Harris is the author of fifteen novels, including Act of Oblivion, Pompeii, Enigma, and Fatherland. He has been a television correspondent with the BBC and a newspaper columnist for London’s Sunday Times and the Daily Telegraph. His novels have sold more than twenty-five million copies and been translated into forty languages. He lives in Berkshire, England with his wife, Gill Hornby.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Tom on September 11, 2024

Robert Harris is at the absolute height of his powers in Precipice, a novel of Prime Minister Asquith and Venetia Stanley, the woman less than half his age with whom he had a passionate affair, just as the world turned to fire. At the onset of the novel, as Ireland appears to be slipping towards revo......more

Goodreads review by Andrew on April 21, 2025

Herbert Henry Asquith served as the British Prime Minister from 1908 to 1916. He took Great Britain and the British Empire into the First World War and was the last Liberal Prime Minister to command a majority government. Through his term as P.M. he was married to wealthy socialite Margot. Asquith w......more

Goodreads review by Steph on August 31, 2024

Reluctantly I’m giving this a 3/3.5 as Robert Harris is one of my favourite authors and I’ve been looking forward to this book coming out for ages. It’s a fascinating topic and utterly shocking behaviour by our then Prime Minister but I felt it lacked pace in terms of the story and characters - it w......more

Goodreads review by Iain on November 05, 2024

A curious book that I enjoyed reading not so much for the fictional embellishments that Harris invents, which is quite a slight, thin tale of love, but for the factual, real life story between PM Asquith and Venetzia. It is quite a revelation to learn that the leader of Great Britain during WWI was......more

Goodreads review by Ceecee on December 29, 2024

4.5 rounded up A terrific very well written historical fiction based on the letters between PM Herbert Henry Asquith and Venetia Stanley. The actual letters are used in the book. Kept me riveted throughout. Who knew HHA was such a player??......more