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Green Dot

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Green Dot

By: Madeleine Gray
Narrated by: Sasha Simon
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About this listen

Hera Stephen is clawing through her mid-twenties, working as an underpaid comment moderator in an overly air-conditioned newsroom by day and kicking around Sydney with her two best friends by night. Instead of money or stability, she has so far accrued one ex-girlfriend, several hundred hangovers, and a dog-eared novel collection. While everyone around her seems to have slipped effortlessly into adulthood, Hera has spent the years since school caught between feeling that she is purposefully rejecting traditional markers of success to forge a life of her own and wondering if she's actually just being left behind. Then she meets Arthur, an older, married colleague. Intoxicated by the promise of ordinary happiness he represents, Hera falls headlong into a workplace romance that everyone, including her, knows is doomed to fail.

Green Dot is witty, profound and painfully relatable in its exploration of solitude, desire, and the allure of chasing something that promises nothing. It is a must-hear for fans of Meg Mason, Sally Rooney and Dolly Alderton.

‘I felt so much joy reading this utterly assured writing. Green Dot is written with such poise, such confidence, I could not look away. I was mesmerised by its sheer brilliance.' JESSIE TU, author of A Lonely Girl is a Dangerous Thing

‘I wolfed Green Dot down over two nights. An incredibly funny book about a woman having an affair that's a really bad idea. Every sentence sparkles' CAITLIN MORAN, author of How to Be a Woman

'I am obsessed with this book. I am obsessed with Hera, with her dad, her friends, her dog. I am obsessed with how funny she is, and how hopeful and dark and tender and bleak the world is through her eyes. Green Dot is a book about love, and how stupid and funny and absolutely beautiful life can be. I would read it forever if I could.' LAURA MCPHEE-BROWNE, author of Cherry Beach

‘Brilliant. Riveting. Sharp. Funny. Dark. I want to give Green Dot all the adjectives but will content myself with saying it is one of the best books you will read all year' ELIZABETH DAY, host and author of How to Fail

‘If you liked Fleabag you will enjoy Green Dot, an Australian debut about whimsical twenty-something Hera, who falls for an unsuitable man' PANDORA SYKES, author of How Do We Know We're Doing it Right?

‘Laugh-out-loud funny and beautifully, brutally relatable—Green Dot is a book that will stay with me for a very long time.' EWA RAMSEY, author of The Morbids

‘Incredibly funny and a bit too real. This debut novel captures the zeitgeist.' BRIGID DELANEY, author of Reasons Not to Worry and Wellmania

‘Just brilliant. Hilarious and sexy but so wise about the human heart, too. Witty as Fleabag, psychologically insightful as Sally Rooney—everyone will be talking about Green Dot' LUCIE WHITEHOUSE, author of Keep You Close

'A gripping read that's smart, funny and highly relatable' LIBBY PAGE, author of The Lido

©2023 Madeleine Gray (P)2023 Allen & Unwin
Coming of Age Literature & Fiction Women's Fiction Funny Witty

What listeners say about Green Dot

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

Detailed love affair - manipulative & narcissistic  characters

Great writing style. Detailed flow of events and very interesting character development & profiles. Can easily see how Hera & Arthur are dysfunctional in their own ways. Their affair is something keeps you guessing how it will end.
The very ending is a bit different but quirky with what I imagine was also “green dot” on a canvass.

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

Delulu isn’t the solulu

Thoroughly enjoyed despite wanting to slap many characters at many different moments through the novel

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

Well conceived

The just published Green Dot, the debut novel by Australian author Madeleine Gray, is about a woman in her mid-20s, landing her first job, and what she gets up to.

It’s breezy and an easy read. I’m ploughing through it, using it as a break from a book that is disturbing me a bit.

Green Dot provides me with insights into a generation that, had I and my offspring procreated in our early twenties, I could be grandfather to. Do I lack empathy and understanding, or does it not quite hit the mark? Lacking sufficient cultural awareness to appreciate the many references clearly doesn’t help.

The breeziness dissipates, replaced by a more serious tone, as an extra-marital relationship becomes serious and has its troubles. How will highly self-aware Hera deal with it? My appreciation deepens. But ultimately, not for me.

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

a strange story

The main character is very hard to like and this is really like watching a train wreck in slow motion. A little too cringe for me

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

I didn’t like the main characters

I found the book to be well written but Hera was insufferable and predictable. The remainder of my Bookclub group abandoned the read. Life’s too short to fill it with that much negativity, but I remained hopeful she would evolve. she remained an entitled victim until the end.

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

Loved it

This is a story that my gosh gets me hooked back into reading. I have picked up some “new” books and struggled to continue/enjoy.
This is just delightful escapism. What a pleasure it was!

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

Predictable

I finished the book but it was predictable the whole way. What you expect to happen does. Hera and Arthur are awful characters, both of them! Jude the dog is more likeable.

Was an ok read. I wanted to see if the ending was any different to what I imagined.

3/5 for me!

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

Incredibly well written but with terrible characters.

The author is a genius with words and characterisation, and I kept listening because of this and because she made a mundane, awful story with very unlikeable characters compelling enough that I wanted to know what happened. I’d listen to /read another of her books but this one conflicted me as I continued to listen but could not stand the main character with her self absorption, entitlement, performative ennui and lack of maturity. Again perhaps that is the gift of the writer to write characters that inspire such emotion.

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

Juicy and Addicting

This book had me audibly gasping, muttering ‘omg’, laughing and at times, ripping my hair out. Honest, raw, emotive and gripping in the most messy, humane way possible. Loved it.

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

So relatable

Not in the sense that I can relate as a mistress but as a female in her late 50’s. Pretty remarkable that this writer can capture a generation much older than the characters in the book but the themes are universal.

An excellent narrator also.

I highly recommend this book.

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