Friends Like These

By: Sarah Alderson

Narrated by: Ellie Heydon, Jasmine Blackborow

Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins

Publisher's summary

A gripping thriller about fake friendships and the truth that lies behind the Facebook page, for fans of The Girlfriend and Friend Request.  

We all know someone like Becca.   

She has the job everyone wants, a designer wardrobe, a hot-shot lawyer boyfriend, holidays to exotic locations. And she flaunts her perfect life all over social media.  

It drove her colleague Lizzie mad, but she couldn't stop looking. They were never really friends - and yet Lizzie knew everything about her.   

Or did she?   

When chance and a terrible mistake pull Lizzie back into Becca's orbit years after they lost touch, she'll realise that you can't always believe what you see online...and that finding out the truth might be the worst thing you can do.   

There's no such thing as a perfect life. Only a perfect lie. 

©2018 Sarah Alderson (P)2018 Hodder & Stoughton Limited

Finally a new twist

I enjoy listening to mysteries and physiological thrillers. I’ve been in quite a dry spell finding the same basic theme dragged out way to long. This book was well performed, kept my interest and lots of fun all the way through.

Brilliant! Loved It!

'Friends Like These' was a very good, exciting book with an excellent premise and quite a surprising ending. Our heroine is a busy body, chatty type who loves to gossip about everyone at work. She's energetic, tireless, and reminiscent of Bridget Jones in that British, too-hard-on-herself way. We go into the book completely irritated with her, but loving her nonetheless.

Then bad things start happening to her as a direct result of her meddling.

The story takes twists and turns and produces a finale that is truly remarkable in that it's original.

I thought this book was brilliant and I loved it!

5 stars

-Wendi

Absolutely fab book

What a fantastic book. I was hooked from the very beginning. The story was very well written and the narrators were brilliant. I did hope for a different ending from the main story line but there’s a psychological thriller for you!

Unfortunately there is only one Sarah Alderson novel available on Audible at this time, so I will have to be patient. I will look for others read by the narrators.

No warning about no ending

The story is somewhat engaging, despite the fact I had to disconnect reason and realty to a huge extent to be focused enough to listen to the whole book. I gave myself permission to let go and let the story go wherever it was going. I had faith that it would culminate into a realistic ending. No such luck. The ending clearly indicated that the author was done with this story and didn’t have the wherewithal to actually end her story. What a disappointment!

doesn't align

Lizzy 's inner dialogue doesn't match the character she ends up being. It is very distracting how conflicting it is.

Not as good as I hoped it would be.

Bummer. This was just not that good. The ending was very lacking. I was hoping to encounter a twist or two but no.Nothing memorable.

????!!!

Horrible storyline...I don’t get WHY the villain has to sneak her way in and win in the end!?!
Very disappointed with the ending...She killed her and her unborn child and came out shining like a damn star...I really miss stories where the good prevail...Damn she destroyed lives and upgraded hers in the process, and it’s all good,
straight BS....

Narrator good, book okay.i dont like to judge

first off I'll say that I hate to give it one star so I didnt because someone might really like this, but I had so much trouble getting into this book. I continued even though I did not like the story, it was so petty and childish to me. I just could not believe the story and that someone would be this shady, not even crazy just obsessive and stupid. If you like work drama and high school drama well maybe you'll like this but I did not think this was a good story

I felt duped.

Someone else wrote: "Lizzy 's inner dialogue doesn't match the character she ends up being. It is very distracting how conflicting it is." and this is exactly how I felt. I felt very lead on my the author to have certain feelings for the main character, and then have her be a completely different person in the end. It was less of a twist and more of a lack of character development. The ending was also disappointing.

Not bad, but not great...

I'll say one thing for "Friends Like These" and that is the plot twist was unique for sure. This premise had a lot of potential but somehow, the storytelling fell short. The characters feel underdeveloped, and the storyline is clunky. I almost threw in the towel about a third of the way in based on the odd main character (she just makes really dumb decisions and you want to shake her) but kept listening to see what would happen. I'm glad I finished it, but I probably wouldn't recommend it unless you have absolutely nothing else to read in the thriller-suspense category.

The narration ruined the entire experience.

I knew this book would annoy me and it did not disappoint. I assumed the story would be very basic and that I would be able to figure out all the "twists" and "surprises" early on and I was ok with that. I was looking for something simple to help me fall asleep. But I found the narrator (I'm not sure if there were two? If so they sounded exactly alike) to be so annoying. All of her characters sounded just like her only they spoke with some kind of weird, slurred drawl like they were drunk or something. Seriously, why did The detectives, James and Autumn all sound alike?! It would have been fine for one character voice but she did it for ALL of the characters and that just about drove me mad. So I ended up hating all of the characters including the two main girls.

I also found this book to be repetitive. The interrogation screens were exactly the same and offered no new information. Honestly, you could have cut out the whole of chapter 25. Also, none of these characters were fully developed or likeable. I wanted this book to be fun, simple and surface but with the narration and repetitive writing I was mostly irritated.

Had to stop listening

I stuck half of this out then had to stop listening. The basis of the story was actually ok but the characters were all unbelievable. The main character was irritating & unlikeabke & the other characters just over the top & silly. The narrator was annoying too, especially with the character of James.
I was really disappointed as the reviews were good & was surprised at what a load of tosh it was.

Wow what a story!

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, just when I thought I had figured it out, another twist came. Can’t wait to read the authors next book.

Fantastic roller coaster of a book

This was a great listen and I could have listened for a few more hours it was so good. Difficult to write a review without giving a spoiler. The book is a bit different from the usual and there are plenty of twists right to the end. I enjoyed both narrators and felt they really 'acted' out the characters well. Was not quite so fond of the male voices though. I felt the author really drew out the characters of both women and it both evoked mixed feelings that evolved throughout the course of the story. I will certainly look out for more titles by this author.

Not worth it

It was building up to greatness but failed. The narration was great though! I was just disappointed towards the end, felt like the story was rushed.

Really Good

Brilliant story, kept me hooked, couldn't put it down. Great narration
Need more like this

Really good book

Great ending, I’m glad it wasn’t predictable. Twists and turns which makes you think you know what’s happening, until you don’t.

Twisty!

This was so clever! All the way through I kept thinking I knew where it was headed and I was wrong each time. Just brilliant. Loved it.

Very enjoyable!

I really enjoyed this book. The characters are well developed, the story a little different when so many in this genre are derivative and the narration was very goo.

Enjoyable in parts

Well written characters and the potential to be a great story but too far fetched. I really enjoyed aspects of this book but found it unbelievable in parts and wasn't desperate to find out what happened and when I did was underwhelmed. With so many positive reviews I expected to enjoy this a lot more. Very disappointing.