Can You Keep a Secret?

By: Sophie Kinsella

Narrated by: Kate Reading

Length: 10 hrs and 43 mins

Publisher's summary

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE • From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Party Crasher and Love Your Life comes a novel with the same wicked humor, buoyant charm, and optimism as her beloved Shopaholic series.

“Sophie Kinsella keeps her finger on the cultural pulse, while leaving me giddy with laughter.”—Jojo Moyes, author of The Giver of Stars and The Last Letter from Your Lover

Meet Emma Corrigan, a young woman with a huge heart, an irrepressible spirit, and a few little secrets:

Secrets from her boyfriend: I’ve always thought Connor looks a bit like Ken. As in Barbie and Ken.

Secrets from her mother: I lost my virginity in the spare bedroom with Danny Nussbaum while Mum and Dad were downstairs watching Ben-Hur.

Secrets she wouldn’t share with anyone in the world: I have no idea what NATO stands for. Or even what it is.

Until she spills them all to a handsome stranger on a plane. At least, she thought he was a stranger. . . .

But come Monday morning, Emma’s office is abuzz about the arrival of Jack Harper, the company’s elusive CEO. Suddenly Emma is face-to-face with the stranger from the plane, a man who knows every single humiliating detail about her. Things couldn’t possibly get worse. Or could they?

Praise for Can You Keep a Secret?

“Venturing beyond Saks and Barney’s, the bestselling author of Confessions of a Shopaholic and Shopaholic Ties the Knot entertains readers with backstabbing office shenanigans, competition, scandal, love and sex. . . . Kinsella’s down-to-earth protagonist is sure to have readers sympathizing and doubled over in laughter.”—Publishers Weekly

“If laughing out loud in public places is your bag, be sure to pick up [Can You Keep a Secret?]. Heroine Emma Corrigan is going to be your new best friend.”—Boston Herald

“Kinsella’s timing is so perfect, her instincts so spot-on, that it’s easy to . . . devour the book like the guilty pleasure it is.”—Miami Herald

“Chick lit at its lightest and breeziest . . . filled with fabulous clothes, stalwart friends, and snotty enemies waiting to be taken down a peg.”—Orlando Sentinel

“[Kinsella’s] dialogue is sharp, even her minor characters are well drawn, and her parody of the marketing world is very funny.”—Washington Post Book World

“[A] comedic frenzy of ill-fated events . . . punchy . . . fast-moving.”—Rocky Mountain News

©2004 Sophie Kinsella (P)2004 Books on Tape, Inc.

Critic reviews

• Romantic Times Award Winner - Best Chick Lit Novel, 2004

"Too good to pass up." (USA Today)

Likable characters in laughable situations

Where does Can You Keep a Secret? rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

Well that's a loaded question, isn't it. Hum...well, out of all audiobooks I've ever completed, it's in my top 25 Chick Lit picks.

What other book might you compare Can You Keep a Secret? to and why?

It's similar to Bridget Jones' Diary, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason (both by Helen Fielding); and Sophie Kinsella's Shopaholic series. Similarities abound as these all contain likable, every-girl main characters that readers relate to & root for as the stories unfold. They are all enjoyable, light and humorous examples of British Chick Lit.

What about Kate Reading’s performance did you like?

She has a voice you want to listen to, which isn't always the case when the reader changes their accent, pitch and cadence for each character. Reading get's it right, making each character all the more enjoyable.

If you could take any character from Can You Keep a Secret? out to dinner, who would it be and why?

Although she's only a character in her daughter's conversations, I'd want to take Jemima's mother out to dinner; simply to find out how many men she's crushed beneath her heal....And perhaps to learn how such a woman could actually reproduce.

Delightful

I giggled my way through this book - a funny Bridget Jones-like heroine, toe-curling situations that just make you want to shudder and laugh out loud at the same time, and a lovely, implausible love story too. The ending was a bit abrupt though - almost a "Deus Ex Macchina" type sudden solution for everything. Kate Reading is a magnificent narrator and made the book come alive.

Hilarious!

Very well written and if you don't get bogged down by the main character's stupidity, it's actually hilarious! Many times I laughed out loud.

This is my first time reading a book by this author and I'm hooked.

It's just okay.

Narrator wasn't bad, but not the best either. Sometimes all the characters sounded the same. Emma and Jack needed to.ve developed more to make me want to see them together. Story was a bit dull.

Cute, funny, and romantic!

This book was a light and easy read! It had me giggling many times.

Excellent!

This book is so funny! If you want a sweet romance with a lot of laughs along the way you will really enjoy this book. The narrator is great too!

wrong reader

What a terrible mistake to have the Kate Reading narrate this book. She simply does not "sound" the part. I couldn't get beyond it. Much better to get the abridged version read by Emily Gray who is more the character. The book's good, but to have someone who seems too old and too mature reading a first person narrative is wrong. Listen to the two samples before choosing.

Enjoyable story but not the greatest narration

I enjoyed the story but the voice does not sound like what I imagined. The narrators voice sounds way older than the character

This could really happen to any one of us!

This story was so funny and so far fetched that I could actually imagine it happening to me. I will never, EVER again spill my guts to a perfect stranger on an airplane no matter where I am going or under what circumstances. This cured me from blabbering just because I'm in a situation where I probably will never see someone again. Ha!

Was it Kahlil Gibran who said 'it's better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt'? Wise man. Very wise.....

Entertaining

Cute book. I enjoyed listening to it. couldn't wait to get back to it some days.