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Hell of a Book

By: Jason Mott
Narrated by: JD Jackson, Ronald Peet
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Summary

WINNER—NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION 2021

AN ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY 'MUST READ'

A TODAY SHOW BOOK CLUB PICK

* * * * *

Discover this astonishing work of fiction from award-winning, NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author Jason Mott.

This is a true story.

An author goes on a book tour for his new bestseller which, as people keep telling him, is one hell of a book.

This is a coming-of-age story.

One morning, he meets The Kid: a young Black boy who looks just like the one he keeps seeing on the news. And The Kid wants him to tell his story.

This is a sad story.

It's the story of a boy who spent most of his life trying to hide. And it may not be that different from the story of our author.

This is a love story.

But to find out why, you'll have to listen to this for yourself.

©2021 Jason Mott (P)2021 Orion Publishing Group
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Critic reviews

"An extraordinary emotional roller coaster of a read - I tore through this profoundly moving novel in a day but have been thinking about it ever since." (Abi Daré, author of The Girl with the Louding Voice)

"Playful, searching, raw and necessary, this writing, this voice, this novel twisted me up and turned me inside out, dazzled me, surprised me and moved me." (Charles Yu, author of Interior Chinatown)

"Hilarious and moving, thoughtful and madcap." (Jonathan Evison)

"How to possibly describe this novel without simply borrowing from its moniker? It is, after all, a hell of a book." (Entertainment Weekly)

"A beautiful and deeply moving book - I'd go so far as to say it's an important book and everyone should read it." (Imran Mahmood)

What listeners say about Hell of a Book

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Predictable

It was very qell narrated and I enjoyed the way it was written but it was predictable for such a heavy storyline.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

It's a hell of an audio book too.

It's not only a great story, imaginatively written and expertly structured, but the audio performance sparkles. The two narrators (performers?) bring the characters to life, giving voice to the two leads and others without ever slipping into mimicry. A fantastic performance of an excellent book.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

A great book (but not for the recently bereaved)

This is a great book with excellent narration that I would really recommend, but there is some fairly emotional grief in there so maybe steer clear if that is going to be tough for you.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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What a listen

This is one of the most poignant, the cleverest, funniest, most despairing, most witty books I've ever heard. It's brilliantly read. And it's powerful. Does exactly what it says on the tin.

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

A confused and resounding failure in our bookclub

This is the most confused book I have possibly read. The two stars are for some good use of metaphors, and the voice acting is okay. The author tries far too hard to write some sort of meta book about his book. Tirelessly repetitive, no sense of direction. We selected it in our bookclub and average scores were below 5 out of 10. I couldn’t finish it, but others who did said it continued to disappoint.

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