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If I Never Met You

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If I Never Met You

By: Mhairi McFarlane
Narrated by: Sara Novak
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About this listen

Preorder Mhairi's new novel COVER STORY – coming soon!

If faking love is this easy… how do you know when it’s real?

The brand new novel from Sunday Times bestselling author Mhairi McFarlane

Laurie and Jamie have the perfect office romance
(They set the rules via email)

Everyone can see they’re head over heels
(They staged the photos)

This must be true love
(They’re faking it)

When Laurie is dumped by her partner of eighteen years, she’s blindsided. Not only does she feel humiliated, they still have to work together.

So when she gets stuck in the lift with handsome colleague Jamie, they hatch a plan to stage the perfect romance. Revenge will be sweet…

But this fauxmance is about to get complicated. You can’t break your heart in a fake relationship – can you?

‘Beautiful and touching – I loved it so much!’ Marian Keyes

‘Super funny, packs an emotional punch and deeply, deliciously romantic’ Cressida McLaughlin

‘Funny, crackling with sexual tension, and …. a total joy to read’ Louise O’Neill

Contemporary Romance Literature & Fiction Romance Romantic Comedy Women's Fiction Comedy Heartfelt Funny Feel-Good

Critic reviews

‘Beautiful and touching – I loved it so much!’ Marian Keyes

‘Sharply relevant, super funny, packs an emotional punch and deeply, deliciously romantic – perfect on every level’ Cressida McLaughlin

‘Funny, crackling with sexual tension, and full of complex, nuanced characters – a total joy to read’ Louise O’Neill

‘Super-smart, super-funny and super-relatable’ The Sun

‘Mhairi works her magic … Poignant, witty and smart’ Woman & Home

‘A funny, smart and wonderfully romantic book about faking it… and making it. I loved every page’ Lucy Diamond

‘Smart, witty, funny and poignant … a delicious page-turner’ Woman

‘Fresh and smart romance’ Sunday Mirror

Praise for Mhairi McFarlane:

‘I loved it! So funny and warm – a delicious read’ Marian Keyes

‘Wildly funny and wildly romantic… Another wonderful novel from an author at the top of her game’ Louise O’Neill

‘Beautiful, funny and heartbreaking’ Giovanna Fletcher

‘Funny and heartfelt, full of humour and wisdom, I absolutely loved it’ Katie Fforde

‘Intelligent, edgy and laugh out loud funny – a romantic comedy to love’ Sunday Mirror

‘The perfect mix of comedy, whip smart dialogue and all the feels’ Fabulous

‘Mhairi gets the mix of laughs, romance and serious emotional depth just right in this page-turner that stands out from the crowd’ S Magazine

‘Hilarious, clever and beautifully written’ Daily Mail

‘Fiery, feminist, fit, filthy and very timely … astonishingly good’ Harriet Reuter Hapgood

‘Totally hilarious and wincingly real’ Jenny Colgan

‘No-one writes such wry, emotionally complex romantic fiction’ Red

‘The perfect balance of romcom and drama… the ultimate holiday read!’ Grazia

‘Sparky, smart, sore-stomach-laughing kind of read’ Fabulous
All stars
Most relevant
The book started off amazing! Gripping me at the very beginning with the characters and plot. However about 3/4 of the way through it began to drag and i wasn’t quite sure where the book was headed. It never quite climaxed as I’d hoped, especially with such anticipation from the title and character detailing and involvement. This book had the potential to be a lot better than it ended up being. I started to loose interest in the lead characters storyline and got irritated at the deviation from the main plot. A lack of clarity towards the end which is such a shame as it seemed a promising book. And I invested so many emotions in psyching myself up for a great finish only for it to be a subtle ‘release of the balloon’ ending ...oh well. Would still recommend though the characters are fantastic and amazingly read!

Started off great with a lots of action and interest

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Enjoyed this, especially liked the main character Laurie. Good pace. Narrator’s accents were good but she didn’t follow the punctuation or line breaks accurately and some phrases were cut in two, losing their intended meaning and breaking the spell of suspended disbelief. 5 stars for the story but not the narration.

Great story

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three times it took to get past the first chapter, I thought I was going to have to return it. however having finished my previous book whilst struggling to sleep at 3 in the morning I decided to give it another go. I'm really glad I did, it warmed up into a brilliant story which I was sad to see end.

loved it after the first chapter

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I think it was the narrator (Sara Novak) not putting enough emphasis and feeling into certain sections but I didn’t find this book as good as Mhari MacFarlane’s other books.

The narration makes all the difference and there were pauses and slips throughout that were not correct and the voice she gave Laurie didn’t have enough warmth to it when coming to those emotional and difficult conversations.

I also thought the ending of the book was quite sad in that the decision to get married is taken so very lightly.

I hope the next one I read/listen to is better.

Good but not as good as others

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Little slow to start, felt like it was unnecessary to stretch it out that long before anything else happened. liked the character Laurie just at time the narrator made her sound a bit naive and young. Jamie was a little bit cliche in the sense that he seemed the typical ‘misunderstood’ person but without any real drama or excitement although his character was likeable. Overall decent enough story to listen to whilst doing household chores.

Liked it enough

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