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Shortlisted for the 2008 Man Booker Prize, and set against the backdrop of a London from the 1950s to the present day, The Clothes on Their Backs is a wise and tender novel about the clothes we choose to wear, the personalities we dress ourselves in, and about how they define us all.

In a red brick mansion block off the Marylebone Road, Vivien, a sensitive, bookish girl grows up sealed off from both past and present by her timid refugee parents.

Then one morning a glamorous uncle appears, dressed in a mohair suit, with a diamond watch on his wrist and a girl in a leopard-skin hat on his arm. Why is Uncle Sandor so violently unwelcome in her parents' home?

This is a novel about survival - both banal and heroic - and a young woman who discovers the complications, even betrayals, that inevitably accompany the fierce desire to live.

Reviews and Press Quotes

Sue Arnold, The Guardian

“This definitely has edge.”

Sunday Express

“If you read only one novel this year, make sure it is The Clothes on Their Backs.”

The Independent

“Her novel is at once a beautifully detailed character study, a poignant family history and a richly evocative portrait of the late 1970s.”

The Mail on Sunday

“A terrific novel, bursting with life.”

The Sunday Times

“A meticulously textured and complex novel.”

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Content Advisory

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• Violence: Mild
• Sex: Mild
• Language: Mild

This recording is unabridged. Typically abridged audiobooks are not more than 60% of the author's work and as low as 30% with characters and plotlines removed.