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The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry
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  • Published: 15 March 2012
  • ISBN: 9781448123155
  • Imprint: RH AudioGo
  • Format: Audio Download
  • Length: 9 hr 57 min
  • Narrator: Jim Broadbent

The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry

Formats & editions
Paperback
2 Jan 2013
EBook
1 May 2012
Audiobook
15 Mar 2012
Paperback
9 May 2023
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A tender, quietly comic, heartstopping and very British coming of (old) age novel from a powerful new voice in fiction.

Brought to you by Penguin.

Winner: New Writer of the Year - Specsavers National Book Awards 2012

When Harold Fry nips out one morning to post a letter, leaving his wife hoovering upstairs, he has no idea that he is about to walk from one end of the country to the other. He has no hiking boots or map, let alone a compass, waterproof, or mobile phone. All he knows is that he must keep walking - to save someone else's life.

Harold Fry is the most ordinary of men. He just might be a hero for us all.

Oscar-winner Jim Broadbent has starred in a huge range of films, from British favourites including Bridget Jones, Hot Fuzz and The Iron Lady, to Hollywood blockbusters such as Moulin Rouge, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and the Harry Potter films. He is set to star in the upcoming film adaptation of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry.
  • Published: 15 March 2012
  • ISBN: 9781448123155
  • Imprint: RH AudioGo
  • Format: Audio Download
  • Length: 9 hr 57 min
  • Narrator: Jim Broadbent
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About the author

Rachel Joyce

Rachel Joyce is the author of the Sunday Times and international bestsellers The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, Perfect, The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy, Maureen Fry and the Angel of the North, The Music Shop, Miss Benson's Beetle, and a collection of interlinked short stories, A Snow Garden & Other Stories. Rachel’s books have been translated into thirty-seven languages and have sold millions of copies worldwide. The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Book Prize and longlisted for the Man Booker Prize. The critically acclaimed film of the novel, for which Rachel also wrote the screenplay, was released in 2023. Miss Benson’s Beetle won the Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize in 2021. Rachel was awarded the Specsavers National Book Awards New Writer of the Year in December 2012 and was shortlisted for the UK Author of the Year in 2014. In 2024 she was awarded an honorary doctorate by Kingston University. Rachel has written over twenty original afternoon plays and adaptations of the classics for BBC Radio 4. She lives with her family near Stroud.
portrait photo of Rachel Joyce

Also by Rachel Joyce

Maureen Fry and the Angel of the North
The Homemade God
Miss Benson's Beetle
Perfect
The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy
Penguin Readers Level 5: The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry (ELT Graded Reader)
Arabian Afternoons
See all

Praise for The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry

One of the sweetest, most delicately-written stories I've read in a long time. One man's walk along the length of England to save the life of a dying woman. Each chapter describes a different encounter along the way, with a definite nod to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. Philosophical, intriguing, and profoundly moving.

Richard Madeley, Foyles website

Uplifting, funny and delicate

Jon Stock, The Daily Telegraph

Tender and funny, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry shows that even our frailties can be uplifting and redemptive.

Edward Stourton

Compelling and truly wonderful. It made me laugh out loud at times and brought tears to my eyes. There are sentences that are just brilliant and well observed.

David Headley, Goldsboro Bookshop

Harold Fry is infuriating, hilarious and completely out of his depth, but I held my breath at his every blister and cramp and, felt, as if by turning the pages, I might help his impossible quest succeed. Marvellous!

Helen Simonson, author of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand

I was completely blown away. I thought I was about to read a comic novel but what can I say - it was indeed funny, but tender, ironic and deeply moving, a really wonderful book.

Pat Abrehard, Harbour Bookshop, Kingsbridge, Devon

A wonderful book ... Full of sadness, hope, and ultimately love. I found it very moving.

Esther Freud

‘Jim Broadbent reads Rachel Joyce’s first novel, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, in a splendidly deadpan manner.’

Sue Gaisford, Independent on Sunday