The Moment

By: Douglas Kennedy

Narrated by: Jeff Harding, Patience Tomlinson

Thomas Nesbitt is a divorced American writer in the midst of a rueful middle age. Living a very private life in Maine - in touch only with his daughter and still trying to reconcile him to the end of a long marriage that he knew was flawed from the outset - he finds his solitude disrupted by the arrival, one wintry morning, of a box postmarked Berlin. The return address on the box - Dussmann - unsettles him completely. For it is the name of the woman with whom he had an intense love affair twenty-six years ago in Berlin - at a time when the city was cleaved in two, and personal and political allegiances were haunted by the deep shadows of the Cold War.

Refusing initially to confront what he might find in that box, Thomas nevertheless finds himself forced to grapple with a past he has never discussed with any living person - and in the process relive those months in Berlin, when he discovered, for the first and only time in his life, the full, extraordinary force of true love. But Petra Dussmann - the woman to whom he lost his heart - was not just a refugee from a police state, but also someone who lived with an ongoing sorrow beyond dreams... and one which gradually rewrote both their destinies. In this, his tenth novel, Douglas Kennedy has written that rare thing: a love story as morally complex as it is tragic and deeply reflective. Brilliantly gripping, it is an atmospherically dense, ethically tangled tale of romantic certainty and conflicting loyalties, all set amidst a stunningly rendered portrait of Berlin in the final dark years before The Wall came down.

Like all of Kennedy’s previous, critically acclaimed bestselling novels, The Moment is both un-put-down-able and profound. Posing so many searching questions about why and how we fall in love - and the tangled way we project on to others that which our hearts seek - it is a love story of great epic sweep and immense emotional power.

©2011 Douglas Kennedy (P)2011 Random House Audiobooks

Great book but a terrible reader

The author is a favourite author of mine. The story is deep and filled with twists but the female voice is beyond irritating and enough not to make me buy another audio book.
Terrible !!!

A gut wrenching love story that leaves you winded

Would you listen to The Moment again? Why?

Highly recommended! This book makes you want to rush out and sieze every single moment you possibly can with your loved ones, lest they be snatched from your life.

What did you like about the performance? What did you dislike?

The narration was a little annoying in that one moment (no pun intended), Petra was being narrated by Jeff Harding, and then inexplicably, it changed to Patience Tomlinson (who sounded like a bit of a robot). But luckily I'm an undying romantic and I stuck with it.

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

I knew there had to be another twist in the tale, but it still came as a surprise. It makes Romeo and Juliet look tame. A gut wrenching love story that leaves you feeling winded! Beautiful, sad and a wonderful read!

This is why I love Douglas Kennedy

If you could sum up The Moment in three words, what would they be?

Believable, unpredictable, satisfying.

What other book might you compare The Moment to and why?

In terms of enjoyment, I really enjoyed the first Douglas Kennedy book I ever read, which was Temptation. This also had lots of great twists and turns. Five Days was also as good. Douglas Kennedy books never seem to go the way you expect them to. I like that.

What about Jeff Harding and Patience Tomlinson ’s performance did you like?

I really liked hearing each reader perform the voices of the opposite sex.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

A lesson in disbelief

Any additional comments?

This book was long, but it was worth my time.

Brilliant tale

As always, Douglas Kennedy delivers with a pacy story, great use of language with some French and German woven in. His story blends the complexities of human relationships, culture and history in such a way, that you can't help but keep reading late into the night! Also, it will make you want to travel to where the story is set, i.e. Berlin, West Germany; before 'The Wall' came down. Loved it, loved it! Read the book as soon as it came out, then purchased the audio book as well. Really enjoyed Jeff Harding's narration-who also narrated Temptation (by Douglas Kennedy).

Suprising plot twists and emotional pull on reader

What made the experience of listening to The Moment the most enjoyable?

I missed almost two nights of sleep....I just couldn't stop listening. The plot and character development were a tiny bit slow at the beginning but knocked my socks off by the end! The plot was so unexpected at points, yet the emotional connection to the characters just kept developing. I ALMOST cried at the last few paragraphs and I NEVER cry during books!!

What about Jeff Harding and Patience Tomlinson ’s performance did you like?

I really enjoyed Patience's German accented female performance at certain points of the novel. I thought Jeff captured the character's different ages well.

Any additional comments?

There are SO many good lines in this book, I think I am going to buy the actual book just to highlight!!! Also, this is a book that SHOULD definitely be transformed for the big screen.