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  • Underbelly

  • The instant Sunday Times bestseller from Mother Pukka – the unmissable, gripping and electrifying fiction debut
  • By: Anna Whitehouse
  • Narrated by: Jasmine Blackborow, Nathalie Buscombe
  • Length: 10 hrs and 55 mins
  • 4.4 out of 5 stars (235 ratings)
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Underbelly cover art

Underbelly

By: Anna Whitehouse
Narrated by: Jasmine Blackborow, Nathalie Buscombe
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Summary

Underbelly

[n.] singular

The soft underside or abdomen of a mammal.

An area vulnerable to attack.

A dark, hidden part of society.

Lo and Dylan are living parallel lives, worlds apart. 

Lo is the ultimate middle-class mother, all perfectly polished Instagram posts and armchair activism. Dylan is just about surviving on a zero-hours telemarketing job from her flat, trying to keep food on the table. But when they meet at the school gates, they are catapulted into each other's homes and lives - with devastating consequences....

Explosive, sharply humorous and unflinchingly honest, Underbelly slices through the filtered surface of modern women's lives to expose the dark truth beneath.

Read by Nathalie Buscombe and Jasmine Blackborow, featuring the authors.

©2021 Anna Whitehouse (P)2021 Orion Publishing Group

Critic reviews

"Darkly voyeuristic but with heart - as funny as it is painful and true. We loved it." (Grazia)

"I don't think I've ever turned the pages of a book so quickly. So sharp, so tender...truly excellent storytelling." (Daisy Buchanan) 

"Entertaining and playful but with huge depth, meaning and heart. I raced through it." (Emma Gannon) 

What listeners say about Underbelly

Average customer ratings
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Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Fatphobic content

I was quite excited to start this book but unfortunately when I got to chapter 4 & listened to the blatant fatphobic content - in reference to the man behind the mum in the queue I had to turn it off & return the title.
If your someone who suffers with body image, eating disorders or weight related issues I would not recommend.

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13 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars
  • jo
  • 28-09-21

Feels like what happened to Cash Garraway

I liked this book and I enjoyed reading. While reading I felt Dylan was very similar to what happened to Cash Garraway, and how she shared her struggles but the middle class 'insta mums' all ganged together to tear her down,

These aspirational insta mums who pretend they are scummy mummies because they feed their kids fish fingers once in a blue moon, promoting this when really they order Hello Fresh every night.

Thank you for writing this book.

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Gripping!

The first chapter is gripping and heartbreaking and incredibly uncomfortable to read / listen - brilliant writing throughout. I’m only 3/4 way through but feel compelled to review now. It really is addictively brilliant.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Book cover misleading

I found this really boring with characters you couldn’t care less what happened to them. I think grown women who are so obsessed with social media and care so much about what strangers think need to get a life. Also, Dilan was always worried about her ex… did it not occur to her to google him or find out where he was… ridiculous. Lo was self obsessed and immature. The narration was ok, the different accents and voices were a bit all over the place. The cover of the book is very misleading, it’s not a murder mystery and I’m still unclear to whom they’re referring to when they talk about ‘she wants to destroy it’ . All in all, wish I’d not bothered.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Didn’t want it to stop!

Loved this book, I was really gripped by the 2 stories and the performances of the audiobook narrators Jasmine and Natalie were SO good. Genuinely made me reflect on the time I spend on my phone and social media. I think I was only disappointed that it came to an end! I wanted to know what happened next, but I think there was a point to it ending how it did.

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1 person found this helpful

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

Really gripping story

Gripping story and feel like I’ve met these characters somewhere before, even if online. Explores very important issues surrounding social media usage too.

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Depressing

I am only reviewing the first 8 chapters because I had to stop listening. The characters were so negative. I presume the writer was trying to create two women from different walks of life who both had troubles but these two were just too depressing to listen to. A little light with the shade and I may have persevered but the narration was sile destroying.

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

Know the feeling

My mum used to cook omelettes au ‘erbs’ which meant there was no food again . I related to this book. At first I thought it was going to be a ‘ oh isn’t parenting boring’ but it shaped up and gripped me. Had similar injustices but. From PTA s which rule the school and don’t require social media .
Women are hard on women , we are hard on ourselves. it’s rough out there .sometimes. Shame the bullies won well done for highlighting what damage that can do.

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

Brilliant performer. Great story

I really enjoyed the audio version of this book. The reader is brilliant. Her ability to switch accents and infuse the words with emotions, suspense, attitudes and character perspectives is Oscar worthy. Loved the reader. The story in this book has hit the zeitgeist and balances real world relationships with online presence and audiences. It shows how modern online audiences are like the baying crowds at gladiatorial battles in the colosseums of antiquity. It shows how it affects lives in reality. It shows how we cannot see the real person through the tinted (and tainted) lenses of social media. One flaw in the story telling is the disappearance of Lo’s husband in the end. Something was happening in her marriage that made Lo shut down conversations with Dillon but that didn’t return to the story and is left somewhat unresolved to the reader. But thoroughly enjoyed this story.

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

Wordy and messy

40 chapters in, and this novel seems to only just have picked up momentum. The literary quality is not complex or rich enough to carry this through as literary fiction. It’s more of a really, really lengthy reflection on the possible negative effects of social media use. The plot moves excruciatingly slowly, the characters fall kind of flat in all the faff. It feels padded to death. Lo’s voice actress is good, Dylan’s sounds like she’s performing a piece of bad spoken word poetry. All the unnatural pausing within sentences sound like line breaks. The end was decent but it took way too long to get there, with little rising tension throughout to maintain the reader’s interest. Plot predictable, too. I was bored.

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