Midst Toil and Tribulation

Safehold Series, Book 6

By: David Weber

Narrated by: Kevin T. Collins

Length: 28 hrs and 23 mins

Publisher's summary

David Weber's New York Times bestselling Safehold series of military Science Fiction adventure, which began with Off Armageddon Reef, continues with Midst Toil and Tribulation

WAR AND FAMINE

Once the Church of God Awaiting dominated all the kingdoms of Safehold. Then, after centuries of stasis, the island kingdom of Charis began to defy the edicts of Mother Church—egged on, some say, by the mysterious warrior-monk Merlin Athrawes, who enjoys the Charisian royal family's absolute trust.

What vanishingly few people know is that Merlin is the cybernetic avatar of a young woman a thousand years dead, felled in the war in which aliens destroyed Earth...and that since awakening, his task has been to restart the history of the long-hidden human race.

Now, reeling from the wars and intrigues that have cascaded from Charis's declaration of independence, the Republic of Siddermark slides into chaos. The Church has engineered a rebellion, and Siddermark's all-important harvest is at risk. King Cayleb and Queen Sharleyan struggle to stabilize their ally, which will mean sending troops—but, even more importantly, preventing famine. For mass starvation in Safehold's breadbasket is a threat even more ominous than civil war...

©2012 David Weber (P)2012 Macmillan Audio

Stopped after the first mis-pronounced name!

I'm not reviewing the book -- I haven't read/listened to it yet. I surely won't be *listening* to this one (and I'm hoping to get my credit back!).

Yet another narrator in this series. This one is breathy, reading with way too much intensity and practically gasping between phrases. As if that wasn't bad enough, as soon as he comes to a name we should all know, he butchers them. Merlin Athrawes's last name has been pronounced A-thraw-ways (or close to that) in all the previous books. This new narrator says, "A-thraws". "Charisian" (previously pronounced kar-is-ian) is now char-ees-ian. "Charis" (previously pronounced kar-is) is now char-is.

Enough is enough. McMillan Audio needs to get narrator and author together for a pronunciation guide. And once there is one, they need to *stick* with it (if not the narrator, at *least* the pronunciation guide!). I am extremely disappointed in this latest narration flop. I've been looking forward to curling up with this book with my Christmas knitting projects for a couple of weeks now.

Poor performance distracts from the plot

I continue to enjoy this series, but unfortunately the narration of this book is quite poor. The narrator uses a breathless over-dramatic tone throughout the book. I'm about 3/4 through the book, but I'm not sure I can make it to the end. I may just skip to the next book which has a better narrator.

Narrator needs to calm down.

Yelling at the mic like it’s an rap battle between Eminem and what’s his name Kelly.

God-awful narrator

Why is it that they feel the need (whoever they may be) to start a series with very good narrators with very good voice talent, then halfway through the series somehow managed to pick the worst possible fit for the series? If he was any worse I'm not sure I would have been able to finish listening to the book. I would have had to gone out and bought the hard copy and read it so I wouldn't have to listen to him.

Nomenclature and Detail

This book definitely advanced the narrative and in some exciting ways. The shift in the pronunciation of series' proper nouns was confusing and frustrating. And the author's display of technical expertise on the details of ships and weapons was sometimes too detailed and boring. In addition, the narrator made every character sound like a septuagenarian.

Great But Bad Choice for Narrator

I just enjoy David Weber's story telling. This for me is an epic story at its best. David shows us a war between good and evil, but which side is good and which side is evil. The author lets you decide for yourself.

Kevin Collins was a poor choice to narrate this book. Not that Kevin did a bad job, he brought about to much change to the book. First off I have gotten used to the narrators to the other five books. There were three other narrators all of them had different voices, but they used the same pronunciations for people and places. Kevin changed every name and places pronunciation. This would have been alright in the beginning of the series, but I had gotten used to the other pronunciations. This threw me off so bad that at one point I thought I was listening to the wrong book. Second, The other narrators had changes in their voices for different characters. Kevin just straight read the material. It was like listening to someone speak in monotone.

What’s up with the pronunciation?

I don’t necessarily mind getting a new narrator… But when they completely change the diction and the emphasis on different syllables after so many other books… That is a little too ridiculous, and something I would have hoped that someone, somewhere whose job it is to manage quality control was able to let that pass.

Good book

Don't really care for the narrator. A bit over acted. I really prefer that they just read the book and don't add in the act.

Worst Narrator Ever!

Is there anything you would change about this book?

This guy absolutely ruined the whole book - his breathy, hyper narration style clashes horribly with David Weber's series. He hasn't even had the basic common sense to check on previous pronunciations of names, places etc. in the other FIVE books, and his clashing mispronunciations had me ready to quit on a book by one of my favourite authors - no easy achievement! I will certainly NEVER buy any book which has him as a narrator. If you haven't already bought this as an audiobook, don't bother - keep up with the series by getting the kindle version!

How could the performance have been better?

Anybody else narrating would have been better!

breathless anticipation

this is a great story, all the books in this series are great and so far they've gotten good people to read for them. but it seems a little excessive when the reader reads the whole book as if the very next word will bring the entire universe crashing down about the listeners ears. I enjoy suspense but 53 chapters of suspense with only 5 or 6 instances of truly suspenseful action is a little much.