An old copper beech overlooks a school, and witnesses all the hopes and loves, dreams and ambitions of the children who grew up there…

By the school house at Shancarrig stands a copper beech, its bark scarred with the names and dreams of the pupils who have grown up under its branches.

Under Junior Assistant Mistress Maddy Ross’s careful gaze the children play, but out of school Maddy’s gaze lingers where it shouldn’t. Maura Brennan, a bundle of fun from the rough end of town, plays with her pals: leap year baby Eddie Barton, the apple of his mother’s eye, and Nessa Ryan, who little realises as she carves his name at the roots of the copper beech on the very last day of school that she’ll get a lot more from one of her schoolmates than her first shy kiss.

The copper beech is the gateway to Maeve Binchy’s marvellous portrait of a small Irish town whose untroubled surface conceals the passions, rivalries, friendships, ambitions and jealousies beneath.

Reviews of The Copper Beech

“You want to read Maeve Binchy’s books as fast as she seems to have written them. This one fairly gallops along because her apparently spontaneous and casual manner covers masterly plotting … It is all very satisfactory” — INDEPENDENT

“Maeve Binchy’s marvellous portrait of a small Irish town whose untroubled surface conceals the passions, rivalries, friendships, ambitions and jealousies beneath” — LOVE READING

“THE COPPER BEECH is as soothing as a cup of tea” — PEOPLE

The Copper Beech

Read by Kate Binchy
Unabridged: 11 hrs and 17 mins


Available in
Unabridged download UK
Unabridged download US

MORE ABOUT MAEVE BINCHY’S AUDIO BOOKS