John R Williford

After thoroughly enjoying Patrick Tull's readings of the Aubrey-Maturin series, I decided to listen to his rendition of Dickens' most humorous novel. Tull is superb, breathing life and wit into the naively pretentious members of the Pickwick Club. His sixth sense for the timing and enunciation of Victorian prose is such that one will not regret subscribing to every 19th century British classic he reads.

A few words of technical caution. The conversion of this reading from Format 1 to Format 2, while understandable, has the tonal quality of listening to a Winston Churchill WWII speech recorded from an old tubular RCA home radio.

This most recent Michael Lewis book is a lighter, more anecdotal read about governments going bust in the aftermath of the subprime financial meltdown. Almost has a Bill Bryson air to it. I give it four stars--but even with that rating, Boomerang pales because The Big Short is truly a great, great book.

Excellent dialogue narration. The narrator's ability to re-cast his voice leaves the reader with no doubt which Forster character is speaking and thus enhances the narrative flow of one of the early 20th century's great British novels.

I have just started listening to this book, and have decided that I will have to buy a printed copy and read its text concurrently while listening in order to make it to the end. This is the third audiobook I have purchased which is read aloud by its author, and it will be the last. I cannot understand Ms Morrison's pronunciation of many of the words. There is no differentiation in voice, so one doesn't know what character is talking or thinking. There are no pauses between the paragraphs or shifts in the time periods. [Contrast the amateurish reading of Beloved with the professionally read "The Sound and The Fury"--an even more diffcult book to follow.] Frankly, Ms Morrison is not a professional reader and subscribers are cautioned to listen to the sample [which I did not] before purchasing this audiobook. Unfortunately, Beloved is only available as an audiobook read by Ms Morrison. So readers of this review don't think I am picking on Toni Morrison, Charles Frazier's self-read of Cold Mountain suffers from the same deficiencies. Does any one know why the producers of audiobooks allow authors to read their own books? I will guess that it all has to do with retaining copyrights and royalties by the author and the author's agent.