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Our Wives Under the Sea

Winner of the Polari Prize, a hypnotic, otherworldly love story

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Our Wives Under the Sea

Written by: Julia Armfield
Narrated by: Annabel Baldwin, Robyn Holdaway
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About this listen

Winner of the Polari Prize
Shortlisted for the Gordon Bowker Volcano Prize

‘A gothic fairy tale, sublime in its creepiness’ – Florence Welch

Our Wives Under The Sea is the haunting novel from Julia Armfiled, the critically acclaimed author of Salt Slow. It’s a story of falling in love, loss, grief, and what life there is in the deep, deep sea.

Miri thinks she has got her wife back, when Leah finally returns after a deep sea mission that ended in catastrophe. But it soon becomes clear that Leah may have come back wrong. Whatever happened in that vessel, whatever it was they were supposed to be studying before they were stranded on the ocean floor, Leah has carried part of it with her, onto dry land and into their home.

Memories of what they had before – the jokes they shared, the films they watched, all the small things that made Leah hers – only remind Miri of what she stands to lose. Living in the same space but suddenly separate, Miri comes to realize that the life that they had might be gone.

'A wonderful novel, deeply romantic and fabulously strange' – Sarah Waters, author of Fingersmith

'Part bruisingly tender love story, part nerve-clanging submarine thriller' – The Times

 Genre Fiction Horror Literary Fiction Literature & Fiction Romance

Critic Reviews

This haunting novel is beautifully written and artfully narrated by Annabel Baldwin and Robyn Holdaway...Thanks to fine performances, Leah's diary entries, Miri's flashbacks, and the unimaginable mystery of the deep ocean all seem real. Listeners won't want to miss this genre-bending love story. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award 2022
Julia Armfield is one of my favourite writers, Our Wives Under The Sea moves fluidly between horror story and love story, the gorgeous and the grotesque. A contemporary gothic fairy tale, sublime in its creepiness (Florence Welch)
A wonderful novel, deeply romantic and fabulously strange. I loved this book (Sarah Waters, author of Fingersmith)
Tender, strange, lucid, and so assured – comparisons feel insubstantial, but if you love sci fi or love stories or books that defy labels or chew-your-arm-off good writing, this is for you (Kiran Millwood Hargrave, author of The Mercies and The Dance Tree)
Beautiful, otherworldly, like floating through water with your eyes open (Daisy Johnson, author of Fen)
Our Wives is spooky and romantic: a gorgeous, lyrical novel that gets under your skin. Armfield leads you softly through a story that feels epic and intimate at the same time (Sarvat Hasin, author of The Giant Dark)
Reading this book is like diving into the deepest depths of the ocean and finding beautiful and disturbing wonders (Kirsty Logan, author of She is Witch)
Delicate and horrifying, Our Wives Under The Sea is a darkly brilliant novel that submerges the reader's imagination in the depths of the unknown (Megan Hunter, author of The End We Start From)
A mesmerizing triumph. Julia Armfield has created a surprisingly seamless novel: it is a love story, a grief story, a question without end. It's a tale of the sea that swallows you whole and breaks your heart in the very best way. It is tender and funny. It is shockingly bold. Without a doubt, it is one of the best books I've ever read. It's not only art, it's a perfect miracle. We are lucky for it (Kristen Arnett, author of Mostly Dead Things)
As in her stories, Armfield is extremely good at anatomising the women’s relationship: the self-defensive blindnesses, the resentments and rituals and angers, grief for vanished joys – all the small moments of which lasting love consists. There are clever lines, everywhere, and wry, funny ones
Sharp, atmospheric, dryly funny, sad, distinctive . . . There is an almost spiritual endlessness to its quest. Like all good novels, it goes deep and then deeper again
All stars
Most relevant
First off, the narrators did a wonderful job, and I especially enjoyed their natural pace,

Secondly, oh wow is this novel gorgeous. It is slow and weird and haunting and gorgeously written. I wonder if it would be a crowd pleaser per say, but for those of us who enjoy slow moments of intense experiences beautifully written, well, this is perfect.

Oh wow

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Not really into cosmic horror, but glad I read this, glad I gave it time and glad I let it haunt me a little.
Never have I ever felt grief, loss, and love in this way.
What a devastatingly beautiful story.

Devastatingly beautiful story

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I've always thought love stories to be a kind of horror stories and vice verse. there is something unextribly connection between love and fear. to love is to the fear, the inevitable loss. through this book Armfield verbelises the duality of deep love for someone and the horror of not recognising them. to grieve, to grapple with loss. to face the visceral experience of plain absense. I love this book so much.

a hauntingly beautiful exploration of grief

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