Karen Cass brings just the right tone to this pleasant English mystery about a modern-day photographer’s model whose disappearance may, or may not, be linked the death of nineteenth-century painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti's wife. Genealogical detective Natasha Blake is determined to solve the conundrum, and Cass gives her a likable style and spirited energy that make us certain she will succeed. Cass does as well voicing the other characters, including upper-crust gentlemen, lowlife guys, and teenaged girls. And she reads the quotidian prose with an informed pacing that maintains our interest, whether the heroine is investigating a deserted graveyard or making herself a cup of tea.
Pub Date: Jan. 22, 2006
Duration: 9 hrs, 30 mins
Publisher: ISIS Audio Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Ayla, one of the "others," is adopted by a clan of Neanderthal cave people. She struggles to conform to their ways, but her advanced human traits overwhelm and threaten their primitive culture in this initial installment of an immensely popular series. Although the story might benefit from abridgment, Rowena Cooper easily carries out the formidable task of enlivening the mostly silent and stereotypical characters with consistent, diverse personalities and human dimension. Through skillful phrasing and inflection, she maintains the reader's interest and suspense, especially with Ayla and her plight, throughout this rambling and imaginative story.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 22 hrs
Publisher: BBC Audiobooks America/ Chivers
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
This lyrical, sensual novel of woman's lot in Manchu, China, is as well researched as it is well written. Authentic in tone, it's nonetheless written for Westerners by a Western expert on China. Moreover, Susan Clark performs the demanding text superbly, with only occasional signs of fatigue. For the most part she not only sustains the quaint diction and Asian atmosphere, but also, creates whole worlds with her voice. She acts the book, rather than reads it, and, in so doing, turns a pretty trifle into a stupendous beauty.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 4 hrs, 30 mins
Publisher: Audio Literature
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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