Nikolai, an 84-year-old Ukrainian immigrant in England, finds he’s no match for his new bride, a scheming 36-year-old émigré with “ferocious breasts bursting like twin warheads.” Nikolai’s estranged daughters, Vera and Nada (whom he compares to Trotsky and Stalin), put aside their own feud to extricate the bosomy gold digger from the octogenarian engineer. Sian Thomas narrates this story on several levels, exhibiting impressive technical skill with British, Russian, and Ukrainian accents, and empathetically communicating the comedy and the tragedy as a family history resolves itself without heroics. The experience makes for a knockout audiobook that—like the tractors discussed in the text—rolls along with its own unstoppable transformative power.
Pub Date: Jan. 22, 2006
Duration: 9 hrs
Publisher: BBC Audiobooks America
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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