Audioraamat: Marley

From the acclaimed author of the “marvel of a novel” (Entertainment Weekly) Finn comes a masterful reimagining of Charles Dickens’ classic A Christmas Carol with this darkly entertaining and moving exploration of the twisted relationship between Ebenezer Scrooge and Jacob Marley.

Young Ebenezer Scrooge and Jacob Marley are very different in temperament when they meet in the gloomy confines of Professor Drabb’s Academy for Boys, but they form a bond that will endure for the rest of their lives.

As years go by, with Marley’s genius for deception and Scrooge’s brilliance with numbers, they build a shipping empire of dubious legality and pitiless commitment to the slave trade, concealing their true investments under the noses of the London authorities. Circumstances change, however, when beautiful Belle Fairchild steps into Ebenezer’s life and calls into question the practices that made him wealthy. Under the influence of a newfound passion, Ebenezer tries to turn Scrooge and Marley’s business toward better ends, but his partner is not ready to give up his unsavory past or easy profits so quickly. Ignoring the costs to themselves and those around them, the two engage in a shadowy war against each other, leading to an unforgettable reckoning that will echo into their futures.

Brilliantly written in Jon Clinch’s signature “spellbinding” (The Washington Post) prose, Marley is an unforgettable reimagining that will forever deepen the way you view the Christmas classic.

'By some uncanny act of artistic appropriation, [ Clinch] has, without imitating Dickens, entered into the phantasmagoric realm that is the great novelist's quintessential territory'startling and creative'remarkable' Masterly.' 'The New York Times Book Review

From the acclaimed author of Finn comes a masterful reimagining of Dickens's classic A Christmas Carol with this darkly entertaining exploration of the relationship between Ebenezer Scrooge and Jacob Marley.

'marley was dead, to begin with," Charles Dickens tells us at the beginning of A Christmas Carol. But in Jon Clinch's ingenious novel, Jacob Marley, business partner to Ebenezer Scrooge, is very much alive: a rapacious and cunning boy who grows up to be a forger, a scoundrel, and the man who will be both the making and the undoing of Scrooge.

They meet as youths in the gloomy confines of Professor Drabb's Academy for Boys, where Marley begins their twisted friendship by initiating the innocent Scrooge into the gentle art of extortion. Years later, in the dank heart of London, their shared ambition manifests itself in a fledgling shipping empire. Between Marley's genius for deception and Scrooge's brilliance with numbers, they amass a considerable fortune of dubious legality, all rooted in a pitiless commitment to the soon-to-be-outlawed slave trade.

As Marley toys with the affections of Scrooge's sister, Fan, Scrooge falls under the spell of Fan's best friend, Belle Fairchild. Now, for the first time, Scrooge and Marley find themselves at cross-purposes. With their business interests inextricably bound together and instincts for secrecy and greed bred in their very bones, the two men engage in a shadowy war of deception, false identities, forged documents, theft, and cold-blooded murder. Marley and Scrooge are destined to clash in an unforgettable reckoning that will echo into the future and set the stage for Marley's ghostly return.

Meticulously crafted and beguilingly told, Marley revisits and illuminates one of Charles Dickens's most cherished works to spellbinding effect.