The ABCs of Spellcraft Collection, Volume 1

By: Jordan Castillo Price

Narrated by: Nick Hudson

Length: 13 hrs and 46 mins

Publisher's summary

Dixon Penn’s family wasn’t terribly shocked when he announced he was gay, but they were devastated to learn he’s the only one without the gift of spellcraft. Fortunately, that doesn’t stop spellcraft from reaching out to him.

Dixon’s prospects have gone from bad to worse, but a contest at the biggest greeting card company in the tri-state area would be just the thing to turn his luck around. So what if he’s not technically a Spellcrafter - he’s been scribing pretty words and phrases all his life. How could anyone possibly write a better verse than him?

Yuri Volnikov, the taciturn Russian security guard at Precious Greetings, is determined to keep the charming contestant out. But Dixon has always been a sucker for big guys with exotic accents, and he won’t take no for an answer.

Whether or not Dixon wins the prize he hopes for, when he and Yuri work their magic together, it’s clear that luck is on their side.

The ABCs of Spellcraft is a series filled with bad jokes and good magic, where M/M romance meets paranormal cozy. A perky hero, a brooding love interest, and delightfully twisty-turny stories that never end up quite where you’d expect.

This collection contains the first five stories in The ABCs of Spellcraft series: Quill Me Now, All that Glitters, Trouble in Taco Town, Something Stinks at the Spa, and Dead Man's Quill.

©2019 Jordan Castillo Price (P)2019 Jordan Castillo Price

Entertaining

Light and sweet cozy type paranormal mysteries. The characters are lovable and if there are future volumes, I’ll listen to those as well. I just can’t give 5 stars because I give 5 stars to the psycop books. These are good and made even better by the narration by Nick Hudson. I’ve never listened to him before and I was amazed. He gets Yuri’s accent like it’s natural to him. He does fantastic work distinguishing all the different voices. I will definitely look for more by him.

IT'S ALL ABOUT the VOICE of NARRATOR NICK HUDSON!

In a brief search of other works narrated by Nick Husdon I found that “The ABCs of Spellcraft” appears to be Mr. Hudson’s first and, at the time of this review, only audio book narration credit. The author, Jordan Castillo Price, hit the jackpot with this paring of Mr. Hudson’s vocal talent with his witty and charming fantasy story about magic through written spellcasting. There is romance through the interaction a Seer named Yuri, our self-doubting hero Dixon, and their quest to find missing Uncle Fonzo while overcoming the evil villains.

Other reviewers have done a great job reviewing this story and author Price has a well-established stable of books. For me to repeat others praise of Price’s work would be redundant. So my review is focusing and the narrator Nick Hudson. The two love protagonists, Dixon and Yuri required two voices. Dixon’s needed to be an American light-hearted voice and Yuri’s voice need’s a base register Russian accent that can be subtitle. Mission accomplished! Mr. Hudson also does credible voices for women, children and takes on a sinister tone for the villain character. He projects emotional tone and drama appropriate to the story’s action and plot twists. Also during descriptive passages he modulates his voice just enough to keep the material fresh and interesting. He captures the fumbling novice conflicted motor-mouth of Dixon perfectly. Yuri’s accent is steady measured stoic yet lightened a wry sense of humor. A lessor narrator would not have captured this subtlety. Uncle Fonzo’s character is crazy; he’s slightly immoral, well-meaning, but secretive; his voice is a delicate balance between trustworthy and deceitful. Mr. Hudson pulls off this tour de force of vocal requirements brilliantly.

Not once in the 13 hours 46 minutes of narration did Mr. Hudson fail to live up to the quality of the story. The story and the narrator are match made Audible publishing heaven. Mr. Hudson packs the range of voice to simulate a whole cast of different and unique voices for the various characters. I look forward to listening to many, many, more audio books narrated by Nick Hudson. He is one of a very small handful of narrators that would entice me to give an unfamiliar author a try. Keep your ear tuned for more works by what I predict will become a popular audio book recording giant.

Four out of five stars

I like the story; the writer has a good grasp of her usage, I didn’t notice many typos or errors the plot is flowing the characters are realistic and the dialogue is inspired. The reason I gave it four o Russian citizen who’s been in the states less than a year but his English is better than most Americans’. The writer does attempt to address this very in frequently by having you read drop an article in a sentence-but in my opinion this doesn’t ring true when the rest of his sentences seem to be created by an English major. Speaking of which, that was my background and my reviews tend to be a bit more detailed, dare I say persnickety, then most.If either the right or the reader is just looking for a quick read rather than a well-crafted story, then disregard my comments.

Great story. Great narration.

This was a fun urban fantasy with great characters. I enjoyed listening to Dixon work through the puzzles he encounters, and I liked getting to know Yuri as he helps Dixon find solutions.

The narrator did a great job of creating distinct character voices, and I can't wait to listen to the next one.

Amazing listen!!

Now I have read all these books and I absolutely love them so much. Dixon and Yuri are so perfect for each other and I just love how funny they are together. Even when Yuri isn't trying to be. Just all the things they get into has me laughing out loud. So I am so happy that Nick Hudson has brought these stories to life. He is absolutely amazing in his narration. I love how he does the voices and all the sound effects. I also couldn't stop laughing with how he brings the characters even more to life. Just everything he did is so perfect for this story!

Wonder heartfelt stories!

This collection of stories will leave you smiling and feeling warm and happy. They are wonderfully written with Dixon and Yuri embarking on adventures together that only make their relationship stronger.

Goofy magic misadventures

This is a several book series collection starring a goofy optimist whose expected magic doesn’t take and an artistic thug with a heart that can at least mimic gold, sometimes. This set of stories has the duo meeting up and following in the wake of some misbegotten spellcasting, and a stray uncle, at midwestern roadside attractions. It’s a goodhearted jaunt since the guys try to make things right for folks who had trouble, without trying to be too greedy for themselves. Dixon has an unholy (and unironic) love for terrible 1960s canned food combinations that is entertaining in its terribleness.

Dixon also tends to talk too much. When he first meets Yuri and Yuri tells him MULTIPLE TIMES to Stop Talking in a bad situation, and Dixon kept running his mouth, I almost ditched the whole thing. I really, truly, hate scenes where one character tells another that they need to shut up for their own safety and the other keeps babbling on without purpose. (If one tells the other to shut up to silence them for nefarious purposes or the talker needs to convey critical info, that’s different, and was clear that wasn’t happening here, or that if it was, the babble wasn’t going to help Dixon.) Dixon then does a 180 & intuits all the nuance in Yuri’s careful words, making his ongoing babble even more obnoxious in retrospect. If, unlike me, you can get through this scene without screaming “Shut up!” so loud you hurt your own throat, the rest of the scenes are more reasonable, even when Dixon talks too much, because he’s not risking their safety with his babble.

I do wish there was more followup with secondary details. For instance, the menagerie. (Maybe the series continues and this happens later? If so ignore this.) The cockatoo seems like a good possibility for a recurring character. The guys meet an entomologist in Taco Town who might know how to get carers for the surplus pet bugs, but it didn’t come up. I wish there was some followup about the reviews/articles for the hot springs hotel. I kept waiting for stuffy nose guy to get some good allergy meds after the smell got better. At least the stray dog was taken care of.

All in all, worth a credit for the package if you want a goofy slapstick roadtrip adventure with a couple of magical gay guys.

Steam: Low. Occasional low/no detail M/M sexytimes. Very cheerful.

Narration: The narrator did an excellent job of voicing an overexcited goofball and a stoic Russian transplant. And their friends and relatives and coworkers. Audio quality was good and consistent.

Delightful

I will fully admit I am a fan of JCP, but I somehow missed this delightful series. In a way, I’m glad. It’s a rough time for us all and this is just the perfect distraction. The characters are adorable. I absolutely love the use of the giddy but unreliable narrator against the granite honesty of another.

The audio is great. NIck Russo does a great job, though he drops accent with Yuri which is distracting. I dropped a star for that :(.

Love it!!!

Rom com romp

This is a nice meaty collection, pulling together the first five short works in the SpellCraft series. The stories themselves are highly entertaining, sort of a paranormal mystery romance mashup featuring a very fun magic system, with two great main characters. I love Dixon’s crazy energy as much as Yuri‘s jaded cynicism. And Dixon’s talent for fixing SpellCraft gone wrong creates so much potential for great stories!

The narration captures the essence of both characters very well. My only quibble is that I wish Yuri’s accent was a little thicker, and my mental image of him has a slightly deeper voice. All in all, I truly enjoyed this collection and would happily welcome further entries in the series!

Excellent

I'm a huge Nick Hudson fan, so I decided to listen to this along with some friends. I'm so glad I did. The Spellcraft books are so good, and so funny. Nick, of course, does an amazing job narrating them.