Doggy Bird

Could have been performed better

Revisado: 03-21-25

First of all this is a very serious and somber book which I have read several times as I have found it very meaningful. The audiobook however has several flaws which are really unfortunate. Whatever genius thought of playing piano music over the ending and beginning of chapters was totally uninspired, It's tacky and distracts and confuses. Furthermore the speed of the reading is intolerable. I slowed it down on my phone player but cannot do so when using the Alexa device. This is not a book that should be read at the speed of a suspense novel.

As for the book itself, I am reading it for the third or fourth time because it's a profound and moving story from which there is much to appreciate. Sadly, it deserves a better audiobook version

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By far the best Jane Austen narrator Juliet Stevenson’s Pride and Prejudice is the most enjoyable of the four versions I own

Revisado: 09-06-24

I would like some of the narration to be a little faster but speeding it up made Elizabeth too fast so I had to leave it but otherwise by far the best narration of one of my favorite Austen reads. I often choose which Juliet Stevenson narration I’m going to read rather than which book - she is outstanding and can make any audiobook she narrates the greatest pleasure.

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esto le resultó útil a 1 persona

Starts out slowly then you give up all activities to finish

Revisado: 07-11-24

I started the book in awful heat this week on a walk I felt I had to complete - and hoped it would keep me going along with lots of water. But the book started out slowly and when I got to the Farmers Market I caved and called my husband to bring me and my heavy load of veggies home. But it was good enough to keep me reading through all of the cooking of soups, salads, etc. And after a few hours I became unable to stop - listening straight for three days. Most of us know the end game of the stories of the fall of the Sackler family and the opioid epidemic they grew rich on but hearing the details was still shocking to me. This is the second amazing book by Patrick Radden Keefe that I have listened to in Audible - the other was Say Nothing about the Irish Troubles which was also unputdownable. Highly recommended - very comprehensive and absolutely fascinating once you understand why the initial chapters tie everything together. Makes you understand why people learn to mistrust institutions.

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Excellent narration and fairly good story for the most part, some things a bit contrived but strong critique overall

Revisado: 07-03-24

I really enjoyed this audiobook for the most part although there were a few parts that dragged and were less convincing but overall it’s an excellent listening experience. The narrator does a great job with a lot of accents and I’m not sure I’d have enjoyed the book as much without the narration. I might not have been able to make it through the whole very very long story. It’s very reminiscent of the Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe although politically from a different point of view but the descent from wealth and the mashup of social, political and racial tensions is reminiscent. Highly recommend the audiobook- great listening experience for anyone who loves London and knows a little about recent U.K. history.

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Interesting but not as good as reviewed

Revisado: 06-30-24

I chose this title because it got an earphones award this month from audiofilemagazine which I have used as a guide for years. I was disappointed because it didn't live up to my expectations and I thought several times of just giving up. I used to read Dominick Dunne in Vanity Fair and I was fascinated by the family of such talented people and their very bad luck. Griffin Donne is the son of Dominick and the nephew of Joan Didion and made a great film about her that I really enjoyed so I stuck with it. It's not a bad audiobook and it kept my interest enough to finish the book but it really didn't live up to an earphones award neither in content or narration. If you already know the family and the circumstances you may be interested enough to listen, but I can't imagine otherwise this would have much interest for anyone just coming to it cold.

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Thoughtful and well spoken cancer memoir

Revisado: 06-23-24

So well written I gobbled it up in three sequential days. I think I would have been moved by this book even if I did not have such a close relationship to illness but as a caregiver and mother of a cancer patient I couldn’t put it down. Highly recommended for its language, sensitivity and insight it is also an excellent audio performance.

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Wonderful book excellent narration

Revisado: 02-23-24

I recently heard Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk and had read this book several years ago before I was familiar with the opera so decided to listen to it instead for a second look. The narration was so good I really couldn’t ’put it down’. It makes me want to hear the opera again as well as hear more of his music. It also makes me want to read more of Julian Barnes. Highly recommended- a real treat!

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LOVED THIS BOOK, POOR NARRATION

Revisado: 02-13-24

Usually when the narration of a book is this bad, I don't bother to finish the audiobook. However, this is such a wonderful book and I have so little time to sit in a chair and read I was forced to finish the audiobook despite how the narrator grated on me. I'm so glad I was able to do so. This is SUCH A WONDERFUL MEANINGFUL book and I enjoyed it so much. I have a paperback copy and I look forward to reading it in two weeks on a long eight hour flight I have planned. However the narrator delivers this test in both a singsong and breathless voice for the main character that is so annoying it really took me quite a while to get beyond how poorly done it was. This is the first time I have read Penelope Lively although I have been meaning to do so for years and have a number of her books awaiting my attention on shelves. Hopefully some of the other audiobooks available will have better narrators as well. This particular book won a Booker Prize in 1987 - and one can easily see why, it's a profound and moving memoir of a woman's experience and love told from her deathbed in poetic bursts of memory through other characters and her own thoughts. I had tears in my eyes at the end of the book - I can't wait to read it again and savor it even more.

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I LOVE listening to this podcast

Revisado: 11-10-23

Since I discovered this podcast I have been listening non stop to the point of not having heard a book since that point a week ago - but I’m learning so much and getting so many great suggestions about what to read next - I especially like hearing guest authors speak but I also enjoy the arguing between the two emcees which I find somewhat revealing. My favorite episode was George Saunders and the best Booker list year which I had to listen to multiple times until I realized you can see the notes!!! Great discovery- highly recommended for book lovers. Unfortunately James Watson (hope that’s his name - he speaks too fast for me to ever get his name) speaks too fast but that’s my biggest complaint about a great podcast.

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EXCELLENT BOOK, NARRATOR and LISTENING EXPERIENCE

Revisado: 09-28-23

I have been listening to about 6 books a month this year for various reasons and this is one of the best audiobooks I have heard all year. First of all I am a HUGE fan of Margaret Drabble whose books I have been collecting for decades waiting for the opportunity to read them since few are available in audio. Finally having time to actually sit and hold a book in my hands this year I began with the Radiant Way and then The Needle's Eye. I hadn't planned to read one of her later novels so early in my journey as the Dark Flood Rises but when I came upon this audiobook I decided to give it a try and couldn't stop for the next three days! The narrator - Anna Bentinck - has a wonderful sense of the characters and really does a great job of pronouncing foreign words as well. The combination for this particular book is perfect as it is about a group of characters who are experiencing different aspects of aging in a few different locales and economic situations but are mostly very literate, cultured, and highly educated. Thus they use a lot of foreign words and even poetry in other languages and this can trip up narrators and interrupt the pace of a novel. I'm usually very picky about accents and was very impressed by Ms. Bentinck whose reading of this book leaves it at the very top of my list of audiobooks this year. The book itself is so well written and so compassionate - but it is not an easy or a jaunty book. It's about the complications of aging and death. But it is BEAUTIFUL and beautifully written and conceived. And now it is beautifully narrated as well. I tremendously enjoyed every minute of listening to it.

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