The Secret Chord cover art

The Secret Chord

The Australian Bestseller

 Preview
Try Standard free
Select 1 audiobook a month from our entire collection.
Listen to your selected audiobooks as long as you're a member.
Auto-renews at $8.99/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

The Secret Chord

By: Geraldine Brooks
Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
Try Standard free

Auto-renews at $8.99/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for $27.99

Buy Now for $27.99

About this listen

 From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of PEOPLE OF THE BOOK, YEAR OF WONDERS and MARCH comes a unique and vivid novel that retells the story of King David's extraordinary rise to power and fall from grace.

1000 BC. The Second Iron Age. The time of King David.

Anointed as the chosen one when just a young shepherd boy, David will rise to be king, grasping the throne and establishing his empire. But his journey is a tumultuous one and the consequences of his choices will resound for generations. In a life that arcs from obscurity to fame, he is by turns hero and traitor, glamorous young tyrant and beloved king, murderous despot and remorseful, diminished patriarch. His wives love and fear him, his sons will betray him. It falls to Natan, the courtier and prophet who both counsels and castigates David, to tell the truth about the path he must take.

With stunning originality, acclaimed author Geraldine Brooks offers us a compelling portrait of a morally complex hero from this strange age - part legend, part history. Full of drama and richly drawn detail, THE SECRET CHORD is a vivid story of faith, family, desire and power that brings David magnificently alive.

'a masterly reworking of what fiction and history have afforded Brooks' vibrant and questing imagination' - THE AGE on MARCH

'A single shard of historical fact, a well-worn artefact ... can send her off to the archives to coax fiction from the seams of history in ways that seem almost miraculous to fans and critics alike.' - NEW ZEALAND HERALD

Australian-born Geraldine Brooks is an author and journalist who grew up in Sydney's western suburbs. In 1982 she won a scholarship to the journalism master's program at Columbia University in New York. Later she worked for the WALL STREET JOURNAL, where she covered crises in the Middle East, Africa and the Balkans. In 2006 she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in fiction for her novel MARCH. Her novels CALEB'S CROSSING and PEOPLE OF THE BOOK were both NEW YORK TIMES bestsellers, and YEAR OF WONDERS and PEOPLE OF THE BOOK are international bestsellers, translated into more than 25 languages. She is also the author of the acclaimed non-fiction works NINE PARTS OF DESIRE and FOREIGN CORRESPONDENCE. In 2011 she presented Australia's prestigious Boyer Lectures, later published as THE IDEA OF HOME. In 2016 she was appointed Officer in the Order of Australia for her services to literature, and THE SECRET CHORD was shortlisted for the Indy Awards, chosen by Australia's independent booksellers.

Geraldine Brooks lives in Massachusetts with her husband, author Tony Horwitz, and their two sons. Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Jewish Literary Fiction World Literature Royalty
All stars
Most relevant
Brooks is a superb storyteller. Makes the tunes and characters so compelling... it’s a really worthwhile book. Highly recommended.

Beautifully told story!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
One of the best written books. Captivating from beginning to end. Felt like i was right there feeling what each character felt. Very grateful for Geraldine using her skills to connect us to human nature.

Captivating from start to finish

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
What a feat to have converted this tumultuous story into a novel. Geraldine Brooks is a genius and the narrator more than lives up to his parallel task. Listening to this book, in my ignorance, in the terrifying weeks following the Hamas terrorist attack and Israel’s equally terrifying response in Gaza is bone-chilling, revealing and thought. What a way to learn about such a key moment in history. And relief that it ends on such a moment of hope. A masterpiece.

Another extraordinary historical novel

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

If you could sum up The Secret Chord in three words, what would they be?

The story was good, but the best bit was listening to it with the correct pronunciation . I never would have read it like this.

What about Paul Boehmer’s performance did you like?

Excellent

Audible comes into its own for this book

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The book was a bit hard to follow because the names were foreign I me and it was hard to follow then by hearing the names. I think it would have been easier had I been able to see them on a written page.
The narrator was good, but I didn't like his version of the female characters
I love Geraldine Brooks, but I would not say this is my favourite book of hers. I would not recommend it. I would recommend People of the Book,a favourite of mine.

Not sure audible is best medium for this book

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews
In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.