Tender is the Night (Classic Fiction)

On the 1920s Riviera the rich and hedonistic disport themselves, drawn by the brilliance and promise of Dr Dick Diver and his fragile wife, Nicole. No one is more infatuated than Rosemary, the beautiful young starlet who will become the main force in Dick's eventual destruction. There's a timelessness about the vacuity of this soulless set that makes the whole dismal story a powerful fable for our times, made totally convincing by the finely nuanced narration. - Rachel Redford, The Observer F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1934 Tender is the Night was his last and most painfully conceived novel. Based on personal experience (the schizophrenia of his wife, Zelda, his affair with a Hollywood actress and the time they spent in Paris, Switzerland and on the Cote d'Azur), it is a sad but hauntingly beautiful exploration of the way in which a needy person leaches the spirit out of a strong one. Dick and his wife Nicole seem to be the most glamorous of couples, but gradually the tragic secrets of their past emerge. Trevor White reads with subtly shifting pace and complete command. - Christina Hardyment, The Times

Though he remains one of the most popular and widely studied of American twentieth-century authors, Fitzgerald is under represented on audiobook. Here, we present the only unabridged recording available of one of his major novels. When the young and naive Rosemary Hoyt comes to the French Riviera in the 1920s, she is bedazzled by the glamorous lifestyles of Dick and Nicole Diver and their high-society set. Yet, beneath this polished veneer, the lives of the Divers are fraught with complexity and anxiety. As their mysterious, problematic past resurfaces, the struggle to keep up appearances takes its toll, and their seemingly perfect lives begin to deteriorate with alarming rapidity. Overflowing with descriptive brilliance and lyrical power, "Tender is the Night" is also remarkable for the strong autobiographical element to the story. In depicting Dick and Nicole Diver, Fitzgerald clearly explores his own tempestuous relationship with his schizophrenic but brilliant wife Zelda.