
Mad
A Novel
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Buy for $18.00
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Emily Atack
-
By:
-
Chloé Esposito
About this listen
In this compulsively listenable debut, set between London and Sicily over one blood-drenched week in the dead of summer, an identical twin reveals the crazy lies and twists she'll go through to not only steal her sister's perfect life but to keep on living it.
Alvie Knightly is a train wreck: aimless, haphazard, and pretty much constantly drunk. Alvie's existence is made even more futile in contrast to that of her identical and perfect twin sister, Beth. Alvie lives on social media, eats kebabs for breakfast, and gets stopped at security when the sex toy in her carry-on starts buzzing. Beth is married to a hot, rich Italian, dotes on her beautiful baby boy, and has always been their mother's favorite. The twins' days of having anything in common besides their looks are long gone.
When Beth sends Alvie a first-class plane ticket to visit her in Italy, Alvie is reluctant to go. But when she gets fired from the job she hates and her flatmates kick her out on the streets, a luxury villa in glitzy Taormina suddenly sounds more appealing. Beth asks Alvie to swap places with her for just a few hours so she can go out unnoticed by her husband. Alvie jumps at the chance to take over her sister's life - if only temporarily. But when the night ends with Beth dead at the bottom of the pool, Alvie realizes that this is her chance to change her life.
Alvie quickly discovers that living Beth's life is harder than she thought. What was her sister hiding from her husband? And why did Beth invite her to Italy at all? As Alvie digs deeper, she uncovers Mafia connections, secret lovers, attractive hit men, and one extremely corrupt priest, all of whom are starting to catch on to her charade. Now Alvie has to rely on all the skills that made her unemployable - a turned-to-11 sex drive, a love of guns, lying to her mother - if she wants to keep her million-dollar prize. She is uncensored, unhinged, and unforgettable.
©2017 Chloé Esposito (P)2017 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...
-
Wrong Place Wrong Time
- A Novel
- By: Gillian McAllister
- Narrated by: Lesley Sharp
- Length: 10 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is midnight on the morning of Halloween, and Jen anxiously waits up for her 18-year-old son, Todd, to return home. But worries about his broken curfew transform into something much more dangerous when Todd finally emerges from the darkness. As Jen watches through the window, she sees her funny, seemingly happy teenage son stab a total stranger.
-
-
Love this book!
- By Amazon Customer on 08-04-22
-
Layla
- By: Colleen Hoover
- Narrated by: Brian Pallino
- Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Leeds meets Layla, he’s convinced he’ll spend the rest of his life with her - until an unexpected attack leaves Layla fighting for her life. After weeks in the hospital, Layla recovers physically, but the emotional and mental scarring has altered the woman Leeds fell in love with. In order to put their relationship back on track, Leeds whisks Layla away to the bed-and-breakfast where they first met. Once they arrive, Layla’s behavior takes a bizarre turn. And that’s just one of many inexplicable occurrences.
-
-
✫✫ 5 Stars ✫✫
- By ❤️Cyndi Marie❤️🎧Audiobook Addicts🎧 on 12-09-20
By: Colleen Hoover
-
In a Dark, Dark Wood
- By: Ruth Ware
- Narrated by: Imogen Church
- Length: 9 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Leonora, known to some as Lee and others as Nora, is a reclusive crime writer, unwilling to leave her nest of an apartment unless it is absolutely necessary. When a friend she hasn't seen or spoken to in years unexpectedly invites Nora ( Lee) to a weekend away in an eerie glass house deep in the English countryside, she reluctantly agrees to make the trip. Forty-eight hours later, she wakes up in a hospital bed injured but alive, with the knowledge that someone is dead.
-
-
Save your credit
- By Kaitlin Welty on 11-09-16
By: Ruth Ware
-
Everything's Eventual
- 14 Dark Tales
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Becky Ann Baker, John Cullum, Boyd Gaines, and others
- Length: 17 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The first collection of stories Stephen King has published since Nightmares & Dreamscapes nine years ago, Everything's Eventual includes one O. Henry Prize winner, two other award winners, four stories published by The New Yorker, and "Riding the Bullet", King's original e-book, which attracted over half a million online readers and became the most famous short story of the decade. Intense, eerie, and instantly compelling, they announce the stunningly fertile imagination of perhaps the greatest storyteller of our time.
-
-
This is a vehicle for listening. We don’t need music
- By J-me on 07-31-19
By: Stephen King
-
Horns
- A Novel
- By: Joe Hill
- Narrated by: Fred Berman
- Length: 13 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ignatius Perrish spent the night drunk and doing terrible things. He woke up the next morning with a thunderous hangover, a raging headache, and a pair of horns growing from his temples. At first Ig thought the horns were a hallucination, the product of a mind damaged by rage and grief. He had spent the last year in a lonely, private purgatory, following the death of his beloved, Merrin Williams, who was raped and murdered under inexplicable circumstances.
-
-
people are funny
- By bet on 12-05-10
By: Joe Hill
-
Rose Madder
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Blair Brown
- Length: 17 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Rosie Daniels leaves her husband, Norman, after 14 years in an abusive marriage. She is determined to lose herself in a place where he won't find her. She'll worry about all the rest later. Alone in a strange city, she begins to make a new life, and good things finally start to happen. Meeting Bill is one, and getting an apartment is another. Still, it's hard for Rosie not to keep looking over her shoulder, and with good reason. Norman is a cop, with the instincts of a predator.
-
-
Excellent!
- By Nathan on 04-28-16
By: Stephen King
-
Wrong Place Wrong Time
- A Novel
- By: Gillian McAllister
- Narrated by: Lesley Sharp
- Length: 10 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is midnight on the morning of Halloween, and Jen anxiously waits up for her 18-year-old son, Todd, to return home. But worries about his broken curfew transform into something much more dangerous when Todd finally emerges from the darkness. As Jen watches through the window, she sees her funny, seemingly happy teenage son stab a total stranger.
-
-
Love this book!
- By Amazon Customer on 08-04-22
-
Layla
- By: Colleen Hoover
- Narrated by: Brian Pallino
- Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Leeds meets Layla, he’s convinced he’ll spend the rest of his life with her - until an unexpected attack leaves Layla fighting for her life. After weeks in the hospital, Layla recovers physically, but the emotional and mental scarring has altered the woman Leeds fell in love with. In order to put their relationship back on track, Leeds whisks Layla away to the bed-and-breakfast where they first met. Once they arrive, Layla’s behavior takes a bizarre turn. And that’s just one of many inexplicable occurrences.
-
-
✫✫ 5 Stars ✫✫
- By ❤️Cyndi Marie❤️🎧Audiobook Addicts🎧 on 12-09-20
By: Colleen Hoover
-
In a Dark, Dark Wood
- By: Ruth Ware
- Narrated by: Imogen Church
- Length: 9 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Leonora, known to some as Lee and others as Nora, is a reclusive crime writer, unwilling to leave her nest of an apartment unless it is absolutely necessary. When a friend she hasn't seen or spoken to in years unexpectedly invites Nora ( Lee) to a weekend away in an eerie glass house deep in the English countryside, she reluctantly agrees to make the trip. Forty-eight hours later, she wakes up in a hospital bed injured but alive, with the knowledge that someone is dead.
-
-
Save your credit
- By Kaitlin Welty on 11-09-16
By: Ruth Ware
-
Everything's Eventual
- 14 Dark Tales
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Becky Ann Baker, John Cullum, Boyd Gaines, and others
- Length: 17 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The first collection of stories Stephen King has published since Nightmares & Dreamscapes nine years ago, Everything's Eventual includes one O. Henry Prize winner, two other award winners, four stories published by The New Yorker, and "Riding the Bullet", King's original e-book, which attracted over half a million online readers and became the most famous short story of the decade. Intense, eerie, and instantly compelling, they announce the stunningly fertile imagination of perhaps the greatest storyteller of our time.
-
-
This is a vehicle for listening. We don’t need music
- By J-me on 07-31-19
By: Stephen King
-
Horns
- A Novel
- By: Joe Hill
- Narrated by: Fred Berman
- Length: 13 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ignatius Perrish spent the night drunk and doing terrible things. He woke up the next morning with a thunderous hangover, a raging headache, and a pair of horns growing from his temples. At first Ig thought the horns were a hallucination, the product of a mind damaged by rage and grief. He had spent the last year in a lonely, private purgatory, following the death of his beloved, Merrin Williams, who was raped and murdered under inexplicable circumstances.
-
-
people are funny
- By bet on 12-05-10
By: Joe Hill
-
Rose Madder
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Blair Brown
- Length: 17 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Rosie Daniels leaves her husband, Norman, after 14 years in an abusive marriage. She is determined to lose herself in a place where he won't find her. She'll worry about all the rest later. Alone in a strange city, she begins to make a new life, and good things finally start to happen. Meeting Bill is one, and getting an apartment is another. Still, it's hard for Rosie not to keep looking over her shoulder, and with good reason. Norman is a cop, with the instincts of a predator.
-
-
Excellent!
- By Nathan on 04-28-16
By: Stephen King
-
The Killer Next Door
- By: Alex Marwood
- Narrated by: Imogen Church
- Length: 12 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Everyone who lives at 23 Beulah Grove has a secret. If they didn't, they wouldn't be renting rooms in a dodgy old building for cash - no credit check, no lease. It's the kind of place you end up when you you've run out of other options.The six residents mostly keep to themselves, but one unbearably hot summer night, a terrible accident pushes them into an uneasy alliance. What they don't know is that one of them is a killer. He's already chosen his next victim, and he'll do anything to protect his secret.
-
-
Incredible--but not for the faint of heart
- By Lesley on 01-11-15
By: Alex Marwood
-
The House of Impossible Beauties
- By: Joseph Cassara
- Narrated by: Christian Barillas
- Length: 15 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's 1980 in New York City, and nowhere is the city's glamour and energy better reflected than in the burgeoning Harlem ball scene, where 17-year-old Angel first comes into her own. Burned by her traumatic past, Angel is new to the drag world, new to ball culture, and has a yearning inside of her to help create family for those without. When she falls in love with Hector, a beautiful young man who dreams of becoming a professional dancer, the two decide to form the House of Xtravaganza, the first-ever all-Latino house in the Harlem ball circuit.
-
-
As real as it gets
- By Michael - Audible Editor on 03-01-18
By: Joseph Cassara
-
John Dies at the End
- By: David Wong
- Narrated by: Stephen R. Thorne
- Length: 14 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
STOP. You should not have touched this flyer with your bare hands. NO, don't put it down. It's too late. They're watching you. My name is David Wong. My best friend is John. Those names are fake. You might want to change yours. You may not want to know about the things you'll read on these pages, about the sauce, about Korrok, about the invasion, and the future. But it's too late. You touched the book. You're in the game. You're under the eye. The only defense is knowledge. You need to read this book, to the end. Even the part with the bratwurst. Why?
-
-
Vulgar Funny. 4.95 Sale Win.
- By C Yohe on 11-19-12
By: David Wong
-
The Bricks That Built the Houses
- By: Kae Tempest
- Narrated by: Kae Tempest
- Length: 9 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Award-winning poet and rapper Kae Tempest's electrifying debut novel takes us into the beating heart of the capital in this multigenerational tale of drugs, desire and belonging. It gets into your bones. You don't even realise it until you're driving through it, watching all the things you've always known and leaving them behind. Young Londoners Becky, Harry and Leon are leaving town in a fourth-hand Ford Cortina with a suitcase full of money.
-
-
Beautifully written but disappointing narration
- By Anonymous User on 10-03-17
By: Kae Tempest
-
Bleeding Violet
- By: Dia Reeves
- Narrated by: Suzy Jackson
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With a head plagued by hallucinations, a medicine cabinet full of pills, and a closet stuffed with frilly, violet dresses, Hanna's tired of being the outcast, the weird girl, the freak. So she runs away to Portero, Texas, in search of a new home. But Portero is a stranger town than Hanna expects. She discovers secrets that would terrify any normal soul. Good thing for Hanna, she's far from normal. As this crazy girl meets an even crazier town, only two things are certain: Anything can happen, and no one is safe.
-
-
Didn't like it. Sorry, not sorry
- By Cii'Em on 02-15-16
By: Dia Reeves
-
White Oleander
- By: Janet Fitch
- Narrated by: Oprah Winfrey
- Length: 6 hrs and 21 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this gripping first novel, a young girl, orphaned when her mother murders an ex-lover, endures the shuffle of a foster child's life. Oprah enjoyed her book club pick so much that she narrates the audiobook edition!
Browse more Oprah Picks.
-
-
White Oleander
- By Tracy on 04-09-04
By: Janet Fitch
-
Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend
- By: Matthew Dicks
- Narrated by: Matthew Brown
- Length: 10 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Budo is lucky as imaginary friends go. He's been alive for more than five years, which is positively ancient in the world of imaginary friends. But Budo feels his age, and thinks constantly of the day when eight-year-old Max Delaney will stop believing in him. When that happens, Budo will disappear. Max is different from other children. Some people say that he has Asperger's Syndrome, but most just say he's "on the spectrum." None of this matters to Budo, who loves Max and is charged with protecting him from the class bully.
-
-
A Brilliant Book
- By Taryn on 08-24-12
By: Matthew Dicks
-
Happy Place
- By: Emily Henry
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 11 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Harriet and Wyn have been the perfect couple since they met in college—they go together like salt and pepper, honey and tea, lobster and rolls. Except, now—for reasons they’re still not discussing—they don’t. They broke up five months ago. And still haven’t told their best friends.
-
-
Not for me
- By Yj on 04-27-23
By: Emily Henry
-
Before I Die
- By: Jenny Downham
- Narrated by: Charlotte Parry
- Length: 7 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Tessa has just months to live. Fighting back against hospital visits, endless tests, drugs with excruciating side-effects, Tessa compiles a list. It’s her To Do Before I Die list. And number one is Sex. Released from the constraints of ‘normal’ life, Tessa tastes new experiences to make her feel alive while her failing body struggles to keep up. Tessa’s feelings, her relationships with her father and brother, her estranged mother, her best friend, and her new boyfriend, all are painfully crystallised in the precious weeks before Tessa’s time runs out.
-
-
Real characters
- By Crazyone on 12-10-11
By: Jenny Downham
-
Ketchup Clouds
- By: Annabel Pitcher
- Narrated by: Julie Maisey
- Length: 7 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Zoe has an unconventional pen pal - Mr. Stuart Harris, a Texas Death Row inmate and convicted murderer. But then again, Zoe has an unconventional story to tell. A story about how she fell for two brothers, betrayed one of them, and killed the other. Hidden away in her backyard shed in the middle of the night with a jam sandwich in one hand and a pen in the other, Zoe gives a voice to her heart and her fears after months of silence. Mr. Harris may never respond to Zoe's letters, but at least somebody will know her story...
-
-
amazing
- By Charleneann on 05-03-17
By: Annabel Pitcher
-
Disappearing Act
- A Host of Other Characters in 16 Short Stories
- By: Robert Sheehan
- Narrated by: Robert Sheehan
- Length: 7 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In his debut collection of short stories, Robert Sheehan disappears into characters, challenging the complacencies of everyday experience, often from entirely unexpected angles. Informed by the author’s peripatetic life, Disappearing Act reflects on the absurdity of human behaviour. Sheehan delves deep into his characters’ streams of self-talk and self-imposed delusions, exploring the dark impulses that lurk below the shiny surfaces of many outwardly normal lives.
-
-
as strange as he is
- By DEKEY on 04-08-24
By: Robert Sheehan
-
The Good Sister
- A Twisty, Dark Psychological Thriller That Will Have You Gripped
- By: Jess Ryder
- Narrated by: Annette Chown
- Length: 10 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
There are two sides to every secret. When her beloved father dies, Josie is devastated to uncover a secret life he has led with another family: another house, another woman, and a half sister, Valentina. Born in the same week, in the same hospital, they look so physically alike they could be mistaken for twins. But the similarities end there.... Josie is sweet and reserved, a counsellor with the perfect boyfriend and the perfect life. Valentina is damaged and reckless, and she always gets what she wants.
-
-
Entertaining, suspenseful despite some holes
- By MarisaReads on 08-27-17
By: Jess Ryder
Critic reviews
"Esposito comes on the scene at breakneck speed in this debut, combining sex, drugs, and a bloodlust that is never satisfied. Alvina is a character that readers won’t soon forget - funny, fierce, and fabulous... readers will clamor for the next two books faster than you can pull the trigger on a gun.” (Booklist, starred review)
"Using Sicily as a backdrop with its gorgeous architecture, villas, and sexy men, Esposito pens an unforgettable summer debut headed by a no-holds-barred protagonist." (Library Journal)
“Pure, unadulterated entertainment. There is nothing Chloe Esposito’s Alvie won’t do. Strap in for a fun, fast and fresh read.” (Ali Land, author of Good Me Bad Me)
What listeners say about Mad
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Jennifer L. Iacovoni
- 05-17-18
I’m mad about Mad
I enjoyed this book eminency. It was a wild ride of humor, deceit, mayhem and thrills.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
2 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Robin Thibodeaux
- 06-27-19
Just What I Needed!
I absolutely loved this book! The story, the narrator, the fast-paced-no-boring-slow-downs is refreshing. I usually can get kinda blah in at least one part of any book but this one I couldn't stop listening!! Great fun but if you don't like blood, crude & rude behavior, filthy language, sex, murder, drugs, etc., then this book is NOT for you. It's all in good fun though so people who are saying they can't relate to this book are just being silly! I don't think it's supposed to relate to anyone. Its just a fictional fun book!!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Paul E. Williams
- 04-08-18
Psycho Chick Lit
As a heterosexual male I probably have no right to give Mad a critical review. It wasn’t written for me and I wasn’t it’s target demographic. So I’ll start with what I did like. First, the writer is witty. The book has more clever lines per minute than an episode of Family Guy. I also think,with the right actress, it will make a great movie. The attitude of the female lead in the book reminded me of the lead in the TV show, The Worst. But the beauty of The Worst was that that the characters fear of being hurt caused them to put on a tough facade that just causes the pain they were trying to avoid. The characters are attractive because we know they’re really hurting inside and just want to love and be loved. The lead character in Mad is simply a psychopath. She’s more American Psycho than Fifty shades. And that’s the problem, because a critical component of an erotic novel seems to me to be characters a reader might actually want to f#ck. No one wants to f#ck American Psycho. Where 50 Shades hit every evolutionary sexual hot button, Mad doesn’t seem to understand the required formula. Where 50 Shades has wealth, good genes, obsessive love, endlesss foreplay, and guilt-free sex because it’s forced, the thrill of imagined naughty ness followed by spankings that don’t hurt and bondage that merely frees the female from any obligation except to endure the pleasure. The characters in Mad are cold and passionless. They F#ck with mechanical, porn-star precision, but with all the passion of a $20 hooker. Robbed of any significant emotional connection to the characters, I found myself fantasizing about killing them rather than wanting to f#ck them. Maybe if I were a polite and proper female reader I might have had more fanciful admiration for the lead character’s “bad girl” persona, but I didn’t. She certainly deserves a spanking. Just not a good one. ;-)
(Final note: My review is of the audiobook. While the narrator was excellent, I would recommend against the audio version. The deficiencies I list above might not have been so problematic if I had been freer to imagine the character’s emotions. While I believe the emotions conveyed by the narrator seemed accurate to the text, it would have been easier for me to imagine her as slightly different or less psychotic without the narrator dictating the imagined inflection and emotions.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!