Bright Shiny Things cover art

Bright Shiny Things

Hakim and Arnold, Book 5

 Preview
LIMITED TIME OFFER

3 months free
Try for £0.00
£8.99/mo thereafter. Renews automatically. Terms apply. Offer ends 31 July 2025 at 23:59 GMT.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
Premium Plus auto-renews for £8.99/mo after 3 months. Cancel monthly.

Bright Shiny Things

By: Barbara Nadel
Narrated by: Charles Armstrong
Try for £0.00

£8.99/mo after 3 months. Offer ends 31 July 2025 23:59 GMT. Cancel monthly.

Buy Now for £14.99

Buy Now for £14.99

Confirm Purchase
Pay using card ending in
Switch payment method
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.
Cancel

About this listen

Out of the blue, private investigator and ex-soldier Lee Arnold receives a visit from an old army mate, Abbas al'Barri. Now living in Ilford with his family, Abbas is convinced that he's had a message from his estranged son, Fayyaad, who was radicalised and was last thought to be fighting for ISIL in Iraq.

Does Fayyaad's message indicate a change of heart? Abbas is desperate for Lee's help in establishing some contact with him.

©2017 Barbara Nadel (P)2017 W. F. Howes Ltd Action & Adventure Detective Genre Fiction Mystery Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Private Investigators Suspense Thriller & Suspense War & Military Fiction Middle East Heartfelt Military

Listeners also enjoyed...

 Spider Shepherd: SAS cover art
Triggers cover art
Dead of Night cover art
The Fireman cover art
The Birthday Girl cover art
Nightfall cover art
The Eyewitness cover art
Killing Time cover art
Dead or Alive cover art
The Solitary Man cover art
The Unravelling of Thomas Malone cover art
Dirty Little Secrets cover art
Dead Man's Hand cover art
The Whisper Man cover art
The Payback cover art
Tango One cover art

Critic reviews

Praise for the Hakim and Arnold Mystery series:
"A new and original pair of detectives...it has the ring of truth." ( The Independent)
"Bleak, brutal and timely." ( Financial Times)
All stars
Most relevant  

What made the experience of listening to Bright Shiny Things the most enjoyable?

like the characters and finally some movement on the relationship between the central two characters

Who was your favorite character and why?

the two leads are well drawn balanced and sympathetic

What about Charles Armstrong’s performance did you like?

it was fine but had enjoyed Paul Thornley reading to date

Long awaited - book 6 please

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I love the Hakim and Arnold series and have listened to them all, so was very excited to get the latest offering, No 5 in this series!
Got in my car today to drive to work, switched on and OMG...she has ditched the brilliant Paul Thornley and replaced him with someone called Charles Armstrong!
I don't want to continue listening as he is not holding my attention and he is just NOT right for these books!
Whatever possessed her to do this??? Such a shame...not sure I'll continue with them anymore as the narrator is vital for me!!!

VERY DISAPPOINTED!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
So, the Hakim & Arnold books are great. The stories are strong and all the sub plots work and they are not predictable. My major problem with this particular production is the narration.

Paul Thornley does the other books in the series and you get to know and und Rostand each character well.

This is the reason why I couldn’t get into this book. It was like going to see a great play and then half an hour before the end, changing the whole cast.

It just doesn’t work.

Why would you change the narrator for this series?

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I found the narration of this book very disappointing. The narrator appears not to have done his homework in listening to the previous books and was inconsistent with his pronunciation of Bangladeshi names, varying at random (it seemed) between "Hook" and "Huk" for Mumtaz's family. He also seemed to confuse "he" and "she" a lot. Paul Thornley did a great job with books 1-4 so perhaps Charles Armstrong suffered in the comparison. However, I'll avoid his narrations in the future.

Great story, poor narrator

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
...and a wonderful series that I've now unfortunately finished. Hakim and Arnold are a fascinating combination, listen to them...

Great narrator...

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

What did you like best about Bright Shiny Things? What did you like least?

Good plot and development of the main characters' story lines from the previous books, but a real shame that it wasn't Paul Thornley narrating.

Would you be willing to try another one of Charles Armstrong’s performances?

Not on a Hakim and Arnold novel.

Wrong narrator

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Changing the narrator on book five what a shame I won’t even waste my time listening to it now

Change the narrator why

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I gave up at chapter 3! Compared to Paul Thornley, the narrator of the previous books in the series this narrator seemed very second rate. I just couldn't identify with his interpretation. Suppose I will have to read this one

Oh for Paul Thornley

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.