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The Enchantment Emporium  By  cover art

The Enchantment Emporium

By: Tanya Huff
Narrated by: Teri Clark Linden
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Publisher's summary

The Gale family can change the world with the charms they cast, and they like to keep this in the family. Alysha Gale is tired of having all her aunts try to run her life, both personally and magically. So when the letter from her Gran arrives willing her a "junk" shop in Calgary, Alysha jumps at the chance. It isn't until she gets there that she realizes her customers are fey. And no one told her there's trouble brewing in Calgary - trouble so big that even calling in the family may not save the day.

©2009 Tanya Huff (P)2010 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Fantasy buffs will find plenty of humor, thrills and original mythology to chew on, along with refreshingly three-dimensional women in an original, fully realized world." ( Publishers Weekly)

What listeners say about The Enchantment Emporium

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

A good fun listen, but an uneven reader

I've enjoyed Tanya Huff's work for years, and as usual, this was a fun urban fantasy story with quirky characters that frequently made me laugh out loud.

There are two big objections I saw in the other reviews that made me hesitant to buy that I wanted to respond to:

1.) The narrator: I'm sorry to agree, but I really wish there were another reader. There are some things she does wonderfully. She voices the Aunties beautifully, but she's uneven. Many other aspects of the pacing & narration were just flat, leaving me a bit confused as to what was going on. Several times something big had happened & I had no clue & had to back up a bit because there were absolutely no vocal cues.

That said, it wasn't enough to stop my enjoyment of the book, but enough to bug me from time to time.

2.) The Gale Family relations/incest: This gave me pause before buying, and I was leery going in, but in the context of the story it makes sense & isn't actually disturbing. (And believe me, I get wigged pretty easily by the topic - it's hard to read the word incest without an assumption of sexual assault and THAT is not my idea of fun reading.)

The Gale family is different. Alien. (Not as in they landed from outer space, but for all I know...) Not entirely human, with different rules and codes governing their behaviour that strikes me as reminiscent of some kind of wolf pack or minor fey court. If you're familiar with Tanya Huff's other work, then you can rest assured that the incest theme isn't like those in Fifth Quarter, in which it did thoroughly skeeve me out & kept me from enjoying the story. If it was a purely human family, it might've bothered me more, but the way their family is run reminds me a fair bit of royal dynasties - cousins marrying cousins to keep the blood pure. Only with inhuman pheromones & different standards. Really different standards.

Which is to say that if you're usually squeamish about such things, you don't need to let the other reviewer put you off.

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18 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

In which we discover the Canadian Accent

I'll say right out that I loved the story. Though previous reviewers have been negative about the essentially manipulative and incestuous nature of the Gale family, it should be noted from the start that the family is set up as being Not Human. They are presented as having their own internally-consistent behavioural code. The reader (listener) is left to make up his or her own mind about it. I don't think I'd ever want to deal with them in real life, but reading from a safe distance is really fun. The story is engaging urban fantasy with a great sense of humour.

Unfortunately, the narrator, through no real fault of her own, kind of makes it impossible for me to listen. Until I'd got about halfway through, I couldn't put my finger on what was irritating me, and it wouldn't really have mattered if the book were set in the US or had been written by an American - but that's really it. The narrator speaks American. The pronunciation of certain words was consistently off - the name "Graham" is in the States pronounced "Gram", and by most Canadians as "GREH-am", for example. In the name "Calgary", the second syllable is usually only barely skipped over, and "Cal-guh-ry", as in this narration, is a highly unusual pronunciation.

These, I could live with. But the EMPHASIS -onthewrongwords- DROVE -meinsane. Maybe someone else wouldn't have noticed, but the narrator CONSTANTLY stressed the wrong words in a phrase - likely only "wrong" from a Canadian standpoint, but hell, the book is Canadian.

I don't really blame the narrator. If I (a born-and-raised Canuck) didn't realise it until halfway through the book, how could she? Otherwise, her narration is really good. She differentiates the characters' respective voices in really interesting and novel ways, and her diction is clear and precise. This is just a warning to the other Canucks out there - if that's likely to annoy you like it does me, you might want to give this one a miss.

If it won't, dig in!

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15 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Buy the book, not the recording

I love this book and have read it many, many times. I purchased the audiobook so I could listen to it on a roadtrip, but the narrator is just horrible. For example, there are several occasions where the narrator reverses the voices in a conversation, most memorably in a conversation between Allie and David near the end of the book. As it is written, it's perfectly clear. As it is recorded, it makes no sense at all. Odd words are emphasized in many, probably most, of the sentences in the book. Pauses are inserted where there's no cause for them. This is honestly the worst narrator I've ever heard. For this book, buy the hard copy.

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14 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

The Enchantment Emporium

Tanya Huff greatly expands the concept of Maiden, Mother, and Crone, to say nothing of seventh sons, horned gods and very intelligent dragons Also the next time I go to a second hand store I will be very careful where I put my hands. In this emporium enchantment is to be taken literally.

I will buy and listen to any book with Tanya Huff's name, and I am so gland I chose this one.

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10 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

How to Ruin a Great Book

Any additional comments?

First, let me say that I love this book. I've read it countless times. When I saw it was on Audible, of course I picked it up. It's a mark of how much I love the story, that I didn't return this book after the first listen.

I can grit my teeth and ignore the fact that the narrator mispronounces some words.

I can grind my teeth and ignore the fact that she uses accents inappropriately. (The fact that the Kenny is described as Asian doesn't mean he has a thick "Asian" accent, especially when the author doesn't mention any accent for him at all.)

I can almost ignore the fact that she pauses in strange places, as though doing an homage to bad Shatner impressions.

But I hate that she uses the wrong voice for a character. There are multiple places where she attributes the sentence to another character, despite clear indications from the author. Where was the director for all of this?

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

Waste of money and time

How on earth did this get published? The voice acting is very good, I'll give it that much. The accents are recognizable and understandable. That's the only good thing about it though. The main characters are nothing but a family of manipulative, amoral, incestous Mary Sues. "The Aunties" opinion is that since Aly failed to use magic to "change Michael's mind" about being gay, her heartbreak is her own fault. They want his blood in their family and might just change his mind for him anyway if they get the chance. And these are the good guys! The "romance" between Aly and Graham (a most unfortunate name for the love interest given that she's in Calgary to investigate the disappearance of her "Gran." I can't tell you how many times I had to rewind mentally while listening to this.) is the most ludicrously superficial I've seen since reading book one of "Twilight." She was devestated over Michael and told her father he was The One for her but then snaps up Graham without ever a FIRST thought, let alone a second. I'm really wishing Audible had a return policy. I really enjoyed Tanya Huff's first couple of Valor books; I'm very disappointed in this one though. I can't finish this book or recommend it.

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Wrong reader for this book

What did you love best about The Enchantment Emporium?

Tanya Huff is an amazing author. She successfully floods her books with nuance and emotion. And her worlds are flat out fascinating.

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Enchantment Emporium?

Anything to do with interacting with the dragons

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Teri Clark Linden?

Anyone in the world would have done a better job of narrating this book. She was obviously "reading" the book aloud, rather than telling the story. It was obvious she didn't understand any of the action or interactions. And many of the voices she chose were flat out irritating.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

I love this book with a passion. It's funny and resonates with me on a personal level. The reader made me grit my teeth constantly.

Any additional comments?

Buy the written book. Read the written book. Send Teri Clark Linden on to different books where she, hopefully, will do a better job. (It would be hard to do a worse job.)

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Love the book, don't care for the narration

I really enjoy this urban fantasy and have read the book more than once. While the story is about a very different family that happens to have unconventional sexual mores, it is not at all explicit. The narrator did accents fairly well, but read the book rather than narrating it. Her intonation was often flat and she emphasized the wrong words, often making it harder to understand the meaning. She also mispronounced a few words, which I would have forgiven if she had actually done more than a flat reading of the story. Towards the end she even mixed up the male and female voices for half of a conversation. A couple of times her accents carried over into the next person talking. While I love the story, the narration was a big disappointment.

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Next book!

I just saw that Tanya Huff's second book for the Emporium series is coming out in November. I am so excited. I love Huff's characters and her style of writing. She writes a story about the Fey in modern life and makes it very original and fascinating.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Mistake

If you enjoy material concerning sexual intercourse between close relatives, by all means please purchase this audiobook. But if you are mentally stable please run. I just could not believe the author would take us on that journey. I mean this is Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Huff hasn't the imagination of a flea. She will not get another chance.

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2 people found this helpful