Searching for Grace Kelly

By: Michael Callahan

Narrated by: Kristin Kalbli

For a small-town girl with big-city dreams, there is no address more glamorous than New York's Barbizon Hotel. Laura, a patrician beauty from Smith, arrives to work at Mademoiselle for the summer. Her hopelessly romantic roommate, Dolly, comes from a working-class upstate town to attend secretarial school. Vivian, a brash British bombshell with a disregard for the hotel's rules, rounds out the trio of friends. Together, the girls embark on a journey of discovery that will take them from the penthouse apartments of Park Avenue to the Beat scene of Greenwich Village to Atlantic City's Steel Pier - and into the arms of very different men who will alter their lives forever.

©2015 Michael Callahan (P)2015 ListenUp Production, LLC

Three Girls in the Big City

This book is a lot of fun. If you enjoyed Valley of Dolls, Sex and the City, or any story of female friends making their way through life in the Big City, you will enjoy this read. The characters are fun, the story takes some unexpected turns, and the setting is fantastic. The author does a good job of putting you in 50's New York. I found myself looking forward to my commute so that I could hear more of the story.

The narrator was good too. I enjoyed her accents and the clear voice she gave each of the characters.

Girlfriends

Searching For Grace Kelly is going back in time for a great story. I loved the unexpected twists!

Loved it!

What did you like best about this story?

Searching for Grace Kelly surprised me. The characters are all multi-dimensional and interesting. I especially loved Vivian, but connected with all three. Fair warning, this story doesn't end with a happily ever after. I like books that break my heart, at least a little, and this one did.

What about Kristin Kalbli’s performance did you like?

The character voices were so real and perfectly suited to each character. She expressed the characters' emotions expertly without taking away from the story's words. I loved this as an audiobook.

If you could take any character from Searching for Grace Kelly out to dinner, who would it be and why?

Vivian, of course. She was so interesting and I just wish I got more of her.

Very Entertaining

I'd call this chick at its best. An entertaining story, wonderful sense of time and place -NYC circa 1955; engaging characters. A good choice for the beach. Narration was good, too.

Like listening to an old B&W Movie

I enjoyed this book very much it was like listening to an old B&W Movie, which I love BTW. Especially Dolly’s voice it was the voice of so many characters in old films.

The Barbizon Hotel and New York City were almost their own characters in this story, and it gave a look into many different classes of people in the 1950’s from the elite of Park Avenue to the emerging bohemians and even the back alleys where no single girl should go. Every character in this book is so fully fleshed out I could see everything they did in my head, even the side characters were fascinating. Every character is flawed in one way or another and is trying to hide these flaws which lead to some very interesting storytelling. These three girls Laura, Dolly and Vivian come from such completely different worlds yet as roomies in the big city they become fast friends. I loved how strong all these women were even when they didn’t think they were (Dolly I’m looking at you). They are trying to find careers and maybe a husband but that is secondary, Laura finds two wildly different men so there is a bit of a love triangle but it is very well written and I could see why Laura was attracted to both of them. Vivian’s find is less satisfactory and we see her go through the toughest choices. And Dolly dear sweet Dolly I just enjoyed her character, she isn’t as pretty, skinny or chic as her roommates but she is a good friend. I also loved the bookstore I would hang out there all the time too!

Kristin Kalibi was a new to me narrator and I was blown away, great voices, every character had a distinct sound and even all of the secondary characters had their own voices I will definitely be on the lookout for more books she has narrated!

As I said I really enjoyed this book , if you like historical fiction from the 50’s and old B&W movies I’d say to give this one a try and I highly recommend the audio version of this because Kristin Kalibi’s narration makes this book even better.

4 Stars

I received this book from the publisher (ListenUp Audiobooks) for a fair and honest review.