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Soft Serve

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Soft Serve

By: George Kemp
Narrated by: Rebecca Macauley
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Stuck in a regional McDonald's, as bushfires close in, three 20-somethings and their dead friend's mum all face a reckoning. Fern longs for Ethan, Ethan longs for Jacob, and Jacob struggles to long for anything. Meanwhile, Pat just wants her grief to ease up.

Soft Serve proves that small-town lives are huge, and that anyone can get stuck in limbo between their past and their hoped-for future. From celebrated Australian playwright and actor George Kemp comes this charming and poignant story: it's drive-thru Chekhov… and full of heart.

©2026 George Kemp (P)2026 Bolinda Publishing City Life Crime Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Literature & Fiction Urban Heartfelt Tear-jerking
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Soft Serve by George Kemp
Guys. I really loved this book. So much so, I re-listened to the last hour while I was tweaking details on a drawing .

I chose Soft Serve for a couple of reasons, firstly, it’s the debut novel by Australian playwright (and actor/educator) @georgepeterkemp, and its blurb was really interesting: “Stuck in a regional McDonald’s, as bushfires close in, three 20-somethings and their dead friend’s mum all face a reckoning.” The audiobook of Soft Serve is less than 5 hours long, so it’s a lovely, sweet snack to tuck between longer books.

After her son Taz passed away, Pat resigned from her position as a school counsellor to take a job at the local McDonald’s, where Taz and his friends used to hang out. Each year, Taz’s friends have a tradition of gathering to honour his memory by toasting with three soft serves. This year, however, the town faces a bushfire threat, and the group has to shelter in place as the wind shifts direction.

A big thumbs up 👍 I’m adding it to my favourites pile. This novel is just so lovely and gentle, but it also hits you in the gut. If you liked Sunbathing by Isobel Beech, this book has the same sense of closeness and familiarity. It also has the same sense of regional Australia as the books by Holly Throsby or In the Common Hour by Sita Walker.

A lovely sweet snack

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Absolutely loved this book. I laughed, I cried, I was absolutely hooked from the beginning.

Incredible

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The author is promising but this novel is dull and hard to follow and difficult to care about. Its quite we’ll read and contains the odd beautiful image. But it’s turgid.

Disappointing

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In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.