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The Queen of Bloody Everything

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The Queen of Bloody Everything

By: Joanna Nadin
Narrated by: Kelly Hotten
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About this listen

Joanna Nadin's first novel for adults, The Queen of Bloody Everything, is about mothers, daughters and how we can make many choices in life but can't choose where we come from.

As Edie Jones lies in a bed on the fourteenth floor of a Cambridge hospital, her adult daughter Dido tells their story, starting with the day that changed everything.

That was the day Dido – aged exactly six years and twenty-seven days old – met the handsome Tom Trevelyan, his precocious sister, Harry, and their parents, Angela and David.

The day Dido fell in love with a family completely different from her own.

Because the Trevelyans were exactly the kind of family Dido dreamed of.

They were normal.

2018, Big Books Awards: Must-Reads Award, Short-listed

©Joanna Nadin 2017 (P)2018 Macmillan Digital Audio Coming of Age Contemporary Contemporary Romance Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Romance Small Town & Rural Women's Fiction Funny Heartfelt Witty Tear-jerking

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Critic reviews

I bloody adored this perceptive, funny, unflinching novel about growing up, love, sex, mothers and everything (Kate Eberlen, author of Miss You)
A bittersweet delight. Perfectly captures the awkwardness and longing of those who don’t quite fit in (Sarra Manning, author of After the Last Dance and House of Secrets)
Funny, poignant and absolutely brilliant (Rachael Lucas, author of Wildflower Bay)
A powerful, nostalgic, beautiful book, whose characters will retain a small place in your heart even after you finished it (Ronnie Turner)
Achingly romantic and painfully real, [and] one of the best accounts of the mother-daughter bond that I have ever read (Ruth Ware)
All stars
Most relevant  
I've never read a book by J Nadin before, but after 'The Queen of Bloody Everything', I certainly will seek out other novels by this author.

I was engrossed by Dido's (the main character and narrating voice) story of her life and her deeply complex relationship with her mother (among others). I loved the honesty, the realistic observations of the contradictory feelings we experience towards loved ones. This is a story of love and longing, rage and resentments, fantasies and regrets. All are themes that are conjured through a brilliant narrative which is engrossing, unsentimental, but moving and tender.

Anyone who loves Lisa Jewell's 'The House We Grew Up In', Dorothy Koomsom, Amanda Prowse and Esther Freud would probably really enjoy this as much as I did.

Insightful and intelligent, witty and honest

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A funny witty story about life with its ups and downs. No one is perfect yet we survive...somehow. A delightful listen!

loved it

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What a lovely book. it may help that the main character is about the same age as me so I really empathised with the timeline. I loved the narration too, really great changes of voice for each character.
Will look for others by this author.

Loved it!!

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Good story, well told, too much swearing for my liking. I like to listen while cooking but totally not comfortable should my grandchildren or my 92 year old mother in law should have heard it.

Mixed feelings

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I really enjoyed this, staying up until 3am without realising, I was so hooked!
Edie is such a character, & although flawed, you know she cares for & loves the wonderful Dido. The recent history backdrop was a trip down memory lane. Really loved it!

Just fabulous

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When it started I thought huh? What’s she talking about, where IS this going?
Then I got sucker punched!
Wish it could have included a better part of the emerging gay community but I suppose it being England and in the 70’s, it was a bit different in the States.
But the story telling is spot on and I found myself really “listening” to it carefully, attentively....I should think that’s why most authors write.
Get the book. Nuff said

Surprisingly good

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Really enjoyed this story and the narration made it for me
Highly recommend this book

Thoroughly enjoyable book

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This is the sort of book I'd like to have done in English literature at school. I'm sure everyone will identify with one part or another. Wise, thoughtful, intense, painfully reminiscent of teenage pangs moving into adult hangups. Our past lives in us!

Not your usual faerytale

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This tale of a mother and daughter relationship had me crying at times but there was always a sense that, however bad things were, whatever awful things were said and done, here was a mother and daughter bond that could never be entirely destroyed. As Dido grew older and wiser, she stoically bore the pain of unrequited love, and allowed herself to be used and abused before she finally found her place in the world. Great empathy from the author and perfect narration.

Bittersweet story of love and sacrifice.

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A beautifully crafted story of a dysfunctional family. Mother and daughter clashing at every corner and the sad, subsequent
trail of destruction for her young daughter. This was my first Joanna Nadin novel and she is a very clever writer. I loved her deep character descriptions, sucking me deep into the lives of them. I could barely stop listening as the excellent narrator brought this story to life. If you like an all-encompassing story with a sharp intelligent edge, you may well enjoy this book.

Engrossing literature

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