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  • The Family Holiday

  • By: Shalini Boland
  • Narrated by: Katie Villa
  • Length: 7 hrs and 36 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (283 ratings)
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The Family Holiday cover art

The Family Holiday

By: Shalini Boland
Narrated by: Katie Villa
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Summary

Two families. One house swap. A vacation to die for.

The white-washed Italian villa is perfect. I thought it might feel odd, living in a stranger’s house for the summer, but as my husband and children swim in the infinity pool, I start to relax. And then, in the back of a wardrobe, I find something that shatters everything....

Sparkling green eyes, square jaw, lopsided smile. A young man with his arm around a beautiful woman. The picture is old and faded, but I’d recognize him anywhere. The man is my husband.

But we’ve never met the family we’ve swapped homes with, and my husband swears it isn’t him in the photo. He’s lying. We argue on the balcony with the sun setting behind us, and I storm out.

When I finally calm down enough to go back to the villa to confront him, I find his dead body sprawled across the veranda.

Who killed my husband? Was our marriage a lie? And are my children now in terrible danger?

©2022 Shalini Boland (P)2022 Bookouture, an imprint of Storyfire Ltd.

What listeners say about The Family Holiday

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
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  • Overall
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    5 out of 5 stars

Good story, beautifully read

The story is gripping and well told. The reading is outstanding: fluent, no mispronunciations, and no overacting, silly accents or unconvincing rendering of male voices by female narrator.

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4 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

good twists

listened to too many lucy price lewis youngest child always sounds precocious this book was a little predictable

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3 people found this helpful

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

*Be Careful What You Wish For*

Two families decide what they need is a house swap. Within each family one family member is hiding an explosive secret. One family live in the U.K. while the other family live in Italy.

The story is told predominantly by two points of view Beth and Amber.

Beth the put upon wife and mother of two children who gave up her career as a chef in order to look after her boys, she is so used to placating her husband that she loses herself as well as her self confidence. I found myself shouting at her.

Her Husband Niall is a successful writer and has controlling issues and his moods tend to affect the household and the fact after so many years of not wanting to take the family on holiday he says they will be doing a house swap. Beth is uncomfortable about it at first but when she sees the location and beautiful house with a pool she is sold on the idea.

In Italy Amber mainly wears the trousers in her relationship with her husband Renzo. She is also cold and calculating with a ulterior motive. Her husband adores her and they have two children.

As each family get on their flights and arrive in their respective countries, things start to get dark and sinister. Beth soon discovers a huge secret that will affect her marriage, whilst Amber is busy scheming until things take a devastating and drastic turn, when the secrets start unraveling one person pays a heavy irreversible price, whilst the other blows up their life.

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2 people found this helpful

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

Great narration - easy listening

I think this narrator is fabulous to listen to. The story has promise and was interesting but I wasn’t particularly excited by the conclusion. It was all a bit bizarre that someone would go to such lengths and I felt the horrid Niall wasn’t really exposed - though I liked the Italian characters!

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2 people found this helpful

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

Really enjoyed this!👏🏽katie is 1 of the very BEST outstanding narrators on here👏🏽♥️

I loved this book, more so because Katie Villa was reading this! I’m not sure if i would have gotten into it if it hadn’t been read so beautifully, because i did at the start kind of get a bit bored but like i said because Katie was reading it she made this book even better!👏🏽💯but once i was past the few chapters I wasn’t as keen on, then WOW i was hooked!!🤗 i only wish it didn’t tell you about the husband dying as that would have been a great surprise🤗 definitely recommend and thoroughly enjoyed this💯💯💯 i love a book about holiday’s so this automatically caught my attention straight away!! Sad it’s finished and now to try and find another book to grip me… I’m SO fussy!😩🤦🏽‍♀️ i ONLY review a book if i enjoy it so that tells you it’s a BRILLIANT book!!💯💯🤗thank you Shalini Boland for an AMAZING book, and thank you Katie Villa for your OUTSTANDING reading as ALWAYS!!💯👏🏽love when i see you are the narrator of a book!💃🏻🙌🏽😂♥️ thank you audible for another AMAZING book!!! Onto the next one🤗💃🏻♥️♥️♥️xxxx

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2 people found this helpful

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

Very listenable

Enjoyed it, good rwist at end. No house swop for me thank you. I’ll stay at home!

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1 person found this helpful

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

Brilliant

Yet another great book by Shalini Boland and fantastic narration by Katie Villa.
A great story from beginning to end with a few twists and turns along the way.
Thoroughly recommend

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1 person found this helpful

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

Very enjoyable

Really enjoyed this and the narration was spot on. But the twist at the end was fantastic!

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1 person found this helpful

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

Great Author. First time read with this new author

I Loved this book. Most memorable moment, the end few paragraphs of the book.....

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1 person found this helpful

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

Was pretty good - kinda disappointing ending

I was very gripped by this book, however I found the ending a bit underwhelming. I feel there was a lot leading up to it and then I feel the twist wasn’t as in depth as I thought.

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1 person found this helpful