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The Whispers

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The Whispers

By: Ashley Audrain
Narrated by: Jill Winternitz
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About this listen

Brought to you by Penguin.

The second novel from the author of The Push, 2021's most explosive Sunday Times bestseller!

One morning on Harlow Lane, four families' lives are changed forever.

Whitney Loverly can only sit by her son's hospital bed after he falls from his bedroom window in the middle of the night. She refuses to speak to anyone.

Back at home, the Loverlys' neighbours must reckon with their own roles in the tragedy - their selfless best friends who live across the street, the ambitious Goldsteins who desperately want a family of their own, and the quiet elderly couple who spend their days people watching on the front porch.

But what happens next, when over the course of a week, the hidden and explosive truths that connect these families must come out?

Exploring envy, motherhood and the intuitions that we silence, this is a novel that asks what happens when good people make bad choices.

Perfect for fans of Celeste Ng's Little Fires Everywhere and Liane Moriarty's Big Little Lies.

©2023 Ashley Audrain (P)2023 Penguin Audio Domestic Thrillers Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Psychological Small Town & Rural Thriller & Suspense

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Critic reviews

The Whispers is spellbinding, a shimmering, visceral ride through the dark side of family, of community, of womanhood and mothering. Nobody delves as deep into the guts of motherhood as Ashley Audrain, she really is in a league of her own (Lisa Jewell, Sunday Times #1 Bestselling Author)
Enticing, nuanced, and unflinching, The Whispers opens a secret portal into the private lives of women in suburbia. A narrative portrait of motherhood and marriage, of loneliness and longing, of loss and desire, this is a novel where the characters are so recognizable, it's nearly impossible to feel they are strangers. Rather, through the course of the deeply thrilling and provocative pages, one comes to feel they're as real as neighbours, colleagues and friends. A truly masterful novel (Nita Prose, Sunday Times bestselling author of The Maid)
Riveting ... a fearless deep dive into the real internal lives of women. The Whispers is a brilliant, deeply affecting novel you won't soon forget (Shari Lapena, bestselling author of The Couple Next Door)
All stars
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The story initially intrigued me and by the end I can say it did indeed have a good storyline. BUT the writing style really does not work for me - lots of short sentences, lots of laboured points, lots of chapters basically saying the same thing but including one juicy nugget. I really struggled to get to the end, but I have to say I'm glad I did, as the end made it all worthwhile.

Really struggled to get to the end

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Until I read The Whispers. Ashley Audrain writes characters and plots with such insight, it’s hard to credit the writing as Fiction.
Huge plaudits to the fantastic author for the effort it must have taken to write this book.
Compelling & inspired.
Thank you

I thought The Push was great…

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The push is probably my favourite read ever so this was highly anticipated. As it’s multiple povs it took me a little longer to get into it but when I did it was another amazing book.
Beautifully written female perspectives on the experience of motherhood and identity.

Amazing follow up to the push

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I really enjoyed The Push so was intrigued to see if this could be as good and it was! Another take on motherhood!

Kept me listening.

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Good narration. Characters not always likeable. But an interesting story about the angst of Motherhood.

Excellent read

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I listened to this at every opportunity as it was so engaging. Definitely worth a listen, as is her other book. The push

Sooo good. Couldn’t put it down

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I loved this from all the characters points of views, The little twists they all get. the ending was great.
I loved the narration however something went wrong with my copy with editing I think as beginning of each chapter was missing the start of each word which although I could guess the word, was annoying.

Great apart from..

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This was an amazing listen. I loved every single moment….highly recommend this book. It kept me gripped the whole time.

Brilliant

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I really enjoyed The Push, even with the confusing ending, but for some reason I couldn’t get into this. I think it’s the narration, didn’t draw me in so lost patience with it quite quickly.

Not my cup of tea

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This is my favourite sort of story- marriages and motherhood! . So well done. Excellent ending too.

Loved this

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