Henrietta Who?

By: Catherine Aird

Narrated by: Robin Bailey

Length: 4 hrs and 51 mins

Publisher's summary

Life for Henrietta Jenkins was a quiet, well-ordered affair - a home with her widowed mother and degree studies at university. But her life changed dramatically when, just before her 21st birthday, her mother’s body was found in a quiet road, apparently the victim of a hit-and-run driver. For not only did the simple case turn into a murder hunt, but the post mortem also revealed that Grace Jenkins had never had any children. In which case, who was Henrietta?

©1968 Catherine Aird (P)2014 Audible, Inc.

Excellent police procedural; very British.

I enjoyed this mystery involving Detective Inspector Sloan. I expect readers would be somewhat polarized about this audiobook. First of all, not everyone likes police procedurals, which are slow and methodical, but where there are occasional hints dropped along the way that you may pick up even before the Detective does. Almost the opposite of a thriller, there is little real action. Secondly, the humor is very British, understated and cerebral. The narrator does a good job, but you must like this style of language that is relatively unfamiliar to an American ear. Here it is delivered slowly enough that it is easily understood and followed--somewhat like watching Masterpiece Theater. The cast of characters is small but well-developed. The book is short, taking a little less than 5 hours. It's light fare, but entertaining. I look forward to listening to other mysteries by Catherine Aird in her Chronicles of Calleshire series. All her books are relatively short; I'll try to pick them up when they are on sale, but these definitely go on my wish list.

5

This is unlike any mystery I have read. It is well plotted, beautifully written and so well read I hung on
every word. Lean, clean, bright, just perfect. Several times I replayed sections to be sure I stayed on top of the action. C. Aird is a mystery writer I missed and now
Audible has lined 'em up for me.

Henrietta's humor

This is a fun listen! The dry English humor is delightful. I am glad I listened, don't miss this one.

Entertaining short read

Very entertaining as a short read. The narrator was enjoyable. Worth the four hours listening time.

Not recommended

It's an intriguing premise and it starts out well, but I simply cannot finish it. The narration is really pretty awful. Perhaps that's my problem being an American listening to an insufferably nasal British accent. But I've listened to many British narrators who were wonderful. Robin Bailey only seems to have two voices and he runs the dialogue together in such a way that it's often impossible to tell "who" is speaking.

But that's just part of the problem. This is the slowest moving mystery I've encountered recently and the characters are simply not engaging or interesting enough to keep me interested. And it's more than just "disinterested." It's a good portion of "annoyed" as well. I find Henrietta too shallow and whiney. Her mother is dead. But, as we quickly learn, Mrs. Jenkins isn't her biological mother - that's the mystery. And Henrietta not only appears not to mourn at all, but immediately and deliberately stops referring to her as "Mother" and snapping peevishly at those who do. But this is the only mother she's ever known ... but she can just "dismiss" her?

Between the insufferable narration and the insufferable main character, I decided I don't care how it turns out.

Holiday read..

good holiday read, that you can read without too much attention. Not too believable, but overall not too bad!

Narrator is unintelligible

I only made it halfway through this book before I gave up. Buyer Beware! The narrator is likely a talented actor with a great feel for character - but his constant habit of muttering lines under his breath was too irritating for words. I kept missing phrases and had to back up, raise the volume and relisten to a line - then immediately lower the volume again so as not to blow out my eardrums. Call me crazy, but this is a book - isn't it important to be able to understand the words? The story itself, what I heard of it, was only so-so, but interesting enough that I will read the rest of it the old-fashioned way.

Short but worth it!

The author's humor portrayed in her characters is delightful. It was my first audio of a cozy mystery and I am grateful to have chosen it. It remains my favourite of "cozies" because of the subtle humor.

Slight mystery

Easy listening except for the mumbling of the narrator. A rather slim mystery, ok if you are a fan of traditional British who-dun-it's. ( no where near the caliber of Agatha Christie, though )

An easy listen

Henrietta Who? is an easy listen, and although somewhat predictable, Robin Bailey does a good job of narrating. The plot begins with a mail man finding a body on the road out in the middle of nowhere. Although the dead woman is known to the community, she is not who she claimed to be. The story is about finding out her true identity and why she claimed to be someone she was not.

A really good, gentle murder mystery!

Having romped through all the Agatha Raisin books and thoroughly enjoyed every single one of them, I was looking for something similar to replace them but really struggling to find anything. After googling similar reads, I came across the Inspector Sloane series by Catherine Aird and I'm really hooked. Like Agatha Raisin, they're not gory, they're a whodunnit. The writing is excellent, the pace is gentle yet compelling and Robin Bailey is just superb as the narrator - his voice is quite beautiful. They're a different tone to what I was looking for but they're still so good yet in a different way. I'm really looking forward to listening to every book in the series

Very Dated

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

The idea of the plot is good and could have developed into a great storyline. Unfortunately the writing is so dated and stilted it made for a rather 'cringe' listen. Published in 1968 but not the 1968 that I remember, even in the heart of rural Derbyshire. This harks back to some mythic 'Christie-esque' place and time. The best that can be said is the welcome absence of 'F' in the mouths of every character.

A little confusing

I enjoyed the plot which is a straightforward murder mystery with no gore or torture etc. The main characters are recognisable however the only criticism I have which is purely personal is that so many characters are introduced that it becomes a bit confusing.

Amusing period mystery

An amusing story set in the post war era. Not a very complex tale but presented in an intriguing way.