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The Best of Everything

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The Best of Everything

By: Kit de Waal
Narrated by: Sara Powell
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About this listen

 **A 2025 Highlight in the Guardian, I-Paper, Prima, Irish Times, Irish Independent and Sunday Independent**
**A Bookseller '10 Titles Not to Miss' selection for April**
'A profoundly compassionate novel of devastating power' Bernardine Evaristo, Booker Prize-Winning author of Girl, Woman, Other
'So deeply moving: sad and beautiful and true' Annie Macmanus, author of The Mess We're In

Paulette's the kind of woman who likes the future all mapped out: the wedding to Denton, the Caribbean honeymoon, the gingham quilt on the baby's crib. Until one morning Garfield, Denton's friend, arrives at her door with the news that Denton won't be coming around any more, that there won't be time for her to say goodbye.

Somehow Garfield finds his way into her bed, and sooner than anyone can believe there is a baby, and suddenly giving Bird, her son, the best of everything is what gives Paulette's life meaning.

So why is it another little boy, Nellie, who keeps Paulette awake at night? Nellie who is being raised a few streets away, with no sign of a mum. Surely Paulette is the last person who should be getting tangled up in any of that?

The Best of Everything is a novel about the love that can steal into our lives - in spite of the best laid plans.©2025 Kit de Waal (P)2025 Headline Publishing Group Limited Family Life Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Psychological Caribbean

Critic reviews

'This is a book of such tenderness, full of pain, grief and despair and yet playful and joyful at the same time. Kit de Waal has an uncanny ability to create vivid characters with such empathy that I want to reach into the pages to hug them. I truly loved this book' (Liz Nugent, author of Strange Sally Diamond)

'What a wonderful novel, bursting with life. Kit de Waal is a writer who knows all the secret longings of the human heart' (Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of Ordinary Time)

'Beautiful. De Waal has the power to astound, to lift and console, to make life with her sentences' (Donal Ryan, author of The Queen of Dirt Island)
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Paulette is a wonderful character: complex, conflicted and convincing.

The Best of Everything is tragic in many ways, as Paulette loses Denton in a terrible car accident that has surprising consequences. Well plotted, with a good pace and a perceptive exploration of relationships by tge author.

Themes of grief, motherhood, betrayal, guilt and kindness.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC.

The wonderful Paulette

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really lovely book nice relaxed listen it was an easy listen with a good plot

really lovely book

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I really didn't expect to enjoy this book as much as I did. So well-written and engaging. I felt for the characters - which is a rare thing nowadays in contemporary literature. What a beautiful story.

Loved this!

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I enjoyed this audio book so much I really didn’t want it to end . I invested so much in the wonderful characters who appeared before me as though they were in the room . Wonderfully written and narrated to perfection . I loved it . It would make an amazing film !

Perfect

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Kit has got this spot on. I don't know where to begin explaining why this is such a fantastic book. I loved everything about it. Thank you for capturing the British [Eastern] Caribbean experience so well. I laughed, I cried and everything in between.

Excellent

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Oh Paulette! such a beautiful story, I couldn't stop listening! Now I wish there was more! Good job Kit ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Beautiful

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Thoroughly enjoyed it
Thank you
Really got to know each of the characters
Magical
Listened to it in 1 day

The storyline

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I loved this book. Pallette is such a strong compassionate woman despite all the adversities in her life. Interesting characters. it made me laugh & cry, and such a good narrator

Heartwarming story

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Loved this book, so tender, sad and uplifting in equal measure. Paulette was imperfect and wonderful for it.

The Humanity

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This truly beautiful story is about motherhood and being a woman. It’s full of love and true sadness, and is one of my favourite books this year.

The Best of Everything

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