Randie Parks

Great Book for Easter!

Revisado: 04-08-25

A beautiful fictional telling of Joanna’s story! I was captivated from the start. The narrator was excellent. At any point during this story I would have given this review 5/5 stars. However, the ending felt abrupt. Technically all looses ends were tied up but I felt like the author was only allowed a certain word count and was told to wrap it up at the end. Still, I would highly recommend this book.

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Great Story In Spite of the Robot

Revisado: 04-18-24

I love Kim Vogel Sawyer’s writing! I have never been disappointed in her stories and this one is no exception. However, the AI voice took away much of the charm of Boone’s Hollow. The mountain dialect fell flat without the proper accents, cadence, and inflection, and made the language used by the characters sound ridiculous. Due to macular degeneration I prefer to listen to the books I “read.” I am glad that I persevered through the AI reading of the story of Bettina and Shay, but I feel like I missed out on a lot of the depth of their personalities and emotions. There is no differentiation between characters. None of the nuances are there that endear the characters to the reader. I know that AI is an economical alternative for authors and publishers, and likely the wave of the future in audiobooks, but this “ reader” is not likely to purchase an audiobook read by a narrator incapable of presenting emotional depth in the future. I highly recommend reading the hard copy of this book.

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Another MUST READ From Tessa!

Revisado: 01-30-24

Tessa is a master at weaving fictional characters into the truth of God’s word. Although fiction, her books always inspire me to open my Bible and read the stories I’ve read all my life from a new perspective. Fortunately, I enjoy the authors writing so much I was able to get past the strange cadence of the narrator. Her awkward emphasis on random words and pauses before hard to pronounce words sometimes made it difficult to persevere. Her almost hillbilly characterization of a couple of the less educated characters was out of place in biblical fiction. Tessa’s writing deserves a more eloquent delivery.

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The abbot is Worth the Pain of Enduring the Narrator!

Revisado: 07-02-23

How sad for Tessa Afshar that the impact of her extensive research and lovely writing was diminished by this ridiculous cartoonish narration. How does this happen? Does no one listen to the book before it is released to the public? I love these stories that are built around the time of Paul when the Church was growing and spreading throughout the world. Imagining the lives of those who helped established the Christian faith is inspiring. If only the narrator has not made me feel I was watching a Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoon!

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Another Great Episode in the Blessing Saga

Revisado: 10-15-22

Lauraine Snelling doesn’t disappoint with this story of Thorliff’s first venture outside of Blessing, ND. Although it ends somewhat abruptly it leaves the listener waiting for the rest of the story. I love audio books because it allows me to “read” while cooking and driving. However, I will be reluctant to purchase books featuring this narrator in the future. His cadence and infliction are boring and repetitive and have nothing to do with the meaning of the text. His pronunciation of the names of the characters is inconsistent with the previous installments of this series read by a different narrator, and his attempt at accents is embarrassing and insulting. Not only are his accents for the southern characters not authentic, his vocal interpretation of every southern character is nasal and cartoonish and sounds like Grandpa Jones from the Hee Haw television series. If this narrator is on the next book in the series I will be reading the book from my library app instead of purchasing the audio book.

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Great Story! Don’t Be Put Off by the Narrator

Revisado: 10-02-22

This is my first book by this author and I loved to suspense combined with the Spiritual content. However, I almost stopped listening because of the narration. The accents of the Latino, Navajo, and Southern U.S. characters was distracting and a little offensive in my opinion. It would have been better to leave that to the listeners imagination. I’m so glad I don’t let that stop me from enjoying an otherwise entertaining audio book.

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