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Evenings and Weekends

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Evenings and Weekends

By: Oisín McKenna
Narrated by: Isabel Adomakoh Young
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About this listen

'I COULDN'T PUT IT DOWN' SHON FAYE

'A MASTERPIECE. THIS SEARING TALE OF LOVE, SEX AND CLASS WILL RESONATE FOR GENERATIONS TO COME' OWEN JONES

'I WAS DEEPLY MOVED BY ITS BEAUTY AND HUMANITY' COCO MELLORS

'Electric and intimate' Guardian

'Impossibly, ineffably beautiful’ Russell T Davies

'Intoxicating' Irish Times

London, June 2019. Maggie is 30, pregnant and broke. Faced with moving back to the home town she fought to escape, she’s wondering if having a baby with boyfriend Ed will be the last spontaneous act of her life. Ed, meanwhile, is harbouring secret dreams of his own.

Phil hates his office job and is living for the weekend, while falling for his housemate, Keith. But there’s a problem: Keith already has a boyfriend. Then there’s Rosaleen, Phil’s mother, who’s tired of feeling like a side character in her own life. She’s just been diagnosed with cancer and is travelling to London to tell Phil, if she can ever get hold of him.

As Saturday night approaches in a city on the brink of political upheaval, all their lives are set to change forever. It’s the hottest summer on record, and the weekend is about to begin.

What readers are saying…

'I’ve had a week long book hangover. Read it!'

'A book I will carry with me in my heart'

'The best book I've read in recent years'

'My life got just a bit richer from having read this book'

'I absolutely loved it, every word'

©2024 Oisín McKenna (P)2024 HarperCollins Publishers
City Life Friendship Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Literature & Fiction Urban England Heartfelt
All stars
Most relevant
Great narration, the story is compelling, earnest and at times sad but pulls you into a world that feels alive.

Thoughtful and warm..

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So very clever, the writer gives us the flaws the joys the mistakes and the loves of these people on the pages. The narration is perfect. The struggles and normally unseen parts of the human voice with all its differences and sameness is characterised in truly believable pictures of our fabulous community of ordinary people.

Digging deep into our strengths and frailties

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This book with its clear and concise language is like being taken on a walking tour of Dalston and Bermondsey through the interwoven lives of friends who live there. As a local to the area it felt like I was listening to the chat of group of friends at the table opposite me in my favourite pub.

A walking tour of East London

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I mostly enjoyed this book though I’ll admit to being a little non plussed by the hype it has been getting. There is a fairly standard plot device (the book is primarily set over a sweltering weekend in London). Lives intersect, stories are intertwined and characters interact with the fate of a stranded whale in the Thames, a story thread that is dropped by the author suddenly and without a satisfactory conclusion. Satisfactory doesn’t have to mean happy, by the way. The whale storyline served no real purpose, neither did the main character connected with it, ‘the Princess of Whales’. She is just one character that could have been culled without affecting the power of the main plot and main characters’ story arcs. For me, the heart of the story is Maggie and Phil and their lifelong soul friendship. I could have done with fewer B characters and a greater focus on Maggie’s history, inner life, and motivations. When we get it, like when Maggie riffs on prochoice not just meaning the choice not to have a baby, but also the choice to have a baby and that choice being facilitated by a living wage, universal healthcare and affordable housing, it is eye and heart opening.

Too many B characters

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My one complaint is that the narrator pronounces the author's name wrong. 'Usheen', not 'Osheen'. Overall a well-written story.

A great book.

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