I really enjoyed this fun audiobook with Tom Allen’s brilliant brand of humour! ‘Tom Allen is Actually Not Very Nice’ is made up of three different shows: Tom Allen is Not Actually Very nice, The Correspondent and Headliners, the last which is an interview with Tom Allen.

The first part of the audiobook contains the show which the audiobook is named after and is a radio show that Tom Allen presented in front of an audience with fellow presenter Gabby Best. I found myself enjoying this radio show, as each episode features Allen as he speaks about a certain situation in life where he hasn’t acted very nice, recreating the incident with Gabby Best pretending to be in different roles and then asking the audience how they would respond in such a situation or for any of their stories to do with these situations. I found this show increasingly funny with each episode, especially with the audience interaction which made each episode feel so fresh and brilliant. While the humour from Allen about his past encounters is funny, it’s definitely the anecdotes that come from the studio audience and Allen’s reactions to them that made me enjoy this first part of the audiobook so much.

The second part of the audiobook is The Correspondent, a short set of episodes with Tom Allen narrating solo throughout. At first I wasn’t sure what to make of this as I haven’t listened to a lot of comedy fiction radio shows before, but this was actually so very funny, especially as the episodes go on and you get used to just how silly this is! Allen narrates his day, as he makes his way to work and then spends the day at his place of work, as the sole person corresponding wit hcustomers at a compaints department for a furniture company. From his terrible little office to his annoying boss and the silly different complaints customers send, and how Allen responds to them, just made me laugh so much! There are about ten episodes of this, each one charting a different day of work and I love how things progress to be worse and worse for Allen until that eventual ending. The correspondent made me laugh so much, it has some funny sound effects, music and just feels so silly that I’m glad it was included on this audiobook as I am sorry to have missed it when it originally aired on the radio.

The final part of the audiobok features an interview conducted by Nihal Arthanayake, and although not as funny as the first two comedy shows, this interview was surprisingly interesting, especially as Allen talks about his past, growing up in his home town of Bromley and some other aspects of his life too. The interview felt like an interesting conversation between the interviewer and interviewee, and I enjoyed learning more about Allen while he injected some of his classic humour into the chat.

Overall I have really enjoyed listening to this audiobook and would recommend it for anyone who loves Tom Allen’s sense of humour. There’s nothing too rude in this audiobook but there is a lot of brilliant humour and it made me laugh so much, especially The Correspondent! I’ll definitely look into buying this for myself and a few others who I know love Allen’s humour too.

Several extremely funny laugh out loud moments, would recommend and will definitely be checking out Tom's podcasts/books in the future

Absolutely love Tom Allen so requesting this was a no brainer and it did not let me down! This collection of projects is ideal for anyone wanting to get to know more about Tom and his past work

I adore Tom Allen, he makes me laugh so much, and I loved his autobiography however was not so keen on this publication.

I like Tom and have seen him on other programs but not one of his own. This is a nice mixture as you get him interacting with the audience, then you get the correspondent where he’s doing a job dealing with customer complaints letters and lastly his interview. I enjoyed this audiobook and he definitely gave me laugh out loud moments.

I would like to thank netgalley and Penguin Random House UK Audio for a free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

The main component of the book, 4 episodes of 'Tom Allen is actually not very nice' was funny, but took up less than 50% of the book. I skipped the add ons.

Hilarious! Tom Allen is one of my favourite people in entertainment. He always makes me belly laugh and this was no exception! Hysterical and sly.

I really did laugh out loud. I like Tom Allen (despite the name of this). He has gone from strength to strength in recent years. A great easy listen!

I love Tom Allen so I leapt at the chance to review this book. I was not disappointed in anyway and i have recommended this book to other fans, my friends who are not familiar with the author and his comedy, and would absolutely recommend this book to other NetGalley reviewers.

I am already a fan of Tom Allen, being an avid listener of his podcast 'Like Minded Friends'.
This audiobook is split into 2 sections: the first being recording of love stand up and the second being a radio play.
I enjoyed both, but I found the radio play a surprise as I wasn't expecting it. It was well written, believable and relatable, as Tom muddles through starting a new job with nightmare awkward situations that anyone who has worked in an office environment will relate to.
The stand up was classic Tom Allen, my favorite being the gym segment which still has me laughing.

My first foray into reviewing an audiobook and a good one to start with!

This is a compilation of four episodes of Tom Allen Is Actually Not Very Nice, along with Series 1 and 2 of The Correspondent, plus a bonus in the form of Radio 5 Live's in-depth interview show, Headliners, where Tom chats to host Nihal Arthanayake.

Tom Allen is very funny and works well off the audience in 'Is Actually...', coming across like a more acerbic Graham Norton (if such a thing were possible!). The Headliners interview is a good addition where Tom opens up on his upbringing in suburbia and coming out.

Really good listen from a very talented comedian and keen observer of everyday life.

I shouldn’t really review this because honestly, I think Tom Allen could read a bereavement section of a newspaper and still have me in hysterics. His delivery is so assured and convincing that he doesn’t actually need good material which is fortunate because you can’t prepare for what an audience will come up with when you are riffing off them.

I couldn’t listen to this on my walks because I was getting some VERY strange looks, giggling my head off.

Just what you need to cheer you up during a pandemic ❤️❤️❤️❤️

I am a big fan of Tom Allen and so just having some of his work collated in a way that I could dip into whenever I wanted was excellent. Smart and very funny this was a light, fun listen at any time. I hope there are further collections.

I found this audiobook is very entertaining, I would highly recommend it.

Many thanks to netgalley and Tom Allen for the advanced copy of this book. I agreed to give my unbiased opinion voluntarily.

Many people know Tom Allen through his TV appearances on The Great British Bake Off & Bake Off: The professionals. His own comedy act is less well known.
Tom Allen is Actually Not Very Nice is not an audiobook, but a collection of Tom Allen’s work, some comedy/standup shows, a series of monologues and an interview. I hadn’t heard these before and the advantage of being a collection of bite-sized pieces made it easy to listen to whilst driving or doing other things. It is a bit of a mish-mash of content & "The Correspondent" is a bit dated, but overall if you enjoy Tom Allen’s humour you will probably like this collection of sketch comedy, humerous interludes and observations.

Disclosure: I received a copy of this audiobook free via NetGalley. Whilst thanks go to the publisher for the opportunity to read it, all opinions are my own.

#TomAllenisActuallyNotVeryNice #NetGalley

I really like Tom Allen, but I found this audiobook was a very odd collection of his work.

I mostly enjoyed the 'Tom Allen is Actually Not Very Nice' BBC radio episodes at the beginning of this audiobook - a show with a studio audience, it works quite well, though it's not his best work.

But they're followed on by The Correspondent ('bittersweet comic monologues'), and then an interview. To me, The Correspondent in particular didn't fit well with the other sections. It was 'okay' but not something I'd seek out or even look to buy. It was quite hard work getting through it.

Then the interview was interesting, but felt like audiobook filler.

I'd much rather have a whole audiobook of 'Tom Allen is Actually Not Very Nice' than this strange mix of TA-related things.

The first is the collection of episodes from the BBC radio show; The Tom Allen is not very nice. Hence the title of the book. I hadn’t heard these before and they were fun.

I’m not sure that this collection of different things really works together as a “book”. After the ‘Tom Allen is not very nice’ episodes you have The Correspondent (comic monologues) followed by and interview.

I enjoyed the first part the most but as a whole collection felt disconnected.

I really enjoyed this for a variety of reasons. Tom Allen's ability to interact with the audience is superb, and the caricature created in both the Audience Participation element and the narrative created within the office were light and enjoyable, whilst discussing relatable and interesting topics. Often it harked back to his original stand-up, which I didn't mind at all, and I find Allen is in his element when in front of a crowd vs skits/staged dialogue. Give the man a panel show already, I'd love to see it.

The audio book 'Tom Allen is Actually Not Very Nice' combines four episodes from the eponymous show, along with eight episodes of 'Correspondent' and a bonus interview.

As you would expect from Tom Allen, the sense of humour is quick, wry and sarcastic. It made me laugh out loud on a number of occasions, particularly his interactions with the audience. Allen has made a living out of being an observer who you struggle to picture living normal life outside of TV. He capitalises on this throughout. I would recommend this to anyone who needs a laugh and who doesn't during these COVID fuelled times.

I was attracted to this audiobook because I have enjoyed Tom Allen on various TV programs but have never seen him in his own show.

This is not a novel or memoir but a collection of his projects.
The first group of episodes was from the titular live Radio show, where Allen asks the audience to help him be nicer. This was funny, very much the Tom Allen I am familiar with and I loved his interaction with the audience.

The second section are episodes of a comic monologue - The Correspondent. The style is a modern form of the epistolary novel and it took an episode or so to get into the rhythm but when I did I enjoyed it, though as a wry commentary on life rather than laugh out loud funny of the live show.
It was also surprisingly dated.

The last section was the most enjoyable. It was an interview with Nihal Arthanayake and it was simply a pleasure listening to them discussing different aspects of Tom Allen’s life including his memoir ‘No Shame’ – a book that has now been added to my ‘must have’ list.

Highly recommended for anyone who is, or thinks they mght be, a fan of Tom Allen.