Narrated by Andi Arndt, Shane East and a full cast
Instant Gratification is another full cast narration and I have to say I’m a big fan. The performers all sound like they’re having a blast and there’s something special about having actual different voices in my ears – no matter how good the narrator is, there’s a difference between the same person using various character voices and different people performing various characters.
There are some bonus scenes done especially for audio in Instant Gratification as well. Not having read the book I can’t know for sure, there are at least three, possibly more: Andi Arndt sings a sexy ode to pancakes (it’s a real earworm), Andi and Jason Clarke do a duet and then four of the cast, sing Take Me Out to the Ballgame. Bonus: they can all actually sing!
The story itself is, for the most part, fun and sexy – pretty standard fare for a Lauren Blakely book. That’s in no way a criticism. I know I’m going to get a reliably good story from Ms. Blakely.
Truly Goodman owns a bar in New York, called Gin Joint. Her twin brother is Malone (from Satisfaction Guaranteed) – his best friend is Jason Reynolds, an English ex-pat and best-man-for-hire. Jason and Truly have been circling around one another for ages and have wicked chemistry together. However, neither feels they can embark on anything because of Malone and the potential to risk the various relationships between the three of them.
When Jason needs a plus-one to attend some of the weddings he’s working and Truly needs advice about English pubs, they make a deal to help each other out. And then proximity does its work.
In amongst it all, Jason is trying to get out of the undercover groomsman gig and build his media presence and Truly is trying to expand her business.
The large cast is full of hilarious characters and the narrators have a lot of fun with them. With so many weddings, there is plenty of opportunity for hijinks from bit players and the story makes the most of them without being cruel or mean about it. There are multiple HEAs in this book so that’s lovely too.
Sebastian York appears as Spencer Holiday (Big Rock) and also as Nick Hammer (Mister O) and I’m never going to complain about having his dulcet tones in my ears. Never.
All of the narrators put in wonderful performances. There were a couple of very minor errors where “he” was said instead of “she” for example (or vice versa) but apart from that, it was just about audio perfection.
Shane East and Andi Arndt portray the main characters and therefore do the lion’s share of the performing. Both are excellent narrators with a great vocal range. Both are also extremely good with emotion and intimacy. I have to say that Shane East narrating a sex scene is pretty special.
There are also wonderful performances from Joe Arden, Zachary Webber, Hillary Huber, Bahni Turpin, Vikas Adam, Adam Lau, Scott Brick, Marisa Calin, Grace Grant, Lili Valente, Jason Clarke, Emma Wilder and the aforementioned Sebastian York.
My only real complaints about the book were with the way Jason was constantly cracking on to Truly. Occasionally it skirted too close to harassment for my liking. (That said, Truly didn’t seem to mind.) The other thing was the black moment – I just didn’t buy the reason for it and it made me very cross with Jason. I won’t go into exactly why because I don’t want to spoil anything, but it did not work for me at all. I ended up thinking Jason was a bit of man-baby. Fortunately, the obligatory separation didn’t last long and Jason had a maturity infusion so I was able to get past it.
Other than that, there was plenty to like. I enjoyed the chemistry of the main characters, as well as the various family connections – found and biological.
The big draw is the full cast narration though. I’m sure the book version of Instant Gratification is fun but the audio is fantastic and I’d definitely recommend it as the best option.
Kaetrin
Buy Instant Gratification by Lauren Blakely on Amazon
