Clara’s Verdict
The British wartime family saga is a genre that could easily slide into nostalgia dressed up as drama. Kitty Neale avoids that trap in A Family Secret, the second book in her Battersea Tavern series. This is London in 1940 – bombs, rationing, secrets, and an indestructible sense of community under pressure – and Neale is good enough a writer to make that setting feel lived-in rather than costumed. If you read The Battersea Tavern (book one), this picks up the characters with affection intact. If you haven’t, you may find yourself wishing you had started at the beginning.
At just under ten hours, it rewards patience. The emotional satisfactions here are cumulative rather than immediate – trust the characters, trust the wartime atmosphere, and it delivers.
About the Audiobook
Winnie Berry runs the Battersea Tavern with the kind of open-door warmth that makes her the neighbourhood’s unofficial confessor. Her abusive husband has left – a relief – but her heart is not safe: she is falling for Harry Hampton, a black-market trader who is already married and who is drawing her steadily into his web of complications. Simultaneously, her son has returned to London, not to visit his child but to charm the new barmaid, a development that will send shockwaves through the family.
The book is properly plotted, with multiple strands running simultaneously: Winnie’s romantic vulnerability, her son’s shiftless charm, the fallout that accumulates when people keep secrets under the pressure of the Blitz. Neale’s strength is in her secondary characters – the regulars at the Tavern, the neighbours, the women who hold the community together while the men are elsewhere fighting or scheming. The Blitz backdrop is handled with historical care: the bombs are present not as dramatic backdrop but as a fact of daily life, shaping decisions and compressing time in ways that feel authentic.
The Narration
Annie Aldington narrates, and she is a natural fit for this material. Her instinct for working-class south London voices is good without tipping into caricature, and she differentiates the characters reliably across nearly ten hours. The emotional beats – Winnie’s moments of hope, her dawning recognition of danger, the darker revelations – are handled with restraint that makes them land harder. Aldington does not overplay the wartime atmosphere; she lets the writing do its work.
What Readers Say
UK readers have awarded the book 4.6 stars, with praise running consistently warm. “A brilliant follow on from the first book – such a lot of twists and turns, kept me guessing with every turn of the page,” one reader wrote, adding they were looking forward to the next in the series. Another described it as “perfect for people who like to read family saga.” One particularly evocative review came from a reader who noted: “It put me at the scene of the war. Not all doom – funny as well.” That mixture of darkness and warmth is exactly what Neale is aiming for, and readers have recognised it.
Who Should Listen?
This is ideal for listeners who love British wartime fiction, family sagas, and the kind of community-centred drama that places ordinary people at the centre of extraordinary circumstances. Fans of Lenny Barker, Pam Evans, or Elaine Everest will feel immediately at home. It is most rewarding for those who have read book one, but it stands independently well enough for new listeners to follow. Start here, then go back to the beginning – you will want to.
Listen to A Family Secret on Audible UK: Get it on Audible. Also available on Kobo, Scribd, and Storytel.
