Is there an audiobook of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe?

Yes. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has an Audible audiobook edition, narrated by Michael York.

How long is the The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe audiobook?

The The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe audiobook runs 4 hr 21 min.

Is The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe on Kindle Unlimited?

No. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was not included with Kindle Unlimited when we last checked on July 12, 2026.

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: Classic Fantasy Tale for Kids (The Chronicles of Narnia Book 2) by C. S. Lewis book cover for the Book of the Day fantasy book review

Our score

4.9/ 5

Incredible

Listen to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: Classic Fantasy Tale for Kids (The Chronicles of Narnia Book 2) free with an Audible trial Narrator, runtime & our audio review

Buy on Amazon

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Prices may vary.

EDITION PUBLISHEDOctober 2008

Genres

Fiction Fantasy Classics

Themes

Betrayal and the pull of feeling importantSacrifice and redemptionTyranny made visible through an endless winterCourage in ordinary-seeming children

The Lion, the Witch and the WardrobeClassic Fantasy Tale for Kids (The Chronicles of Narnia Book 2)

Name: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: Classic Fantasy Tale for Kids (The Chronicles of Narnia Book 2)
Price: 11.99 USD
Availability: InStock
Author: C. S. Lewis

C. S. Lewis

C.S. Lewis's The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe sends four siblings through a wardrobe into a snowbound, talking-animal Narnia ruled by a jealous witch, and builds a compact fantasy adventure that still lands for readers of any age.

The Review

Our take

You feel the cold before you understand it. Lucy pushes through fur coats expecting a wall and instead her foot lands on snow, and Lewis never slows down to explain how a wardrobe can open onto a forest. That's the first thing this book gets right: it trusts the door and moves straight through it, and so do you. There's no throat-clearing chapter of rules or maps. A faun with an umbrella is standing there under a lamppost in the middle of nowhere, and that image alone tells you everything about the tone you're in for, cozy and strange in the same breath.

Narnia itself works because Lewis keeps the stakes physical rather than abstract. The White Witch hasn't just seized a throne, she's made it always winter and never Christmas, which is a genuinely brilliant way to make tyranny legible to a child reader: you feel the wrongness of an endless season before anyone tells you it's wrong. Every creature Edmund meets on his solo detour into her camp, and every kindness the other three receive from strangers along the road, keeps the political situation grounded in small, specific encounters instead of lecture. When Mr. Tumnus risks his own neck for a girl he's just met, that's the whole moral architecture of the book compressed into one gesture.

The real spine, though, is Edmund. His slide into betrayal isn't a plot device bolted on for tension, it's the most psychologically alert thing in the book: a boy who feels smaller than his siblings finds someone who makes him feel important, and he keeps choosing that feeling even as the cost becomes obvious. Lewis doesn't soften what that costs him, or the family, and the reckoning that follows hits harder for being so unshowy about it. Aslan, when he finally arrives, isn't written as a plush children's-book mascot. He's magnetic and a little frightening, joyful and grave in the same scene, and the sacrifice at the book's center plays out with a weight that most adult fantasy can't manage in three times the pages.

The pacing is brisk almost to a fault. Lewis covers what another writer might spend three hundred pages on in barely more than a hundred, and a few transitions, Edmund's full turn especially, happen fast enough that you could blink and miss the hinge. But that briskness is also the book's gift: nothing overstays its welcome, every chapter has a clear job, and the story never loses the reader in scenery for its own sake. It reads in an afternoon and stays with you for considerably longer than that.

Why you should read

Readers who want a fantasy adventure that moves fast
Anyone who loves a talking-animal, secondary-world setting
Families wanting a shared read-aloud with real depth
Fans of clear moral stakes without heavy-handed preaching

What to expect

Brisk, compact pacing across a short page count
A vivid winter-kingdom setting with talking animals
A child character's believable, costly betrayal
A mythic, weighty climax despite the book's small size

What lingers isn't the snow or the swordfights, it's the lamppost. A fixed point of ordinary light standing at the border of an impossible world, marking the spot where a wardrobe stopped being furniture.

Reviewed by Rowan · How our reviews are written

Our verdict

4.9/ 5

Incredible

Listen to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: Classic Fantasy Tale for Kids (The Chronicles of Narnia Book 2) free with an Audible trial Narrator, runtime & our audio review

Buy on Amazon

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Prices may vary.

Where to read or listen

Is there an audiobook of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe?: Yes. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has an Audible audiobook edition, narrated by Michael York.
Listen to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe free with an Audible trial
We earn from qualifying Amazon purchases.
How long is the The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe audiobook?: The The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe audiobook runs 4 hr 21 min.
Is The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe on Kindle Unlimited?: No. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was not included with Kindle Unlimited when we last checked on July 12, 2026.
How much does The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe cost?: On Amazon: Kindle $11.99, Paperback $6.04, Hardcover $10.40. Prices as of August 22, 2026 at 5:20 PM EDT and may change.

Filed underFantasy Classics Browse the archive →

CollectionsPage to Screen Short Reads Browse collections →

More by C. S. LewisSee every C. S. Lewis book we've reviewed, with our scores.All C. S. Lewis books →

Common questions

What is The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: Classic Fantasy Tale for Kids (The Chronicles of Narnia Book 2) about?: You feel the cold before you understand it. Lucy pushes through fur coats expecting a wall and instead her foot lands on snow, and Lewis never slows down to explain how a wardrobe can open onto a forest. That's the first thing this book gets right: it trusts the door and moves straight through it…
Is The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: Classic Fantasy Tale for Kids (The Chronicles of Narnia Book 2) worth reading?: We scored The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: Classic Fantasy Tale for Kids (The Chronicles of Narnia Book 2) 4.9 out of 5. C.S. Lewis's The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe sends four siblings through a wardrobe into a snowbound, talking-animal Narnia ruled by a jealous witch, and builds a compact fantasy adventure that still lands for readers of any age.