The Crown Conspiracy by Michael J. Sullivan

Source: Podiobooks
Length: Approx. 9 hrs
Reader: Nathan Lowell

The book: Literature that is innovative can be challenging and mind-changing. With the long days of  summer approaching, though, a good story with familiar elements is just as welcome. The Crown Conspiracy liberally borrows from its predecessors in the medieval fantasy genre, but lack of originality can be forgiven when the tale is told well.

The main characters here are a pair of hear-of-gold thieves distinctly reminiscent of Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser.  The heroes get themselves into trouble through a obvious set-up and set about trying to escape from captivity and avoid their pursuers. There are some plot twists that aren't terribly surprising for anyone familiar with the genre, but the story is told with such humor and a sense of adventure that these tropes feel natural. The writing alternates between exciting set-pieces and long exposition conversations as the author fleshes out his fantasy world. This short novel is the first in a series of six, so there are some loose ends, but the book itself winds up to a satisfying conclusion.

Rating: 8 /10

The reader: As I stated in a previous review of his own book, Lowell is a gifted reader. The recording is professionally produced with appropriate music for the beginning and end of each segment, along with shorter bits of music for scene changes. If I have any complaints, it's in Lowell's voices for his characters. I found it hard to distinguish between the voices, and the uneven distributions of British accents added to the confusion. Overall, though, this was an excellent recording.

"Markheim" by Robert Louis Stevenson

Source: LibriVox (mp3)
Length: 44 minutes
Reader: William Coon

The story: In desperate need of money on Christmas Day, Markheim approaches a local pawnbroker.  Markheim's evil intentions go beyond just selling stolen goods. His deeds, however secretive, do not go unnoticed. A touch of the supernatural enters into the story, bringing the tale beyond the usual trappings of a dark crime story and into a discussion of the nature of evil and the powers of free will.

This story strongly reminded me of Crime and Punishment (previously reviewed) with both its general outline and its themes. The major difference is  the addition of the supernatural into the story. This addition allows Stevenson to open up the story into the future and past, but also into the soul of Markheim and investigate the essence of his being. With only a fraction of the length of Dostoevsky's novel, Stevenson is able to visit many of the same themes.

Rating: 8 / 10

The Reader: Coon is a superb reader. He builds the tension of this story so that the listener feels the growing psychological horror of the crime. Even though this recording dates to the early days of LibriVox, Coon's recording is clear and well-made.

photo by wallg via flickr. Creative Commons by attribution, non-commercial, no derivatives

"Rashomon" by Ryunosuke Akutagawa

Source: peopleTalk (mp3)
Length: 16 min
Reader: Sadao Ueda

The story: If you've heard of this story before, it's probably from the excellent 1950 film of the same name directed by Akira Kurosawa. The movie, however, takes most of its plot from another story by this same author. So, if you've already seen the film, you're not losing anything by reading this classic Japanese story as well.

The setting is the decaying Rashomon gate in Kyoto during a economic depression. A laid-off servant shelters under the gate, trying to decide whether to live an honest life and probably starve or turn to a life of crime in order to survive. As I listened, I couldn't help but think about people in modern society thrust into the same situation. This story would be a great starting place for a discussion on the validity or invalidity of the concept of moral relativity and its application.

Rating: 8 /10

The reader: Ueda is a professional actor who really knows how to use his voice for storytelling. He builds the excitement of the story to the climax through his use of pacing and rhythm. Ueda has a Japanese accent that is not so strong as to interfere with the understanding of the story, but lends some authenticity to the telling. Apart from some muddy sound and confusing language effects in the introduction, this is a well-recorded piece.

(photo of Nanzen-ji Gate, Kyoto by rdvark via flickr. Creative Commons attribution, non-commercial license)

The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie

Source: Maria Lectrix (zipped mp3s)
Length: 8 hours, 8 minutes
Reader: Maureen O'Brien

The book: Agatha Christie gets a bad reputation for writing books full of unlikely circumstances and formulaic plots. Read enough of Christie and her imitators and this reputation starts to feel earned. Still, Christie shouldn't be blamed for the work of knockoffs and the demands of her fans to write "another one like the last one but different."  At her best, Agatha Christie books are entertaining and memorable reads.

Fortunately for Free Listens, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, along with The Secret Adversary (reviewed previously) are in the public domain in the United States. Christie's first mystery featuring the Belgian detective Poirot, the mystery is told from the point of view of Poirot's own Watson, Lt. Arthur Hastings. While Hastings is home on leave from World War I, he visits his friend John Cavendish at Styles manor. A murder occurs, as it tends to do in these stories, and Hastings calls on his acquaintance Poirot, a detective who is living nearby as a war refugee. As Poirot investigates, suspicion falls on each character in turn before the murderer is finally revealed. This basic plot, with some twists, was recycled in later stories, but it's worthwhile to go back and enjoy the first incarnation of a classic devise.

Rating: 9/10

The reader: O'Brien has a lovely voice that conveys the emotions of the characters. She varies her voice slightly for the cast, with a slight Belgian-French pattern of speech for Poirot and accents that approximate English accents for most of the others. The recording is of middling quality; it's good enough to listen to, but has some muddy sound that can be overlooked for a free reading. The book is in the public domain in the U.S., but in many other countries it's still under copyright by the Christie estate, so check your local laws before downloading.

(photo by connerdowney via flickr. Creative Commons Attribution, No derivatives, Non-commercial license.)
(Review entered in Cym Lowell's Book Review Wednesday Party. Follow the link for more book reviews)

"Justice Delayed" by Decoder Ring Theatre

Source: Decoder Ring Theatre (mp3)
Length: 25 minutes
Reader: Full cast

The story: Decoder Ring Theatre produces a modern take on old-time-style radio with their great superhero serial The Red Panda and their private detective series Black Jack Justice. The short radio plays are backed by music and sound effects in a way that draws listeners into the stories. They feature exciting plots, snappy dialogue and usually nothing more objectional than comic-book violence and mild innuendo.

This story, one from the first season, has a plot that was to my mind predictable, but enjoyable nonetheless. The main joy in listening to these stories is from the banter between Jack Justice and his business partner, Trixie Dixon, Girl Detective. These witty insults and sly flirtations recall the better writing from the Golden Age of pulp detective writing and writers like Rex Stout, Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett. Though the characters are not fully developed here, as the series goes along, they become deeper and more interesting. With forty-two episodes over six seasons, there's plenty of time to get to know these characters and hours of entertaining listening.

Rating: 8 / 10

The readers: Christopher Mott, as Jack, is perfect in his role as a hard-boiled detective. He's got a no-nonsense declamatory style with the right doses of hard-boiled and human. As Trixie, Andrea Lyons is sassy and smart. She's got a Chicago-ish accent, though the exact name of the city where the action takes place is never mentioned. The other characters are well-acted, particularly Detective Nick Sabin, who becomes a recurring character in the series. The music adds to drama and fits in well, giving the right amount of atmosphere without overdoing it. The sound effects likewise are professionally done and make the production a polished product.

Fantomas by Marcel Allain and Pierre Souvestre

Source: LibriVox (zipped mp3s or M4B)
Length: 10 hrs, 11 min
Reader: Alan Winterrowd

The book: Literature is full of great detectives; less so with great criminals. The criminal masterminds that take center stage in novels are often either effeminate plotters or crooks-with-a-heart-of-gold types. Fantômas is the rare criminal genius with the brawn and cold-heartedness to carry out gruesome murders, yet the charm to seduce a princess as he robs her. Close on his heels is the detective Juve of the Paris police, a master of disguise with the intelligence to almost, but not quite, catch up with Fantômas.

In France, Fantômas stars in over 40 books by Allain and Souvestre; the authors' system of working together on the plot, then dividing the writing of the chapters led to this astounding productivity. Fantômas's criminal exploits and his pursuit by Juve make for an entertaining read, but the characters do not have the brilliance of Sherlock Holmes nor the humor of Arsene Lupin.  Although the characters are not so deep, the plot twists so much that even when I thought I knew the identity of Fantômas, there were still several more surprises. Fantômas belongs in the middle ground between the pulps and the great classics of the crime genre.

Rating: 7 / 10

Reader: Allan Winterrowd has a strong American baritone that does not distract from the story. He varies his tone slightly for the various characters, without going so far as to perform voices. As far as I could tell, he pronounces the French place-names correctly, though I'm no expert in French. Winterrowd speaks in a steady pace that allows the listener to keep up. The recording itself is well-done and clear.

(Entered in Cym Lowell's Book Review Party Wednesday. Visit the link for reviews of other books.)

"Booktaker" by Bill Pronzini

Source: AudioGo (part 1 | 2)
Length: 1 hour, 40 min
Reader: Nick Sullivan

The story: The "Nameless Detective" is the protagonist of Bill Pronzini's long-running hardboiled crime series. In this short story the anonymous gumshoe is hired by the owner of a used and antique bookstore. Some valuable maps and etchings have been stolen from the store, despite the installation of an antitheft system, and suspicion has fallen upon the bookstore's employees.

This is the first of the Nameless Detective stories I've read, and I really enjoyed it as a light read. Besides providing a interesting setting for the mystery, the bookstore locale gives Pronzini a fun chance to pay homage to his antecedents by namedropping some of the the detective novel pulp magazines.  Pronzini doesn't break any molds with this story, but he does hit all the right genre notes with an intriguing locked-room setup, a cast of equally plausible suspects, and enough clues to figure out the solution a step before the protagonist, though I didn't.

Rating: 7 /10

The reader: Nick Sullivan is a professional narrator with excellent acting chops. At first, I thought his reading pace was too slow and deliberate, but when he started voicing the characters, he really was able to shine. This audiobook is being released by AudioGo, which was formerly BBC America. They also released another Nameless Detective story for free at their website. I'm not sure how long these stories will be kept posted, so go ahead and get them if you're interested. (Thanks to Jesse Willis of SFFaudio.com for pointing out these stories).

"The Seven of Hearts" by Maurice Leblanc

Source: LibriVox (mp3)
Length: 1 hour, 5 minutes
Reader: Tim Bulkeley

The story: Maurice Leblanc, a contemporary of Arthur Conan Doyle, created the character of Arsene Lupin, a character as popular in France as Sherlock Holmes is in the English-speaking world. In many ways Lupin is the anti-Holmes: where Holmes is English, analytical, and dedicated to catching criminals, Lupin is French, emotional, and is a criminal himself. Yet like Holmes, Lupin usually ends up on the side of good, stealing from the rich and unscrupulous with a style that is dashing and charming.

In this story, Leblanc, who is both the real-life author and the in-story character chronicalling the exploits of Monsieur Lupin, explains how he first met the Gentleman Thief. The tale, which begins with an unusual robbery and involves a hole-punched seven of hearts as a calling card, is as much a baffling mystery as any of Conan Doyle's creations. When we finally get to meet Lupin, the brains behind all the machinations, we are introduced to one of the great characters of fiction with many more stories to come.

Rating: 8/10

The reader: Bulkeley has a rich, pleasing British accent that gives this reading a sense of style. He performs each character with his or her distinctive voice, even doing a decent falsetto for the lone female character. Bulkeley does stumble a few times and seem caught off guard by the structure of a sentence here and there, but overall, this is an outstanding reading.

The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Source: Project Gutenberg, courtesy of Audiobooksforfree.com (high-quality mp3s: parts 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15)
Length: 3 hours, 45 minutes
Reader: James Telfer

The book: This is my favorite Sherlock Holmes novel, and one of my favorite books of all time. Although I think that usually Holmes shines best in the short stories, this novel is the main exception, where Conan Doyle is able to extend the excitement of the short stories to a longer medium. In a bit of a departure from the usual Holmes stories, Conan Doyle combines a mystery with a seemingly supernatural horror story about the titular Hound, giving the tale an legendary feel.

Though it is the greatest of Holmes's mysteries, the detective is absent for much of the story, allowing Watson's character to take center stage. One of the many reasons I love the new BBC series Sherlock is that it revives Dr. James Watson as the intelligent and brave physician seen here, rather than the bumbling sidekick of many Holmes adaptations. In fact, Steven Moffat, the producer of that series, has hinted that "Adler, Hound, and Reichenbach" would feature in the upcoming season, so here's hoping to see the deadly beast come to screen.

Rating: 10 / 10

The reader: As a mentioned in my review of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and A Study In Scarlet, Telfer is a flawless narrator. His ability to imitate the different British accents, from Devonshire to Oxford, give the characters an added depth that doesn't appear on the printed page. I've linked the high-quality mp3 versions from Project Gutenberg above in parenthesis. I don't recommended the first 15 mp3's from the Gutenberg page nor the free version from Audiobooksforfree.com, since even though they're the same recording, both are encoded at a low bitrate, leading to poor quality sound.

(Entered in the Book Review Wednesday contest at Cym Lowell. Follow the link for reviews of other books by various bloggers)

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas

Source: Lit2go (iTunes U link)
Length: Over 30 hours
Reader: Rick Kistner

The book: Set during the exile and return of Napoleon, The Count of Monte Cristo begins with the unjust imprisonment of Edmond Dantes. Dantes eventually escapes prison, and with the help of a massive fortune, becomes the Count of Monte Cristo. With his disguise in place, Dantes proceeds to find those from his former life, rewarding the families of those he loved and punishing those who betrayed him.

What a doorstopper! Reading The Count of Monte Cristo is a massive undertaking but one that is very rewarding. Getting through this novel would be a tedious chore if it weren't that the tale is so full of adventure and intrigue. Knowing a bit about the reign of Napoleon, especially the events of the Hundred Days, will help, since Dumas certainly assumed his audience in the mid 1800s was familiar with their own country's no-so-long ago history. Still, there are so many twists and subplots that it's easy to get lost. You just have to trust in Dumas's storytelling and know that everything will be explained in the end.

Rating: 8/10

The reader: This is an epic undertaking for any reader. Rick Kistner does a pretty good job with it, as usual. There are some audible lip smacks and slight noises, but that's easily overlooked for an unabridged free copy of such a large book read by a single reader. To be honest, I didn't listen to the entire book; I listened to some chapters and read some chapters.

(This review was entered in a contest for Book Review Wednesdays. Follow the link for other book reviews from other blogs.)

Personal Effects: Sword of Blood by J.C. Hutchins

Source: J.C. Hutchins (episode 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7)
Length: 3.8 hours
Reader: J.C. Hutchins

The book: While listening to NPR on a car trip last year, I heard a story about Personal Effects: Dark Art by J.C. Hutchins, who I had previously heard of from his podcast novel 7th Son. What intrigued me about Dark Art was that in addition to the printed story, the book came with additional documents, like a drivers' license, case files, and phone numbers to call. Along with these, Hutchins released this free audio novella, Sword of Blood, as a prequel to promote the full-length novel.

I love this marketing idea; it gives me the chance to meet the characters, sample the author's style, and decide whether or not I want to invest the time and money to read a longer book. In this case, though, I decided the longer book really wasn't something in which I was interested. Sword of Blood introduces Zach Taylor, an art therapist at a mental institution. When one of his elderly patients finishes a quilt and lets it slip that a coded message is hidden in the pattern, Taylor begins to investigate the old woman's background and the crime that put her in the asylum in the first place. I enjoyed the plot, though it requires a considerable suspension of disbelief, but Hutchins' writing style, which involves throwing rapid-fire nerd culture references, seemed strained and instantly dated. Although I enjoyed the audiobook enough that I didn't feel like I wasted my time, I don't think I'll be buying the novel.

Rating: 7/10

The reader: Reading his own material, Hutchins gets the chance to enhance his story by putting the right emphasis on words and using his own patterns of speech for each character. He's a gifted reader and does a great job at making the scary parts more exciting. Each episode is bracketed by announcements by Hutchins for his novel, which is understandable, but gets annoying after a few episodes. The aggressive music that starts and ends the episodes fits in well, but listeners should be aware that it's coming, lest they startle themselves.

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Source: Lit2Go
Length: Approx. 20 hours
Reader: Rick Kistner

The book: Even within the lofty lists of Western canon, there are some books that stand above the rest in reputation. Even if you haven't read them, you don't challenge the placement on these lists of books like Ulysses, Moby Dick, or Anna Karenina. Crime and Punishment is one of these classics and up until a few months ago, I had never read it. Then I started to notice references to the book or its protagonist Raskolnikov in articles, books and even in music. Clearly, the universe was telling me what to read next.

It's not an easy read. Raskolnikov is mentally unstable through most of the book and Dostoevsky reflects his character's delirium in dreamlike imagery. To make matters more difficult, the characters are often hiding their true motives, and part of the effort of reading is figuring out how much each character knows about the other and how much each knows the other knows about the first.  The on-again, off-again lucidity of the protagonist, combined with the web of deception make the book a challenging, but rewarding puzzle.

Beneath this puzzle lies a theme that is familiar to many people nowadays: the tyranny of money. Almost every scene in the book concerns who has or doesn't have money, how much they are spending, or how they plan to get enough money to live a few more days. In doing the research for this review, I wasn't surprised to find that Dostoevsky himself was deeply in debt and wrote the book to pay his bills. Of course, there are other themes as well - morality, justice, love, and all the other big themes of human existence - but I find it comforting that this book about poverty is now available to people who can't pay for it.

Rating: 8/10

The reader: Rick Kistner again does an excellent job with this reading. For a full evaluation of his reading style, see my recent review of The Jungle. My problem in the audiobook is not so much with the reader or the recording, but that it's a difficult book to listen to. Several times in the novel, the narrative tends to change direction in a few sentences, so that if you missed a phrase or short sentence, you completely miss the twist. It's a book that requires your full attention and several re-reads of important paragraphs, so listening as an audiobook is perhaps not the best approach to take to this demanding novel.

"The Barber and his Wife" by Dashiell Hammett

Source: CrimeWAV (mp3)
Length: 28 minutes
Reader: Seth Harwood

The story: This was the first published story for Dashiell Hammett, author of such noir classics as The Maltese Falcon and Red Harvest. While this story doesn't feature the same hard-boiled detectives as in those books, it does include some classic Hammett themes: violence, deception, and infidelity. The barber of the story's title, Louis, is the type of man who enjoys watching boxing, going to burlesque shows, and eating red meat. He is having troubles in his marriage, but he thinks he's secure in everything that really matters to him: respect, health, and above all, manliness.

This story, published in 1923, has much in common with many of the other pulp stories I've read from this decade. I think what Hammett was struggling with in this story, like in the Conan stories of Robert E. Howard, was the role of a man in a society that had given up its agrarian model of manliness. Being a strong traditional man no longer meant that one could get ahead in American society, not when strong, manly men could be easily cut down by machine gun fire in the trenches of World War I or left without a job through the dealings of effete bankers on Wall Street. As Hammett points out at the end of this story, "Why, a man might as well be just a weakling."

Rating: 8/10

The reader: Seth Harwood, as I've mentioned before, is an excellent narrator. He uses a tough voice for the character of Louis and a nasal Northern accent for his wife, Pearl. The story is told in a matter-of -fact tone that reminds one of Humphrey Bogart's portrayal of Hammett's most well-known character, Sam Spade. Breaks in the story are marked by a film noir trumpet blast that fits in well with the story, but is a bit jarring if you're not expecting it. The podcast includes a short introduction and concluding statements from Harwood, putting the story in context.

The Tragedy of Macbeth by William Shakespeare

Source: Wired for Books (Act 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 )
Length: 1 hr 48 min
Readers: Actor's Theater of Columbus, Ohio

The book: Macbeth is a good subject of the Scottish King Duncan until some witches show up to suggest Macbeth will be king. With his wife's heavy persuasion, Macbeth murders Duncan and becomes King of Scotland himself. For a while, everything is fine. But if you've ever seen a Coen brothers film, you know that these kind of criminal enterprises tend to go horribly wrong. Soon, Macbeth is murdering everyone around him and Lady Macbeth has gone insane.

Although I first read Macbeth in high school, it took until I saw the play live at the  Shakespeare Tavern in Atlanta until I really enjoyed it. Like many great works of art, I have to see, hear, or read Shakespeare's plays several times before I can really appreciate them. The first time through, I'm just trying to puzzle out the language. It takes until the third or fourth time I encounter the play, usually in different formats, before I can really appreciate the depth of the work. Even if you've already read or seen this play, do yourself a favor and listen to it one more time.


Rating: 8/10

The readers: The reason I rarely review audio plays is because there's just so much going on that it's hard to encompass everything in a short review. I'll be brief by saying the actors here do a fine job of bringing the play to audio. Sometimes it's a bit difficult to follow what they're saying, but that's more because of the complexity of the language than the actors' voices or the recording quality. I'd recommend following along with a printed text rather than trying to listen to this one in your car.

"A Good Man is Hard to Find" by Flannery O'Connor

Source: The Morning Oil (via Black Market Kidneys) (mp3)
Length: 32 minutes
Reader: Flannery O' Connor

The story: A family in Georgia is heading out for a family vacation to Florida. The situation is familiar to anyone who's taken a family road trip this summer: the kids are bratty, the grandmother tells dotty stories, and the father just wants to get there. On this vacation, though, something goes terribly wrong and the story takes a much darker turn.

This is one of my favorite stories ever written. It seems like every time I read it, I find new details that are funny, disturbing, or that give new insight into the complex characters that inhabit this short piece of fiction. The meaning of the story is also complex. Are people generally good or inherently evil? What makes a good person good and and evil person bad? It's a difficult story to interpret, but I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I do.

Rating: 10/10

The reader: This reading comes from a talk that O'Connor gave at the University of Notre Dame shortly before her death. A couple paragraphs near the beginning of the story get cut out due to a recording skip, but the lost section isn't vital to the story. The sound quality isn't that great, but it's a pleasure to hear O'Connor reading her own work in her Deep South drawl. The combination of the poor sound and the heavy accent may make it difficult for some people to understand, but being a Southerner myself, I had little problem.

Jack Wakes Up by Seth Harwood

Source: Podiobooks.com
Length: Approx. 10 hrs
Reader: Seth Harwood

The book: Sometimes you just need to have some fun being bad. This is both the theme and the best reason for reading Jack Wakes Up. Former action-movie star Jack Palms is stuck in a rut on his road to recovery from the nadir of drugs, divorce, and the implosion of his acting career. He has cleaned up and turned his life around, but has no direction and no income until his friend Ralph contacts him. Ralph is coordinating an agreement to supply some Czechs with cocaine to deal. All Jack has to do is help entertain the Czechs and impress them with his minor celebrity status.

Like Jack, the reader will have to check his scruples at the door. The language is harsh, with copious swearing. The plot, while fast paced and cinematic, is concerned with drugs, strippers and plenty of graphic violence. Jack himself is a likable character, but many of the others behave with stupidity, greed, or sadistic cruelty. This is not a pretty world that Harwood has drawn, but if you're a fan of Quentin Tarentino or Elmore Leonard, you'll enjoy this entertaining novel.

Rating: 8/10

The reader: Harwood's reading of his novel is good. He provides voice characterizations using patterns of pauses, tone of voice, and accents. His narrating voice is straightforward and honest-sounding, fitting Jack's personality. My biggest problem with the recording comes with everything outside the book. The introduction and exit music is hip-hop, appropriate for the mood. But almost every episode begins and ends with clips from the previous episode and next one. This may have been necessary when the chapters were first podcasted, but now that they're collected, it becomes tedious. Also tedious is the swaggering "homie" attitude that Harwood adopts for announcements and self-promotion. He's trying to sound tough, but ends up sounding ridiculous. If you can skip over everything between the introduction and first chapter of each episode, you won't miss a thing.

"A Jury of Her Peers" by Susan Glaspell

Source: Librivox (mp3)
Length: 53 min
Reader: Cori Samuel

The story: Most mysteries focus on the "who" or sometimes the "how" of a crime. In this story both "who" and "how" seem to be apparent from the beginning. The real question is why Minnie Wright would strangle her husband.

While the county attorney, the sheriff, and a neighbor search the house for clues, the wives of the sheriff and neighbor are left alone in the kitchen. Here, they discover secrets about the Wrights hidden within the details of domestic life. The clues are also symbols - spilled sugar, an open bird cage, a misformed log cabin patterned quilt waiting to be knotted - all these point to the crime, but they also represent the broken dreams of Minnie Wright.

These clues, combined with the condescension that the men show for their wives show how women can be pushed to the side of a marriage, no matter whether the husband is loving or spiteful. Despite their differences, all three women in the story share this difficulty; as Mrs. Hale tells Mrs. Peters, "We all go through the same things, it's just a different kind of the same thing."

Rating: 9/10

The reader: Cori Samuels has the most lovely British voice I can imagine. Some might argue that this story of rural America should not be read by a non-American accent. Those who argue such nonsense deserve every broken bone I'm wishing on them right now. Samuels' voice is a welcome teller of any story, particularly this one. She knows how to use pauses to set off a word or sentence without overly drawing attention. To build drama, she varies her volume and speed, then stops, and releases the tension. Her recording set-up is quiet and free from hiss. This is my first encounter with Ms. Samuels' reading; I will certainly be reviewing more of her work in the future.

The Innocence of Father Brown by G.K. Chesterton

Source: Librivox (Zipped mp3s)
Length: 10 hrs, 23 min
Reader: Brian Roberg

The book: The Father Brown stories, of which this is the first collection, are not always as exciting as a Sherlock Holmes story or as clever as some of the better Agatha Christie tales, but they do have G.K. Chesterton's great humor and intelligence embodied in the series' main detective, a priest by the name of Brown. Father Brown is the opposite of the hardboiled detective. Instead, he is Chesterton's ideal of a priest: clear-headed, non-prejudicial, and above all, forgiving. After catching a criminal, Brown would rather calmly reason with him to change his ways rather than turn him over to the police.

Chesterton wrote a number of non-fiction pieces defending and extolling Catholicism, and his fiction bears the same mark. The Father Brown stories often feature seemingly supernatural occurrences: witchcraft, divine judgment, a ghost, an invisible man. Father Brown reasons his way past surface appearances to a rational solution, implying that his faith in a supernatural God is a rational belief, not mere superstition. Although his stories are wrapped around Catholic teachings, Chesterton never loses sight of writing a good tale. He delivers a satisfying assortment of mysteries with the first Father Brown book and from what I've read of the second, continues in The Wisdom of Father Brown.

Rating: 8/10

The reader: Brian Roberg reads with a measured pace that allows the listener to pick up clues, if they are mentally quick. He has careful pronunciation with a nondescript American accent. Roberg does not act voices for different characters, but he does vary his tone of voice with what is being said. The recording is clear and, as always with Librivox recordings, available in several formats, including two bitrates of mp3 as well as ogg vorbis.

"Fat Larry's Night with the Alligators" by Ken Goldman

Source: Well Told Tales
Length: 23 min
Reader: Rick Stringer

The story: This gangster story provides enough violence and double-crosses to satisfy a Sopranos fan. Mafia initiate Danny has just pulled off his first mob hit, icing Fat Larry for skimming profits. As the story begins, he and veteran mobster Sal DeLuca are headed to the Florida Everglades to dump the body. When they get to the swamp, Danny finds more dangers than just the alligators.

The story is told in coarse forthright language which lends it a sneering tough-guy attitude. Goldman provides the gory details to make this story a compelling window into mob life. Although the story moves slowly at first, Goldman doles out twists that make the earlier descriptive passages more than just atmosphere building in hindsight. This is not a story for the ages, but it accomplishes what it intends: entertainment.

Rating: 6/10

The reader: Rick Stringer gives a fantastic narrative performance. Varying his pacing with the action, Stringer builds the tension up to the story's climax. He does not overdo the Italian accent but instead voices the mobsters as individual characters: Danny with newbie excitation and Sal with ruthless callousness. The recording is well-produced by an entertaining podcast.

"The Murders in the Rue Morgue" by Edgar Allan Poe

Source: Librivox
Length: 1 hr, 34 min
Reader: Reynard T. Fox

The story: Edgar Allan Poe begins his story "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" with a long discourse on analysis, holding up the importance of observation as superior to mere intellect alone. After this rambling expostulation, the story actually begins as the narrator introduces us to his freind C. Auguste Dupin. Dupin is a prime example of one possessed of the powers of both intellegence and observation. Dupin soon involves himself in a seemingly demonic crime: an old woman and her daughter have been brutally murdered inside a room in which every entrance was locked. Witnesses reported screams and an inhuman babbling coming from inside the room, yet when they forced the door open, there was no one inside but the two dead women. With the police baffled, Dupin begins to collect clues to solve this apparently impossible crime.

Although this is considered the first detective story, I was surprised at how many of the conventions of the genre are already in place. The detective is eccentric, antisocial, and physically weak. Early on in the story, he demonstrates his skills in a frivolous but amazing display of observation to the admiring narrator who serves as a stand-in for the reader. The police are bumbling, overlook evidence, and arrest an innocent man. The crime is bizarre and incorporates many chance events. Yet despite these tropes-in-retrospect, this is a very good story. You can see its obvious influence in the Sherlock Holmes stories, the TV show Monk, and even in a story nominated for the Hugo Award, one of science fiction's top honors (the link goes to an audio version of "A Small Room In Koboldtown", courtesy of Escape Pod).

Rating: 7/10

The reader: Reynard reads in a marvelous English accent. He varies his voice enough to discern characters and convey a sense of who they are. There are a few minor faults: a whistling sound in the s's and a tendency to read each of Poe's many subordinate clauses separately, though this flaw probably can be more accurately placed at Poe's infatuation with long, rambling sentences like this one. These slight problems were not enough to distract from the story and its overall excellent reading.