The Assassin and the Desert Audiobook By Sarah J. Maas cover art

The Assassin and the Desert

A Throne of Glass Novella

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The Assassin and the Desert

By: Sarah J. Maas
Narrated by: Jennifer Gambino
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About this listen

The Silent Assassins of the Red Desert aren't much for conversation, and Celaena Sardothien wouldn't have it any other way. She's not there to chatter, she's there to hone her craft as the world's most feared killer for hire. When the quiet is shattered by forces who want to destroy the Silent Assassins, Celaena must find a way to stop them—or she'll be lucky to leave the desert alive.

©2012 Sarah J. Maas (P)2025 Dave Tony
Epic Fantasy Paranormal Paranormal & Urban
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What listeners say about The Assassin and the Desert

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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Horrible Narrator

Was this an accidental draft that got published? It's Assassin's Blade with terrible narration with repetitive title announcement before each chapter. Listening to this narrator was like being in the most boring college lecture in a monotone voice, no variation between characters, mispronounced basic words, characters, and locations, to the point where I fell asleep mant times. I'm going to see if I can get my credit back.

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

It’s… meh

My biggest complaint is the narration. I thought it sounded like she was talking into a tin can, and her inflection was the same for every single sentence. I don’t think she’s listened to the audiobook versions of the main series because her pronunciation of names was different, which really bothered me. I also felt the story had already been told in the main series, I didn’t get anything new from this novella. Not necessarily worth using the credit in my opinion.

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  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Terrible narration

Same story as the book no new additions and narrator was so dry and mispronounced names. Love Sarah and her books but pass on this one.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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Just get the Assasin’s Blade

I didn’t realize that this was the same story as the one in the Assasin’s Blade until I started listening to it. This narrator is terrible compared to Elizabeth Evans who makes the novella in Assasin’s Blade come alive. I would not get this and just get the Assasin’s Blade.

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    4 out of 5 stars
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Great novella

Enjoyed the book! It just bothered me that some of the words were pronounced differently than the main books.

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1 person found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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Narrator kills it.

Throne of Glass is a well loved piece of work. The entire series is available. I cannot fathom why this narrator didn’t listen to any of the available works to learn the used pronunciation. It makes me irrationally mad and I cringed every time one of the characters and or locations were butchered. There is also no life or strength to her voice like we are used to from the prior books. She may be a great narrator but she was poorly prepared for the venture. I would skip the audio and read the novella I physical form or e-book if you have the tism and these things matter. Story was great it was a refreshing dip back into the world. Unfortunately it will be a once and done for me unless they fix the narration.

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    1 out of 5 stars
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Narrative is AWFUL is it AI?

I’m honestly struggling to finish. It’s sounds like a teacher reading story time. Her pitch and tone goes up after every sentence starts with weird pauses. Not to mention the butchering of so many words including simple thing ex. Dias. I can almost understand the names cause they’re complicated but come onnn do a little research. TOG has a huge fan base. I guess Elizabeth Evan’s spoiled me cause she was amazing and I’m starting to think it was AI
generated. So far it’s just been repetitive disappointment

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    1 out of 5 stars
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Wtf was that????

Are you kidding me ? It’s literally the same story that’s in assassins blade. It is CRIMINAL that Elizabeth Evans is not narrating this book. Did we literally learn nothing from the narration of the Acotar books??? not only this, but this narrator literally has no emotion. She literally sounds like a robot and you can tell she’s never read a Sarah J. Maas book before because she’s pronouncing things wrong. We have been waiting two years to get a book and we get a retelling of a small chapter in already small book. When she heavily suggested that she was writing a book in this world during an interview the way that I have been waiting for a Dorian and Manon book to drop. AND THIS IS WHAT WE GET. Copy paste and call it a novella??? If I was to tell somebody to read these books, I would never tell them to read this book. This is absolute horseshit and literally screaming money grab. We did not need this book. We did not want this book. This is another terrible decision on Sarah J. Maas and her team’s part.

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    1 out of 5 stars
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**"Duplicate novella

This is the exact copy of her other novella with a slightly different title and a worse narrator. I paid for it instead of using an audible credit, so it's not eligible for return. Very dissatisfied listener.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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Refreshing take!

I actually bought the novellas independently on purpose to have a break from the same narrator. LOVE Sara J Mass and I enjoy Sarah Evans narration but it was so nice to change things up and this was actually my favorite of the Assassin’s Blade novellas! The narrator is getting very bad reviews, maybe she’s new but I truly didn’t think it was bad and the pronouncing of certain things was actually more like my brain wanted them said anyway.

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