The Girl Before cover art

The Girl Before

The gripping global bestseller

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The Girl Before

By: JP Delaney
Narrated by: Emilia Fox, Finty Williams, Lise Aagaard Knudsen
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About this listen

 SOON TO BE A MAJOR TV SERIES

THE ADDICTIVE MILLION-COPY BESTSELLER

THE SUNDAY TIMES AND BESTSELLER
THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
SHORTLISTED FOR THE BRITISH BOOK AWARDS CRIME & THRILLER BOOK OF THE YEAR
THE SUNDAY TIMES THRILLER OF THE MONTH
THE SIMON MAYO RADIO 2 BOOK CLUB PICK

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Enter the world of One Folgate Street and discover perfection . . . but can you pay the price?

Jane stumbles on the rental opportunity of a lifetime: the chance to live in a beautiful ultra-minimalist house designed by an enigmatic architect, on condition she abides by a long list of exacting rules.

After moving in, she makes a shocking discovery about the previous tenant, Emma, and Jane starts to wonder if her own story will be a rerun of the girl before.

***********

'DAZZLING' - Lee Child
'ADDICTIVE' - Daily Express
'DEVASTATING' - Daily Mail
'INGENIOUS' - The New York Times
'COMPULSIVE' - Glamour Magazine
'ELEGANT' - Peter James
'SEXY' - Mail on Sunday
'ENTHRALLING' - Woman and Home
'ORIGINAL' - The Times
'RIVETING' - Lisa Gardner
'CREEPY' - Heat
'SATISFYING' - Reader's Digest
'SUPERIOR' - The Bookseller

(P)2017 Random House Audio©2017 JP Delaney Crime Thrillers Fiction Mystery Psychological Suspense Technothrillers Thriller Thriller & Suspense Women Sleuths Women's Fiction Detective Crime Exciting Scary Technology

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Critic reviews

This is going to be the buzziest book of 2017 . . . This year The Girl Before will be that book
I was instantly gripped and held captivated by the pace and elegant writing. I devoured it in two straight sittings
A remarkably poised (debut) psychological thriller
Dazzling - a pitch-perfect thriller
The tension is built up subtly, leading to a devastating climax. A really clever thriller . . . [the film] will no doubt become the third big 'Girl' film
Riveting! One of the most compelling page-turners I've read in years. Twisty, turny, and with an ending not to be missed!
Slick, sexy, suspenseful and smart
Original and entertaining
A deeply addictive literary thriller that deserves to be one of this year's biggest successes
Original and brilliantly written
Get hooked on this hair-raiser about a woman who scores what seems like her dream home . . . until she finds out the mysterious fate of the previous tenant
Creepy . . . The buzz around this could not be fizzier
A compulsive, sexy thriller that's set to soar
The Girl Before is deservedly anointed the 'top girl' of this season's suspense novels
Constantly cranking up the suspense . . . a thoroughly satisfying read
Enthralling
A guaranteed best-seller
The most intriguing plot idea I've seen in a good while
Genuinely eerie . . . beautifully handled . . . the pages fly
Riveting . . . Writing with precision and grace, Delaney strips away the characters' secrets until the raw truth of each is revealed
A guaranteed best-seller
A masterfully crafted spellbinder . . . guaranteed to astonish
Superior psychological suspense . . . a cleverly constructed thriller
The plotting is exceptionally well thought-through
A crisp psychological thriller
The Girl Before is more than worthy of the accolades . . . a complex triangle of twisted obsession . . . say goodbye to your nails
A great thriller and one that instantly hooks you in, in the very first line, and never lets you go . . . utterly compelling and very satisfying . . . A wonderful portrayal of psychological obsession at its creepy best
An outstanding debut that is more than a match for Paula Hawkins's The Girl on the Train
The Girl Before is a cat-and-mouse game that toys with our expectations and twists our sympathies. At times almost unbearably suspenseful, it keeps us guessing from the first page to the very last. Don't miss it
Ingenious
JP Delaney builds the suspense
One of the best thrillers you'll read in 2017
A fast-paced page-turner
Horribly compelling
A tense psychological thriller, replete with twists and turns
All stars
Most relevant
Imagine Hitchcock's Vertigo, sexed up and then described by some very unreliable narrators then you've got The Girl Before.
Not a bad book - in fact it's quite an an addictive page turner - I liked the (somewhat glamourised) architectural context and the deliberate repetitive scenarios, but all too 50 Shades in the sexy alpha male depiction (and husky female narrators).
Talking of which, I found the two female narrators almost impossible to distinguish between which did become confusing - the book is probably clearer.

50 Shades of Girl on a Train

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This book was so addictive I literally kept reading anywhere. I loved the comparisons of Emma's past and Jane's present. Good narrators that where familiar except the Norwegian one who also had a sweet voice and an almost British accent. Ps I'm Norwegian too so I was dreading something too Scandi. The book is a great mix between a thriller and a ghost story.

Gripping to the very end!

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It took me a while to get into this book, the story was pretty good but it missed the mark somehow. I struggled to find empathy with any of the characters and the last hour seemed to drag. not for me!

okay

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It's hard to put a finger on exactly what makes some psychological thrillers thrilling, and some fall flat. This is the best of the lot - and I work for Audible so I've listened to quite a few. It could be the opening scenario: the frustrating search for affordable accommodation in London that is familiar to so many, and the thrill of the beyond-wildest-dreams opportunity that presents itself in the form of an aesthetically perfect luxury flat, available for next to nothing.

It could be that the flat itself becomes a character to rival the two main protagonists and the alpha male architect they both covet. It could be dual voices of two different but equally troubled and unreliable narrators.

Whatever it is, this is a brilliant, gripping audiobook that will leave you unable to press the pause button. The tension is wound to breaking point, the atmosphere is claustrophobic and unsettling, the characters are vividly drawn and the twist is as devastating as it is unexpected.

Better that all the 'girl' novels that came before

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The narration was good. I liked the way it was written from different viewpoints. It was easy to follow. However it wasn't suspenseful. I didn't gasp in surprise when the ending was revealed. Not a book I will listen to again.

Disappointing ending.

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