• Cleaning the Kingdom

  • Insider Tales of Keeping Walt's Dream Spotless
  • By: Lynn Barron, Ken Pellman
  • Narrated by: Ken Pellman
  • Length: 13 hrs and 22 mins
  • 3.7 out of 5 stars (68 ratings)

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Cleaning the Kingdom  By  cover art

Cleaning the Kingdom

By: Lynn Barron, Ken Pellman
Narrated by: Ken Pellman
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Publisher's summary

What is it like to be the eyes and ears of the institution known as "The Happiest Place on Earth"? How does it really feel to work day in and day out leading part of the world-famous Disneyland Custodial Team? Just how do they keep such a busy place so clean?

Find the answers to these questions and more as secrets are revealed in this unauthorized, honest, and affectionate memoir from insiders who struggled to keep guests happy, tame wild new cast members, and keep the original Disneyland clean through a time of tremendous change, growth, and controversy for the resort. You'll discover that cleaning up is just a part of the job as you experience heartwarming triumphs, heartbreaking tragedies, and hearty laughs along with the people who lived them.

©2015 Ken Pellman and Lynn Barron (P)2017 Ken Pellman and Lynn Barron

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What listeners say about Cleaning the Kingdom

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

Terrible narration

I want to lead by saying I love listening to audiobooks. I have over 100- all from Audible. While the content of this story is potentially interesting, this is the worst narration of an audiobook I've ever heard. Simply put, it is not up to Audible's quality standard.

The narration has a background gain hum- as if it was recorded quietly and then the master volume turned up to be in normal listening range. This hum is annoying and distracting but it also makes the narrator's breaths and swallows painfully obvious.

The reader also seems to be reading this book for the first time. Occasionally stumbling over words and off sentence cadence. The reader coughs a few times and clears his throat. These elements make the book hard to listen to on a long car trip where the blemishes feel obvious.

This book came highly recommended, but due to poor recording quality, I must recommend against this audiobook.

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5 people found this helpful

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

Great content, not so great recording

I really enjoyed the book and listen to Ken and Lynn's podcast "The Sweep Spot". this book expands on their experience in the park in a way that I never got in their podcast. I would highly recommend the book to anyone interested in theme parks, especially Disney. The only reason I am not giving this book all five stars is the recording quality. Much of the time Ken's microphone is cranked way too high and sounds pretty terrible. Also around chapter 14 there are some bizarre sounds from what I can only guess is a computer. If they used a decent audio recorder and microphone at the right level it would make a world of difference. Then we could really get the full experience in of Ken's silky smooth radio voice, I am not kidding it's pretty amazing.

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5 people found this helpful

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

Poor Quality

While the content is interesting enough, this has the lowest production quality I have ever heard from Audible. The recording is tinny and hard to listen to. The narration is clumsy and amateurish, as though the reader hadn't seen the text before. Which is odd, since it's read by one of the authors. All in all, it was very hard to listen to.

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4 people found this helpful

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

Great Listen, Poorly Narrated

Any additional comments?

I enjoyed this "book" even though much of the information was information I already knew. Unfortunately, the narration is horrible. The clarity of the recording is one issue, and this is compounded by a very poor narration. The narrator sounds as if he were reading the book for the first time, which, given he is the author is confusing. There are needless breaks in sentences, mis-pronounced sentences, and stumbles over the words. Additionally there seems to be no consistency between pausing between sentences, heading, chapters, etc. In some places they run together, and in others there are gaps that just do not make sense in the context of what is being said. This is truly a case where a professional narrator would have made a good book great, and a poor narrator, made what appeared to be a good book, poor.

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3 people found this helpful

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

WARNING! Recording/Narration is that BAD 😥

Thought all the reviews were an exaggeration but I was wrong, it is probably the worst I've heard. There are noises in the recording and the narrator is choppy, not sure if it is spliced together or narrator is out of breath as you can hear his heavy breathing. I don't recommend if you want to focus on story, may be passable as just background noise. Probably better to read book if you are a lover of all Disney things. HEAR sample before buying (I didn't) 😞

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1 person found this helpful

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

It was fine I'd say

I think people are over-reacting about the VoiceOver. It certainly isn't polished and professional, but it's fine. It's listenable. I listened at 1.5x speed and that also made it closer to passable because it ramped up the pacing and made the flubs go by faster.

It was okay overall. I liked the writer's attitude. He came across genuine, positive, and empathetic. He truly has the Disney spirit and it's a shame they wouldn't pay him what he's worth to keep him. Their loss. He sounds like a great worker. He also covered a lot of territory in the book, which was good.

The downsides: He covered many areas in unnecessarily excruciating detail. We understand how a bathroom is likely cleaned. We don't really need to hear about what is done to the seat and how the sink is cleaned. Nor do we need all the information on what streets he turned on to get to work each day and how busy the road was. He also shared many personal reflections that weren't always relevant to a broad audience. The author very cleverly contained all the grossouts to chapter 5. I can see why he'd do that. But I think he probably could have expanded more on that chapter. People are looking for a little shock and awe. Instead, he kept it pretty conservative.

Overall, I felt like it was too long for the amount of truly interesting information he was sharing. But it was still a fine read for anyone interested in the topic.

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

Unlistenable!

This is probably the worst production of a audio book I’ve ever heard. The content may have been entertaining but was not worth the pain of trying to listen to the narration.

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

Perfect for Disneyland lovers!

Love the book, love the podcast! If you love DISNEYLAND this book is a must have! Learn about part of the magic that's rarely talked about!

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

Worse recording quality on Audible

Although some of the content is interesting, the recording quality is extremely poor and amateurish with unusual noises, pauses in the narration at odd times at disorganized content. If you are interested in the subject, read the hard copy!

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

More conversation than audiobook

I could definitely see where this book is hit or mess. I enjoyed the story but struggled with the narrator due to long pauses and mispronunciations. Once I took the point of view of a grandpa sharing a story with his grandchild and not an audiobook I enjoyed it.

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