What a cleverly written book
Fascinating characters
Plenty twists and turns
A story about revenge and decisions that are wrong
Great plot

Thank you netgalley, Charlie Gallagher and Harper Collins UK (audio)

Here is an author than never disappoints. The Friend by Charlie Gallagher was another excellent read and the audiobook was Narrated by: Alexis Rodney who I found brilliant reading this latest book. When your lovely daughter is in a coma after trying to take her own life and someone approaches you and they can tell you why.. and then your wife has been hit by a car. The same person has all the answers but it comes at a price!
All you need to to is meet them to find out! "the truth"

WoW what a great thriller! this was. I was hooked within the first few pages again and then decided to listen to the rest of this book by audiobook. It was brilliant I felt I was part of the audiobook.

I highly recommend both the book and audiobook

Big Thank you to Netgalley, the author Charlie Gallagher and the publishers HarperCollins UK Audio and Avon Books UK for the digital ARC in exchange for my fair and honest opinions.

I was so happy to try out this new thriller audio book. This is a very different style than I usually choose.

Initially although It was really intense i struggled to maintain attention. .However, I am so pleased I persevered!

The characters were varied & plentiful and the plot kept you guessing and guessing with so many twists and turns!

The story was chillingly gruesome in parts and perhaps should have a warning regarding the depths of this darkness?

Without giving away too much away the story provokes concerns for sexual exploitation with young girls and shows how innocent people can be easily manipulated, because of their hurt and love, in to taking revenge in ways never ever thought possible. '

The friends' darkness is chillingly disturbing! There were parts where I was listening with an open mouth!

The story finished very cleverly & brought together all loose ends perfectly and the reader / listener is left feeling satisfied with the answers it provides. (Unlike some endings which leave you frustrated!)

I would thoroughly recommend this book & look forward to future novels by this author.

The narration was also great and carried story perfectly.

'It takes a good narrator to maketh an audiobook'

Thank you Netgalley and the publishers for my advance copy of this audiobook. As a visually impaired member I appreciate these opportunities to continue to enjoy a good book!

This review is entirely my own.

Great narrator chosen. What a gripping storyline made more shocking by how it replicates human behaviour within situations. Be careful who you trust

This is a stunning first book in a series which had me totally hooked right from the start. Charlie Gallagher, a new author to me, has written a fast paced, adrenaline fuelled thriller.

This is definitely an edge-of the-seat book. The storyline is quite dark and has hints of The Stranger by Harlen Corben and The Chain by Adrian McKinty, and the violence was a little graphic at times. It is complex and well plotted with several different strands which all blend together brilliantly.

Alexis Rodney did a great job with the narration.

This is an audiobook with twists a plenty. I'm not sure how much I can say without spoiling it, but it is certainly sinister, and the twists are largely unexpected. I wonder if this is a novel that was written backwards, as it is extremely cleverly interwoven.

The characterisation is satisfactory, I didn't find the characters particularly deeply explored, but they sufficed in moving the story where it needed to go.

A very clever novel, and certainly enjoyable and well narrated in it's audiobook form.

So this Audiobook took me a while to get into but once I did I enjoyed listening to it. The story centres around some teenage girls who are groomed into sending sexualised images of themselves. The fallout of this is one has a breakdown and one takes an overdose and ends up in hospital, one of the girls is the daughter of a local footballer and he wants to know what happened. When a private detective tracks him down and offers him retribution he takes him up on it. What follows are lots of deaths which don't seem linked but obviously are, There is just enough suspense to keep it believable although the means of the murders are a bit far fetched which I find slightly annoying. The narrator was good but one of my increasingly irritating thoughts of audiobooks are when they try to mimic a voice of the opposite sex it very rarely works. A good listen

This was really intense and slow to start but I really loved how all the strands tied together in the end so it made sense. It made me really think about my teenage daughter which is a sign of a good story for me, that it encourages thought.

The narration was great and very well suited the story.

I was given an advance copy by netgalley and the publishers but the review is entirely my own.

‘The Friend’ is a rather complex detective novel, with lots of different layers. I admire Charlie Gallagher for subverting the usual narrative arc, although this does always lead to confusion when you’re listening to an audiobook and can’t easily check details that you’ve already read. For this reason, I feel that I would have enjoyed the novel more as hard copy.

The characters were all interesting, and I particularly enjoyed the character of Joel, the detective, and would enjoy reading more about him in subsequent novels. I found the huge amount of male characters a little confusing, although the author had made an effort to give each one a different personality, occupation, back story etc.

I was wondering when book covers would start to feature trigger warnings, and I felt that this novel is a good example of where some may be required. Although the cover is atmospheric, it does not really hint towards some of the scenes that it contains. I’ve read a lot of crime thrillers, but this one is not for the faint-hearted and does contain some rather graphic descriptions of injuries, and this was not the only aspect of the novel which readers may find disturbing. If you are reading horror, then it is to be expected, but in a crime thriller this was a bit unexpected.

I didn’t really like the narrator of this audiobook - I felt that he paused in some really odd places, and that his intonation didn’t always match what he was saying. This did improve in the second half of the novel but was quite off putting in the first half. I’m giving the audiobook version of ‘The Friend’ three stars, but will be giving it four stars on Goodreads as I was disappointed with the reading.

An incredibly dark and twisted mystery full of twists and turns.
The storyline is brilliant. A (as a parent) terrifying back story that leads in to the current mystery of “The Friend” and what he is doing. I loved the multiple plot lines, shocks, plot twists and reveals. I connected to all of the characters and really felt for the people involved with The Friend.
The audiobook version was a great way to “read” it. The narrator speaks engagingly and keeps your attention throughout. Despite the book following several characters one narrator was able to narrate the entire book well.

Loved listening to this audiobook.

It was thrilling , suspenseful and captivating!

Many thanks for my copy of this audiobook in return for an honest review

Yet another book I nearly gave up on in the beginning only to really get in to later on. I hate it when characters don’t go to the police when it’s so obvious they should, but then the book would have been quite short. This is a creepy tale of manipulation, loss and lack of power. It’s not a feel good book by any means. Read it

The title and cover of this book lead you to imagine a story more 'friendly' than the contents! Be aware, this is a violent thriller about revenge and the darker side of lie. I listened to the audio version and can't say that I really enjoyed it. Not the best narration I've heard recently. I think I would have prefered to have read the book and perhaps would have followed it better. Not really one for me but it's not a bad book and will be great for some people who like this genre.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher and Charlie Gallagher for an ARC in return for an honest review.

I’m not quite sure what I was expecting from this book. I thought maybe it would be a tame thriller. I could not have been more wrong! This is the most intense book I have read in a while. It’s dark, gripping and a little scary! This is the ultimate psychological thriller. Perfect for thriller addicts!

Really enjoyed this book
Ex football star Danny Evans 15-year-old daughter. is lying in hospital in an induced coma after trying to take her own life,
When a stranger approaches him to say he know who made his daughter do this
The police hadn't found who had made Callie his daughter try and take her own life but Danny knows someone is to blame, Will Danny takes him up on his offer.

DI Joel Norris returns to work after his breakdown. Will it be too much to handle as it becomes clearer that his first murder case is part of a much bigger plot?

As the plots progress there are a lot of twists and turns as the story unfolds and what is the link between them all?

Well worth a read or listen as mine was the audio book

I thought The Friend by Charlie Gallagher was really clever, how intricate the stories wove together and slowly unfurled the connections between the victims of the mysterious but deadly do-gooder. It was expertly narrated and every time 'The Friend' spoke, I could hear notes of Fagin from Oliver which I loved! The story quickly drew me in and I was eager to listen to more, firstly about Danny Evans and then about Richard, whom I hoped would be around until the last page. This is the first book by Charlie Gallagher I've read, but it won't be the last. Thanks to Netgalley and to the author for an advanced copy.

Here’s a quick checklist to see if you’ll want to friend The Friend:

- Did you read Harlan Coben’s The Stranger or watch the series on Netflix and like the overall concept but find the execution too far fetched? And/or,

- Were you sucked in by the “game” aspect of J.D. Barker’s A Caller’s Game but disappointed that there was so much explosive over-the-top action? And/or,

- Do you like the central premise of the Saw movies, where a villain puts his victims through tests, but dislike the horror and gore aspects?

- Did you love Adrian McKinty’s The Chain right up until it ended the lamest way possible?

Personally, my answers were yes, no, yes, yes. And since three outta four ain’t bad, I was very intrigued when I saw early praise for Charlie Gallagher’s latest thriller. He’s a new-to-me author - and the cover for The Friend is certainly generic - but I decided to take a chance on it anyway. Sometimes that pays off, and this was one of those times.

This is a thriller with a great plot, fascinating characters, and plenty of twists. I also love that there’s a police procedural element to it. I believe this is the start of a new series featuring D.I. Joel Norris, and consider me signed up for the sequel.

I received a gifted advance listeners copy of the audiobook courtesy of HarperCollins UK Audio via NetGalley for review. Alexis Rodney did an outstanding job with the narration, capturing each of the character’s moods and emotions in his singular performance.

This isn’t my first book by Charlie Gallagher and it won’t be my last. I found this one to be a bit of a slow burner but the suspense and creep factor is on point. Interesting storyline with plenty of twists. The need to continue listening to find out what’s going on is huge and the blurb gives you an idea that you make your own assumptions but they may not be right. I was pleasantly surprised how it veered down another road. I did enjoy it but it lacked the fast pace for me but still worth a listen.

Thanks to Netgalley and Harper Collins UK Audio for the opportunity to listen to and review this ARC that was published on the 1st of April.

This was a good solid thriller with interesting twists and a plot that engaged all the way through. I was given a free audio version to listen to courtesy of Netgalley, and sadly I didn't seem to gel with the narrator, although I can't put my finger on it. I get the impression I would ha e enjoyed the written word more for this one, as I appreciate it's hard to build suspense in an audiobook.

For storyline and plot though, it was great!

‘The Friend’ drew me in with a tantalising synopsis alluding to a deadly game and 2 devastated parents trying to find out why their daughter made an attempt on her own life. A mysterious stranger comes along promising the answers they crave.

This audiobook is a very worthy addition to contemporary crime fiction, and I feel fans of this genre won’t be disappointed. DI Joel Norris is a likeable character, who, I’m sure will have a long and lucrative career spanning a series of novels.

This book doesn’t scrimp on guts and gore! The narrator carries this off very well, being clearly talented and easy to listen to.

The plot is very intricate but written very well so I didn’t get confused at any point!

My thanks to Net Galley, author and publisher for the opportunity to review this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.