A Tale of Two Cities

The best thing about A Tale of Two Cities is everything -- the characters, the plot, the exceptional writing, and the emotional pull of nearly every sentence.

All the characters came alive. My favorites are Jarvis Lorry and Sydney Carton.

I've read this story several times and always discover new feelings and images, but Jon Smith has made it far better with this excellent performance. I would recommend any audiobook read by him.

This books grabs you from the first sentence to the very last: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times (first sentence) and It is a better thing that I do than I have ever done (almost the last). Everything word, every sentence, is perefectly placed. The narrator, Jon Smith, is excellent.

This really great story was all but destroyed, weighed down by a narrator who seemed to simply not give a hoot that he consistently mispronounced words, names, places (hearing the Madame and Monsieur Defarge pronounced Defrage throughout the reading - I swear to you - fingernails on a blackboard would have been a happier sound). Periodically the reader seemed to forget himself and get lost in the book, immediately improving his performance, but unfortunately he would inevitably return to his former stilted and dreadful reading.

We could have made a drinking game out of taking a shot every time some person, place or thing was mispronounced - mind you, we would have had to limit our listening time or suffered prolonged bouts of inebriation as five minutes rarely pass in this performance without a pronunciation malfunction.

I'm sure there is a great unabridged Tale of Two Cities out there someplace. This is not it.

Growing up in an era in which American school kids actually read the classics in their English classes, I remembered Tale of Two Cities as one of my favorites. The audio version reinforced this impression. The brilliant prose style, the interplay of characters, the comic, the dark, and the melodramatic dextrously interwoven, and the surprises of plot development kept me listening with pleasure through the whole book.

It has a more sublime ending than any other book I can recall. Other than that, the scenes with Mme. DeFarge are darkly fascinating. Also those regarding Dr. Manette in the Bastille. I don't want to give anything away!

I haven't, but I enjoyed his narration. It is subdued and emotionally low key, which I guess could be perceived as boring, but I thought it was a great counterpoint to the melodrama of the book. Characters are easily distinguishable and the accents are well done.

You can't make a better choice than the opening phrase of the book!

I could not get into this book because of the speaker. It left the book a boring mess.

Chose a better reader.

Used someone who could of put more dramatics into the story rather than just a one pitch reader?

None

That just about sums it up. I read the book myself years ago and loved the story then but the audiobook was a sad disapointment.

I tried twice to listen because I do love Dickens, but the narrator was horrible. I gave up!

The narration was intolerable. Could not listen past the first few hours so Ipurchased new version.