Carol T. Carr

Who Are the Remarkably Bright Creatures?

Revisado: 03-03-23

After reading this book, I will never again visit an aquarium without wondering what those aquatic animals might be thinking about me behind their tank walls. Marcellus the Octopus is a principal character of this story, with the humans around him providing a saga of family chaos and challenges that he can only wonder at within the prison of his tank in an aquarium on the coast of Washington…until he decides these humans desperately need his help. An expert at getting out of his prison (and returning to it when he must to stay alive), Marcellus befriends Tova, the aquarium cleaner, who has mourned the loss of her son for the past 30 years, and Cameron, a California misfit who wanders into town searching for the father he’s never known and who also ends up cleaning in the aquarium. The eternal story of human interactions and how muddled they can get ensues, with Marcellus being the silent stirrer of the pot.

The narration is very well done. Michael Urie the perfect mouthpiece for Marcellus who manages to convey his sardonic wit along with his three hearts of gold. Marin Ireland captures the remaining cast of characters with full command of accents and age groups and is a narrator I will search out for other books. Shelby Van Spelt’s prose is a pleasure to read, and the plot remarkably well-crafted.

If you’ve watched The Octopus Teacher, this book is the perfect follow-up. If you haven’t yet, I highly recommend you watch and read both. They are well worth your time, and you will not be disappointed.

Who are the remarkably bright creatures? You'll have to read to the end, but be prepared for surprises.

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Another Elegant Read

Revisado: 08-07-17

Amor Towles has done it again--written a compelling story with exquisitely drawn characters that is in sum the epitome of elegance.The premise of a man held under house arrest in a setting that for most of us would be a vacation experience of a lifetime evolves from being suspiciously unrealistic to a reasonable backdrop, and by the end ultimately proves the worth of a man is determined through adversity and opportunity. The narration adds its own form of elegance; Nicholas Guy Smith conveyed with remarkable accuracy the voices of Russians, Americans, French, young girls and sophisticated women. There is much wisdom in this book that is highlighted by his perfect expression and cadences.

Up to this time, I've held Towles's Rules of Civility as the most elegantly written contemporary book I've read. With A Gentleman in Moscow he has written the bookend to that thought. Many kudos to both writer and narrator for a beautiful job done.

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Excesses of Convolution Exquisitely Narrated

Revisado: 07-27-15

I've just forged my way through all 23+ hours, and I feel like at least half of that time was unnecessary to make the point (or lack of point) of this story. Calamity Physics gave me high hopes that this would be another exquisitely crafted volume with characters who grew with every new facet exposed. Wrong. The characters, even as unique and unusual as many of them are, are primarily two-dimensional. The main character, McGrath, does evolve, but it is never really clear what he has ultimately learned from his experiences and insights.

I can live with uncertain endings, and I relish the opportunity to craft different endings in my own mind. But with this book I felt cheated of even that opportunity, as it is never clear what is real or what is part of fiction in which all the characters are playing a part. All that said, it is lovely prose, and Pessl can create any atmosphere or mood with her words. I would read her books for that alone, and just hope that as she matures as a writer, she learns how to craft a tighter and less ambiguous plot.

Outstanding, flawless narration. Weber is a genius with his accents.

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Excellent Narrator--Deficient Plot

Revisado: 09-23-13

Once again, Davina Porter (not Christina Moore) nails the characterization of a broad range of characters, but it's not enough to save a tedious plot. The story could have been accomplished with half the murders, for each of which the reader must sit through pages of hand-wringing, finger-pointing, and internal dialogue of doubts and counter-doubts. The classic antagonism between upper-class Brits and the police was also carried to extremes to make that point. I was hoping for a series to keep me going through the fall and winter, but I could barely finish this first volume. Multiple thumbs down.

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esto le resultó útil a 8 personas

A Disappointment

Revisado: 06-03-13

I had hoped for another series where I could get to know some characters well and follow them through several books. I can barely make it through a quarter of this one. The plot is slow and plodding, I haven't yet found a character worth investing in, and the narrator is killing it with all her variations on the cliche accent of a Western hayseed. I refuse to waste any more time with it. Buyer beware!

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This Series Has Hooked Me On Mysteries

Revisado: 05-15-13

I was a non-believer in the magic of mystery until I discovered this series. Bowen enchanted me with her well-crafted characters and the unpredictable plots she places them in. At first blush, Georgianna seems a character hard to identify with--a young royal, 34th in line for the British crown, educated at a finishing school in Switzerland, whose social crowd is the royalty of Europe. But it's 1932, nearly everyone, including her family, has lost nearly all their money. Georgie is penniless, and struggling like all the common folk to find a job, get a stable home, and hopefully find someone to love. It's not much help that she is a regular guest to tea with the Queen who wishes to arrange a marriage for her or send her off to the country to be lady-in-waiting to an aging princess, and has no compunction about asking her to spy and do other illegal things on her behalf.

The strength of this book (and the four that follow in this series) is the fine crafting that Bowen has used to create her characters. Georgie is human, basically good to the core and lovable, and we can all identify with her struggles to make it on her own in the world. She also has a penchant for finding dead bodies strewn in her path and a remarkably good head for solving mysteries. Bowen has also provided a charming rogue to bring the tease of romance into the stories, which makes each one the equivalent of a page-turner. And a Cockney grandfather you want to hug.

The best part, however, is the narration. Kellgren is outstanding with not only her accents, which abound in these books, but also with bringing the characters to life with richness and authenticity. She is a master with her interpretation and gives a tour de force performance.

All in all, a great read and one that will make me search out other mysteries. However, I doubt I'll find any that will rise to the level of Bowen's.

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Well-crafted and well-performed

Revisado: 04-09-13

Stunning in its breadth and detail, this book conveys the history of one of the world's most important cities in an intensely personal manner. It will be impossible to visit New York now without sensing the influence of the Indians, the Dutch, the British through their occupation during the Revolution, and all the immigrant cultures that followed.

Rutherford weaves a story based substantially on commerce and banking in a human manner that brings to life all the issues and challenges that New York faced, as it grew into the metropolis of today, through the stories of individual families. Much to his credit, he maintains a solid character development of entire families through many generations, from the 1600's to 2009. Bramhall's narration is outstanding, conveying young girls, ancient grandmothers, and a multitude of ethnic accents with great skill and authenticity.

I marvel most at the construction of the story. It takes great skill to tackle such a large history and convey it with enough human interest to keep a reader spell-bound for 36 hours. I could have listened for many more. All in all, a great book and fine performance that I highly recommend listening to.

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esto le resultó útil a 3 personas

Artfully Crafted Tapestry

Revisado: 12-03-12

What could easily be a recipe for confusion--a storyline that spans a century with chapters that jump back and forth decades at a time, interspersed with the timelessness of fairy tales woven throughout--results instead in a remarkable blending of the lives of multiple families across four generations to tell a story of love, treachery, an ultimately a celebration of the will to survive. Every main character is portrayed with multiple levels, being slowly fleshed out as the story discloses the reasons behind their actions. (That said, I felt the relationship between Rose and Eliza was never drawn clearly enough to justify the decisions they both made.)

The narrator was outstanding--sensitive, clear, carrying off an assortment of accents with great competency. I will search her out for other readings. And the scope of the story, as grand as it was, encompassing a century and half the globe, was pared down to the essentials enough so that the reader has a good sense of the various eras. A part of me feels that perhaps the story could be told with fewer words, but it would be hard to sacrifice some of the lush descriptions and lovely language.

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Too Many Flaws

Revisado: 10-09-12

It's rare that I can't finish a book, but I knew it was time to quit when I found myself cringing at the thought of picking it up again. So I'm bailing at 75%. I just don't care what happens at the end. And I don't care about these characters either, after hoping all that time for the authors to build them into people you want to know better and understand. For the past few chapters I've continued to listen to try to figure out why, as I'm a writer too and want to know how not to make this mistake. But I've lost patience with that process as well as the book.

Part of the problem is the narrator who has a strange understanding of Southern accents, which seem to heighten and disappear like passing clouds. Even his main character is difficult to identify at times because his accent is constantly changing. And, yes, it's a story about teenagers and teenage love, and I get that it's YA, but teenagers these days have far more depth than any of the characters the authors have created. High school is so much more than petty spats between warring cliques, and I believe the authors passed up some fine opportunities in the HS setting to add meaning to the story and to the characters.

The other challenge to this story is the artifical construct of the "caster" world the authors try to create. While I know the book has been praised for placing a story in the present time in a place any one of us could recognize, supposedly making it that much scarier, it felt more contrived to me than the fantasy world created in the Harry Potter books. And even though I haven't finished it, I know this book is too long for the story it's trying to tell.

All in all, a big disappointment, and one I regret spending a credit on.

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Another Quindlen Jewel

Revisado: 09-11-12

Spousal abuse is a challenging, difficult topic to both write and read about. I put off reading this book for some time, despite having read several other gems in Quindlen's repertoire and knowing the quality of her work. And though it was still a hard book to take in, the skill with which she developed every character in this book made it well worth the effort. Spousal abuse doesn't happen in a vacuum between a husband and wife; children and families are equally victimized and scarred for life, and Quindlen uses every bit of her remarkable writing expertise to make this point. As well, Quindlen used those skills most effectively to show the birth and evolution of an inherently flawed relationship.

Phimister's verbal portrayal of every character was equally well-done. She captured well the painful suffering and confusion of the main character as well as her moments of joy, but easily slipped into the voice of a Bronx cop, an aged holocaust survivor, an eleven-year old boy and a Southern belle. Her reading was thoughtful and sometimes pensive, totally fitting a story wherein the main character is struggling to understand what happened to her life.

There are some stories in life where there can be no happy ending. This is certainly one of them, but it still ends on a note of realistic hope for the future, and I thank the author for that. I highly recommend this book.

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esto le resultó útil a 6 personas