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The Little Friend

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The Little Friend

By: Donna Tartt
Narrated by: Laurel Lefkow
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About this listen

The second novel by Donna Tartt, best-selling author of The Goldfinch (winner of the 2014 Pulitzer Prize), The Little Friend is a grandly ambitious and utterly riveting novel of childhood, innocence and evil.

The setting is Alexandria, Mississippi, where one Mother's Day a little boy named Robin Cleve Dufresnes was found hanging from a tree in his parents' yard. Twelve years later, Robin's murder is still unsolved and his family remains devastated.

So it is that Robin's sister Harriet - unnervingly bright, insufferably determined, and unduly influenced by the fiction of Kipling and Robert Louis Stevenson - sets out to unmask his killer. Aided only by her worshipful friend Hely, Harriet crosses her town's rigid lines of race and caste and burrows deep into her family's history of loss.

Filled with hairpin turns of plot and "a bustling, ridiculous humanity worthy of Dickens" (The New York Times Book Review), The Little Friend is a work of myriad enchantments by a writer of prodigious talent.

©2002 Donna Tartt (P)2015 Audible, Ltd Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Fiction Scary

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Editor reviews

Winner of the WH Smith Literary Awards 2003, The Little Friend is written by Pulitzer Prize winning author of The Goldfinch, Donna Tartt, with an audiobook narration by the brilliant voice artist Laurel Lefkow. A little boy is found murdered in the front garden of his Mississippi town, the mystery of his death never solved. His sister is the only person who delves deep into the very roots of the community to uncover his killer. This novel is all at once gripping, tense, suspenseful and addictive. It is the work of a master writer. Available now from Audible.

Critic reviews

"A dazzling tour de force” ( Daily Mail)
"Beautifully written and immaculately crafted ... even though there's humour, the tension is palpable. Unputdownable” ( Daily Mirror)
"Harriet is one of the most engaging and rounded characters you are likely to find ... gorgeous, fluent, visual." ( The Times)
All stars
Most relevant  

Is there anything you would change about this book?

The plot!

If you’ve listened to books by Donna Tartt before, how does this one compare?

Her book the GoldFinch is much better.

If this book were a film would you go see it?

No, it is the wonderful writing that kept me listening not the story at all!

Beautiful writing, but boring story

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Great story very engaging found myself looking for to each journey in the car for the next instalment.

Not what I was expecting

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Beautifully written, hypnotic and lyrical and a superb narrator. I am a bit frustrated at the ending but this would not stop me recommending this audio book overall.

A friend indeed...

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Beautifully written and read. I read it when it came out and I've relay enjoyed listening this week. It is brilliant.

Wonderful

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Engaging from the first moment, gripping and suspenseful, with twists and turns and excellently narrated

Brilliant book

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A second novel, like a second album or second anything, is hard. The Secret History is, rightly, well regarded as one of the finest debut novels of all time.

But The Little Friend, barely spoken about at all really, is an over long and overblown story, that aims to be about childhood and long summers, all entwined in a murder mystery, and is ultimately a bore

Nothing wrong with the voice performance here, or the actual quality of the writing, there's simply not enough plot to sustain the story, and it doesn't help that every single character is uniquely unpleasant in their own way, making it hard to support or care for any of them.

Disappointing

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Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Definitely - this was a gripping well written book - with excellent characters

Who was your favorite character and why?

Hariet

Which scene did you most enjoy?

Gum & the cobra

EXCELLENT

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A visceral evocation of interior lives and the impact of imagination on the world around us. skilfully narrated. Really absorbing.

Southern atmosphere and vivid introspection

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Really enjoyed this book, it absorbed me in the time the book is set. Great narration too

Great story beautifully told

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I came to this after listening to The Goldfinch, which I loved, and while this was a very different story, it was once again very enjoyable. Lots of interesting characters, a wonderfully rich setting, and a class narrator. A little meandering at times, but a good rewarding listen, to which I was always happy to rejoin.

Interesting characters, wonderfully rich setting

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