The Best of Times cover art

The Best of Times

A compelling bestseller of secrets, hopes - and worlds torn apart

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The Best of Times

By: Penny Vincenzi
Narrated by: Judy Bennett
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About this listen

 A hot summer's day, a crowded motorway, a split second that changed people's lives forever. Gripping, heartbreaking, exciting and unputdownable, this new novel will be one of 2009's biggest and most enjoyable novels - from the irresistible Penny Vincenzi.

(P)2009 Headline Digital©2009 Penny Vincenzi Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction Women's Fiction Marriage Heartfelt

Critic reviews

Astute Vincenzi is at her absolute best
A very personal, intimate exploration of goodness and doing the right thing at the right time
An unputdownable novel of hopes and dreams, setbacks and secrets
All stars
Most relevant
So many characters it was confusing and didn't get to know any in depth. Interesting idea but a superficial story that had a predictable happy ending.

OK, easy reading.

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Quite entertaining. Kept on thinking it must have been abridged as (for example) a character would furious with someone & it was hard to know preceding reasons why. Rather superficial. Because author chopping &.changing from character to character & scenario to scenario,before a clear picture of each person had been built in my mind it was difficult to remember who we were talking about now. Was really more a documentation of facts than any in depth build up of people & their own personal worlds & how the accident effected them in a personal way; inside their heads, from their point of view.

OK ish. Bit bland

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So disappointed. Didn’t realise it was abridged version. Read the story years ago - huge book and hugely enjoyable. What a shame especially as so well narrated by Judy Bennett aka Shula from The Archers 👏

Badly abridged

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This book was recommended to me and I’m not sure to do this day whether I typed in the correct title and author- I’m ashamed to say someone I know would actually like this book!
Obvious story line, too many bland stereotypes as cataracts- so many in fact that you end up becoming muddled as to who is who. The only differentiation was the narrators attempt at accents. I say attempts because they too, were poor. The worst of this book however is the writing. Cliche after cliche. One star because I once cried with laughter through a whole chapter at the writing....It’s not meant to be a comedy.

Utterly dire

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Don’t bother with this book. Horrible voices and accents put on by the narrator. Not a lot of depth in the storylines or the characters. Only good thing; it’s in English, not American.

Awful

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