The Great Russian Short Story Collection

25 Classic Tales by the Great Russian Authors

By: Leo Tolstoy, Anton Chekhov, Fedor Sologub, Alexander Pushkin, Maxim Gorky, Nikolai Gogol, Fyodor Dostoevsky

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 11 hrs and 44 mins

Publisher's Summary

The ultimate collection of great short stories by the best Russian classic authors.

• 1. "Her Lover" by Maxim Gorky
• 2. "The Empty Drum" by Count Leo Tolstoy
• 3. "The Hoop" by Fedor Sologub
• 4. "The District Doctor" by Ivan Turgenev
• 5. "The White Dog" by Fedor Sologub
• 6. "The Cloak" by Nikolai Gogol
• 7. "A Soothing Dream" by Fedor Sologub
• 8. "The Christmas Tree and the Wedding" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• 9. "A Work of Art" by Anton Chekhov
• 10. "Children Wiser Than Their Fathers" by Count Leo Tolstoy
• 11. "The Bet" by Anton Chekhov
• 12. "The Coffin Maker" by Alexander Pushkin
• 13. "The Three Hermits" by Count Leo Tolstoy
• 14. "Twenty-Six Men and a Girl" by Maxim Gorky
• 15. "The Queen of Spades" by Alexander Pushkin
• 16. "A Candle" by Count Leo Tolstoy
• 17. "The Self-Sacrificing Rabbit" by Nicolai Schedrin
• 18. "The Honest Thief" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• 19. "Comrades" by Maxim Gorky
• 20. "The Long Exile" by Count Leo Tolstoy
• 21. "The Nose" by Nikolai Gogol
• 22. "The Chorus Girl" by Anton Chekhov
• 23. "The Old Verger" by Vladimir Korolenko
• 24. "The Encased Man" by Anton Chekhov
• 25. "The Pistol Shot" by Alexander Pushkin

Public Domain (P)2015 Red Door Audiobooks

Narrator is detestable.

I can't finish because I cannot concentrate. the narrator sounds silly, and I don't know why she has to make things sound "scary" when they're not. Seriously, every story is a horror story because of her narration. Very annoying.

Terrible narrator

What didn’t you like about Cathy Dobson’s performance?

Every three words she does a downward inflection and a drag! It really makes no difference what she's reading: the title, the author's name, the middle or the end of a sentence. It's so terribly monotonic, I replayed a 10 minutes story three times and still could not follow. This is by far the worst audio book I've ever gotten.

Great selection ruined by abysmal narration.

Superb selection but the narration ruined the experience. Dobson reads every sentence as one would read a fairy tale to a child. Somehow she managed to strip profound passages of meaning with her annoying overdramatic performance. Her unwarranted emphasis on every last word of a sentence was cringeworthy. So disappointing because she ruined the magnificent selections.

Room for improvement

I greatly admire the writers represented here. I was frustrated at not knowing more clearly which one I was listening to. Cathy Dobson has an intriguing voice, but also a few idiosyncrasies of phrasing and diction that I at first found distracting -- later on, I got used to them, yet still found they drained away some of the power of the stories.

Who pressed the record button?

As much as I liked the stories, and tried to block the nature of the narrator’s voice, I couldn’t last more than 45 minutes of listening to this narrator. Who produced this, who directed it and how a sound engineer is ok with recording this monotone, raspy, slithery voice for a whooping 11 hours. Couldn’t she at least change the voice a bit for each story?

Dreadfully Artifical Reading

What disappointed you about The Great Russian Short Story Collection?

The reader is possibly the worst I have come across. Completely artificial and inappropriate emphasis and intonation

Would you be willing to try another one of Cathy Dobson’s performances?

Definitely not !!

You didn’t love this book--but did it have any redeeming qualities?

The stories are by significant authors but any positive qualities they may have are more than outweighed by the very strange reading.

Any additional comments?

There are several other adverse comments on this reader on other titles on Red Door Audio
Books catalogue. I cant imagine why she was chosen other than for financial reasons

Great stories ruined by dreadful reading!

I have purchased and listen to a large number of audiobooks through audible. I have found the standard of presentation to be generally excellent but I am sorry to say that this one is really quite dreadful. The reader as the very unfortunate habit of speeding up and raising the pitch of her voice in the middle of every single sentence and then slowing down and dragging the last word out of EVERY SINGLE SENTENCE!! This is slightly entertaining early on but drives you absolutely mad by the time you have listened to the whole book. Avoid!!

Awful

Wow but this is terrible. One of the stories listed (The Nose) is missing and others are duplicated. The reading sounds like a telephone answering machine and the word emphasis is misplaced throughout. Apologies to Cathy Dobson but this is very poor!

Classic stories spoiled by reader

Just started listening today. Immediately put off by the rather strange style of the narrator.

really off putting narator

had to give up on this one. really contrived and artifical narration was just too irritating

Sadly awful narration

Completely unlistenable - such a shame as I was so looking forward to these short stories. Sounds like a teenager being silly.

Horribllllllllllllla

Oh, I’m sure I can’t say anything about the stories because of the narrator. If this was free it would be an arduous and difficult listen. Not dissimilar to paying to hear, the chalk board with nails thing. Actually, I feel robbed. Wish I listened to the sample. Damn it, I feel like a proper goose!