9780062467522
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The Evening Spider audiobook

  • By: Emily Arsenault
  • Narrator: Bernadette Dunne
  • Category: Fiction, Historical, Thrillers
  • Length: 10 hours 21 minutes
  • Publisher: HarperAudio
  • Publish date: January 26, 2016
  • Language: English
  • (1406 ratings)
(1406 ratings)
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The Evening Spider Audiobook Summary

A gripping blend of psychological suspense and historical true crime, this riveting novel–inspired by a sensational real-life murder from the 1800s–by critically acclaimed author Emily Arsenault delivers a heart-stopping mystery linking two young mothers from different centuries.

Frances Barnett and Abby Bernacki are two haunted young mothers living in the same house in two different centuries.

1885: Frances Barnett is in the Northampton Lunatic Hospital, telling her story to a visitor. She has come to distrust her own memories, and believes that her pregnancy, birth, and early days of motherhood may have impaired her sanity.

During the earliest months of her baby’s life, Frances eagerly followed the famous murder trial of Mary Stannard–that captivated New Englanders with its salacious details and expert forensic testimony. Following–and even attending–this trial, Frances found an escape from the monotony of new motherhood. But as her story unfolds, Frances must admit that her obsession with the details of the murder were not entirely innocent.

Present day: Abby has been adjusting to motherhood smoothly–until recently, when odd sensations and dreams have begun to unsettle her while home alone with her baby. When she starts to question the house’s history, she is given the diary of Frances Barnett, who lived in the house 125 years earlier. Abby finds the diary disturbing, and researches the Barnett family’s history. The more Abby learns, the more she wonders about a negative–possibly supernatural–influence in her house. She becomes convinced that when she sleeps, she leaves her daughter vulnerable–and then vows not to sleep until she can determine the cause of her eerie experiences.

Frances Barnett might not be the only new mother to lose her mind in this house. And like Frances, Abby discovers that by trying to uncover another’s secrets, she risks awakening some of her own.

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The Evening Spider Audiobook Narrator

Bernadette Dunne is the narrator of The Evening Spider audiobook that was written by Emily Arsenault

Emily Arsenault is also the author of The Evening Spider, The Broken Teaglass, In Search of the Rose Notes, Miss Me When I’m Gone, What Strange Creatures, and the young adult novel The Leaf Reader. She lives in Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts, with her husband and daughter.

About the Author(s) of The Evening Spider

Emily Arsenault is the author of The Evening Spider

The Evening Spider Full Details

Narrator Bernadette Dunne
Length 10 hours 21 minutes
Author Emily Arsenault
Category
Publisher HarperAudio
Release date January 26, 2016
ISBN 9780062467522

Subjects

The publisher of the The Evening Spider is HarperAudio. includes the following subjects: The BISAC Subject Code is Fiction, Historical, Thrillers

Additional info

The publisher of the The Evening Spider is HarperAudio. The imprint is HarperAudio. It is supplied by HarperAudio. The ISBN-13 is 9780062467522.

Global Availability

This book is only available in the United States.

Goodreads Reviews

Meg

September 22, 2015

Fascinating (true!) historical mystery told in diary/epistolary format, interspersed with contemporary 1st person narration, both about newly married women with infants living in the same house. Sounds complicated, but it wasn’t once I got into it - then it ended up keeping me turning pages late into the night! Loved, loved, loved how it all turned out.

Jennifer

November 08, 2020

3.5 StarsEnjoyable mystery with a bit of paranormal added in. I enjoyed the back and forth between Frances' life in 1885 and Abby's life in the present day. It was kind of interesting to learn that this was based off real cases. I would read more by this author if I came across them.

Colleen

February 13, 2016

Find my full review at http://aliteraryvacation.blogspot.com.When I read the synopsis for The Evening Spider I immediately reached out to the wonderful ladies at TLC Book Tours and asked to please be a part of this tour. It had so many elements I love in one package: historical setting and true crime; psychological suspense; possibly ghosts with nefarious plans creeping around a creaky old house, terrifying a new mom. Jackpot! Now having finished I'm a little torn about how I feel about the story overall. Did I enjoy it? Very much! Did it live up to what I was expecting in my head or give me the gasping shock I wanted as my mind was blown by unexpected revelations? Not exactly. The set up of the chapters was a little odd to me at first, but as I kept reading I really began to enjoy it. The story is broken up in short, alternating chapters between Frances in a Lunatic Asylum in 1885 as she relays to her brother the actions that brought her there five years before and Abby in 2014 trying to figure out what spirits might be haunting her house and possibly injuring her baby daughter. Once I got used to this pattern I found that it definitely kept the pages turning as little, unsettling bits of information are continuously dropped for the reader just before it switches back to the other storyline. And there are some legitimately creepy aspects about both storylines that I found just delicious. I think my favorite creepy aspect would have to be Abby trying to figure out whether her house is truly haunted or whether she might be starting to lose her mind. She hears shushing on her baby monitor, doors are hard to open as though someone is pushing against it, she starts having these disturbing nightmares with someone else's baby in it as well as dreams that hint at something horrible having happened in Abby's past....it all adds up to just a general feeling of foreboding and I kept waiting to see exactly which way her somewhat tenuous hold on sanity was going to fall. This isn't to say that Frances's story didn't have a lot to offer. From the get-go the way she was having such a seemingly innocuous conversation with her brother while sitting in a Lunatic Asylum made me think she was off her rocker and was going to really shock me with what we were going to learn. She was a very odd character and the way she presented her story made me think I wasn't quite getting the full picture. Towards the end of the novel I kept feverously turning pages to see what would happen and then.... Unfortunately I found the ending for both storylines odd and mostly unsatisfying. For the life of me I cannot figure out why the author chose to end both the way she did. We only learn bits and pieces of what really happened in Frances's story while never getting much reasoning or follow up and, in Abby's case, I still don't fully know what was happening. Abby makes a decision in her past that, no matter which way I try to reason it, I cannot fathom why she did it and there is no real resolution to her story. I was left feeling sort of like....is that all? Unsatisfying ending aside The Evening Spider did hold my attention and give me hours of entertainment. Others might like the ending better than I did, so if the synopsis sounds like something you would generally enjoy I would recommend giving it a try. Just don't expect to be blown away when you turn the last page.

Kelly

January 04, 2016

3.5 starsI love Emily Arsenault's books. They're incredibly creepy and also incredibly smart. This one is sort of a ghost story, and it's actually chilling.There's so much going on in The Evening Spider that it's actually hard to discuss in any detail without the risk of spoiling things. So here's what I can say: I very much like Abby and empathized with what was going on with her.Because of the way this is written, I had some very real questions about what was really happening and what was in Abby's head. This made the book even creepier than it may otherwise have been, because is there anything scarier than the idea that you may be more of a harm to your child than whatever it is you think is potentially a harm to your child? (SO CREEPY.)There's such an insane feeling of dread going throughout the book, too. Everything about it is just intense. This book may not be for everyone, but if you like spooky stories, it's absolutely for you.Recommended.

Katherine

May 26, 2020

Excellent suspense thriller. Kept me on my toes and definitely a page turner. Would highly recommend to anyone looking for a mystery.

Diane

March 18, 2016

A few years ago, I read Emily Arsenault's novel What Strange Creatures and loved the brother/sister sibling relationship at its core. Her latest novel, The Evening Spider, has a sibling relationship in it as well, although that is not the central issue of the story as it was in What Strange Creatures.The inspiration for this story came from the author hearing what she thought was human voice over her daughter's baby monitor shushing the baby. She combined this with an interest in the true story of the murder of a woman in the 1800s, a woman she believed to be an ancestor.The Evening Spider introduces us to Abby, married to Chad, and new mom to baby Lucy, who has moved into an old house in the small town of Haverton, Massachusetts. Abby hears a voice over Lucy's baby monitor that sounds like someone is shushing her baby.This unnerves Abby, and she does a little research about the previous owners of the house. She discovers that there is a diary from Frances Barnett, who once owned the house with her husband, Matthew, a lawyer.Abby reads the diary and becomes fascinated with Frances, especially the letters Frances wrote to her brother Harry from a lunatic asylum Frances had been sent to by her husband. Frances was a new mom too, like Abby, and she became obsessed with a murder trial that her brother had a connection to.As Frances' story unfolds through her letters, Abby tries to learn why Frances was committed to a hospital. She turns to the head of the local historical society for more information and a local medium to see if her home is haunted by Frances or someone else.The story took awhile to get going, but once it does, it intrigues the reader. I found so many layers to this psychological suspense, including an incident that happened to Abby in college that may color her actions in the present.Frances is a captivating character. She loves science, and her interest in how arsenic works gets her into trouble. She wasn't a traditional housewife with traditional interests in cooking and sewing, and that made people suspect of her.I also found it surprising that in 1885 forensic science played such a big role in the murder trial. I would have thought that a recent phenomenon, but the lawyers used detailed forensic information from respected scientists to help prove their cases. (I hope this doesn't mean we'll see a new CSI:1885 series.)The Evening Spider is a novel about obsessions- Frances for the murder trial and Abby's obsession with Frances. It features interesting, well-developed characters (just like in Arsenault's previous book), and the ending of the story is a surprise to the reader.Fans of John Searles' Help For The Haunted will enjoy The Evening Spider. They both involve mediums, a haunted house and taut psychological suspense. And although I was a new mom over twenty years ago, Arsenault brings back those memories and fears of new motherhood vividly in this story.I highly recommend The Evening Spider. It's a creepy, taut, suspenseful story that will keep you up at night reading to the end.

Becky

January 28, 2016

Abby is a new mom with time on her hands. When she first hears the strange noise through her baby monitor, she's quick to attribute it to anything and everything she can. Anything but a ghost, that is. But after eliminating the possibilities, she begins to wonder. A history teacher, Abby was charmed by the fact that their house dated back over a century. What's more, the house had been in the same family for much of that time before she and her husband bought it. But now she wonders about the house and the people who lived there. Is it possible that one of them, someone from long ago, never truly left?I do so love Emily Arsenault's work. She's one of those authors whose new releases will always end up on my must have list! Her stories always have elements of mystery and suspense, but this one is a little different in that it's part historical fiction and part ghost story as well.Arsenault talks about how stumbling over the very real murder of Mary Stannard inspired part of this story. The Stannard trial is one her other lead character, Frances Barnett, follows in her own day. Abby learns of Frances (and the case) via a journal found in the home years before. But the reader learns of Frances through flashbacks as well - from her time in a mental asylum.Throughout the story there are really two burning questions: is Frances haunting the house and, if so, what is her intention? The ghost seems to soothe baby Lucy but the first occurrence of the noise is also linked to a mysterious bruise, the first of many, that appears on the child.Abby is a little off. She's experienced trauma in her past - the second chapter of the book is her discovery of her dead roommate in college! That story is just one of the threads that runs through Abby's part of the book.As for Frances, the reader isn't quite clear about why she's been institutionalized.There are a lot of parallels between Frances and Abby and it's easy to sympathize with them both. In them, Arsenault has built two very strong characters whose tales are undeniably gripping. Nineteenth century crime, the treatment of mental illness, and post partum depression are all featured in the book as well, all coming together in yet another thrilling puzzle of a read from Arsenault!

CoffeeTimeRomance

June 14, 2016

I did not know whether to be shaking in my shoes or read with the lights on. The Evening Spider WILL definitely capture your attention. The reading from both Abby's and Frances's point of view just added more chills to this story. I awaited with baited breath to get to the end just to find out the mystery, and I was totally surprised and not at disappointed. This was my first book by Ms. Arsenault but I have already hunted down more of her books for reading! Kudos on a VERY thrilling read.MatildaReviewer for Coffee Time Romance & MoreOfficial Review @ Coffee Time Romance & More

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