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    Five Days: A Novel
    Five Days: A Novel
    Five Days: A Novel
    Audiobook11 hours

    Five Days: A Novel

    Written by Douglas Kennedy

    Narrated by Tanya Eby

    3.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    From the critically lauded, internationally bestselling author of The Moment comes a profoundly moving novel that explores how a single brief encounter can change one’s life.

    Laura spends her days looking at other people’s potential calamities. She works in the radiography unit of a small hospital on the Maine coast, bearing constant witness to the fears of patient after frightened patient. In a job where finding nothing is always the best possible outcome, she is well versed in the random injustices of life, a truism that has lately been playing out in her marriage as well. Since being downsized, her husband, Dan, has become withdrawn, his emotional distance gradually corroding their relationship. With a son in college and a daughter soon due to leave home, Laura has begun to fear that the marital sounds of silence will only deepen once the nest is truly empty.

    When an opportunity arises to attend a weekend medical conference in Boston, Laura jumps at this respite from home. While checking in, she meets a man as gray and uninspired as her drab hotel room. Richard is an outwardly dull, fiftysomething insurance salesman. But during a chance second encounter, Laura discovers him to be surprisingly complex and thoughtful, someone who, like herself, is grappling with the same big questions about decisions made and the human capacity for self-entrapment. As their conversation deepens and begins to veer into shared confessions, the overwhelming sense of personal and intimate connection arises. A transformative love affair begins. But can this potential, much-longed-for happiness be married to their own difficult personal circumstances? Can they upend their lives and embrace that most loaded of words: change?

    A love story as clear-sighted and ruminative as it is affecting, Five Days will have you reflecting about the choices we all make that shape our destinies. Crafted with Kennedy’s trademark evocative prose and pitch-perfect in its depiction of the complex realities of modern life, it is a novel that speaks directly to the many contradictions of the human heart.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateApr 30, 2013
    ISBN9781480520080
    Author

    Douglas Kennedy

    Douglas Kennedy is the author of eleven previous novels, including the international bestsellers The Moment and Five Days. His work has been translated into twenty-two languages, and in 2007 he received the French decoration of Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. He divides his time among London, New York, and Montreal, and has two children. Find out more at DouglasKennedyNovelist.com.

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    Reviews for Five Days

    3.5/5

    45 ratings8 reviews

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    • 5/5
      As a new author for me I was immediately enthralled with the character of Laura....I was completely consumed with her thinking and with what was happening to her during those...five days. I was definitely worried by Day Three...wondering how this story could possibly evolve but what a total pleasure to read this book!!! Kennedy is a new author for me and I'm delighted that there are more of his works to read.
    • 5/5
      Kennedy's biggest talent is the ability to seduce a reader, to the point where you can forgive transgressions, bittersweet plot lines, or being reduced to tears by tragic events, just as long as he keeps on writing. Five days is heart-swellingly passionate as a love story, hair-tuggingly frustrating for the protagonist's missed opportunities but always riveting. It stayed in my mind for weeks.
    • 3/5
      this book is about love and loss and hope and happiness and unhappiness and life. the characters struggle to find the courage to make changes in their lives. it really brings up how hard life is and how important it is not to lose hope.
    • 4/5
      I really liked the character development. The book could have spoken to me at alother time in my life. Liked it more as the book went on and even wasn't disappointed with the end of the story.Bought a advanced publishing issue at a book store in Fair Hope.
    • 3/5
      You'd never guess from the title, but this is a story set over five days! Four of the days are sequential - the fifth day is a year later. It's about a woman called Laura, somewhat unhappily married to Dan. From the outset she knew he was not going to be the love of her life. Nevertheless, they have been together for twenty largely happy years and they have two children. She works as a radiographer in a small Maine town and feels somewhat rueful that she has let her early passions for travel and learning slowly dissipate.Laura travels to Boston to attend a weekend conference for work and by chance meets Richard, with whom she has an almost instant connection. They are drawn together by their love of language - they both know what a misanthrope is! It must be love! Over the next few days as they talk incessantly, both will re-examine their lives and what they want to change. Laura will need to make some decisions about what she values and what she is prepared to let go.I have read most of Douglas Kennedy's books and there are many things that I like about his writing. He's a natural storyteller and he has a real gift for capturing female characters. He is also very good at depicting depression without getting mired in it. The way that he writes reminds me very much of Anita Shreve. Having said that, this isn't his best work. It moves very slowly - there's a lot of dialogue, a lot of text messages. I bought the romance, but I didn't FEEL it. I read the book in two sittings, and I enjoyed it, but only in a lukewarm way.
    • 4/5
      I am going to disagree with the previous reviewers. I have enjoyed all the Douglas Kennedy books that I have read and this one was no different although it was in a different style from others of his. The format reminded me a little of the before sereis of films - Before sunrise, Before sunset and the new one I have not seen yet. just the two main characters in the book.The big question this book deals with is the issue - are you living the life that you dreamt of in what ever way you take that - relationships, work etc or as time goes by have you settled for much less, submerged in a mundane daily routine, not really happy but not prepared to do anything about it. But then if something happened and you had the possibility to make a change to do something different and live the life you dreamt of would you do that. Change requires courage.This book is set over a period of five days - four consecutive days and one a year later. It involves a chance meeting between two characters Laura and Richard and is told from Laura's point of view.. She has a job as a radiographer that is beginning to bore her. Her marriage is unhappy. She has spent her life caring for others, nurturing her children and being the sole bread winner to a husband who has lost his job. She is looking forward to an escape to Boston - a few days away at a conference.There when checking into the hotel she meets Ricahrd a nonedescript insurance salesman and they share an easy banter. Later they end up at the same cinema and after the film share a drink together. From there they discover they have much in common, they can discuss things not able to be discussed with their partners. Richard too is in an unhappy marriage and has dreamt of leaving. They share stories of their lives and their families even the heartbreaks. they share in a way they could not share with their partner. And the flame is lit. As he describes it they fall in love and begin to plan a life together, each of them discussing the steps they would need to take to leave their unhappy marriages. Both of them had known real love before they married but for different reasons it had been denied them. So the question is can they both see this through knowing the hurt it will cause to others. Without giving all the details of the end away I thought it was a realisitc ending and the right ending for the book. There were positives there and some change did take place. I did really enjoy the book and the issues it raised. I did not find it too long or too boiing at all. I was keen to keep reading and see how it all panned out. I thought he did a great job of telling it from the woman's point of view.
    • 4/5
      On the day before I began reading Five Days, an article appeared in the weekend paper supplement titled the Silver Years Itch. This article examined the growing trend of mid life divorce, most commonly instigated by wives who, after twenty years or so of marriage and child-rearing, are leaving to rediscover who they are, or were, as individuals, as distinct from wives and mothers.Five Days explores this phenomena by introducing 42 year old Laura who finds that contentment with her life's path is becoming increasingly elusive. Her marriage is crumbling, her children are moving into adulthood and her work as an X-ray technician is no longer satisfying. She looks forward to temporarily escaping home and work to attend a weekend medical conference in Boston and that is where she meets Richard, an insurance salesman, and is stunned to rediscover joy, passion and hope for the future."...we all know these women because they are, more or less, reflections of ourselves." comments Laura while discussing The Easter Parade by Richard Yates with her best friend Lucy, and I think this is what Kennedy hopes the audience of Five Days will find. That readers will empathise with Laura's restlessness, with her rediscovery of happiness and the choices she makes. I do think that Kennedy displays real insight into the complicated nature of personal sacrifice made by women to nurture marriages and children. Laura has spent years putting her family's needs before her own and being both emotionally and financially responsible for them has taken it's toll.Aside from generally finding adultery contemptible, I was less taken by the whirlwind relationship that develops between Laura and Richard which I thought shifted between wildly romantic and farcial. I had no problem figuring how it was all going to end though ultimately I appreciated it's contribution to Laura's growth.Five Days is a contemporary story of life, love and second chances. I did enjoy the novel, which I found a reasonably quick and thought provoking read, though my cynical side prevented me from being swept away completely. Still, I am tempted by the premises of a number of the author's backlist titles and may find time to read more from Douglas Kennedy.
    • 2/5
      Unfortunately I gave Douglas Kennedy another try with his newest book Five Days. Laura is a radiographer who is attending a radiographer convention in Boston where she has met an insurance salesman also on business. Laura begins a relationship with him in hopes of finding herself, some hope for life and a break from her stressful life in Maine. What could have been an inspirational story becomes long winded under the pen of Kennedy. As in The Moment he takes way too long to make his point . It takes 90 depressing pages before we even begin the five day event for Laura. I am obviously not of fan of his writing style. Unfortunately, I won't try another of his anytime soon.