The third installment in Bilyeau's award-winning trilogy finds Joanna Stafford vowing to live a quiet life weaving tapestries after her Dominican priory is closed by King Henry VIII. When she's summoned to Whitehall by the king, who admires her weavings, she discovers her life is in danger. Nicola Barber's excellent narration brings Henry VIII's court to life, introducing listeners to a variety of historic figures, including the scheming Thomas Cromwell and naïve Catherine Howard. Barber handles multiple characters, including a diversity of male voices, with impressive ease and offers an especially engaging portrait of Joanna, a complex, likable heroine with spunk and brains to spare. Both a lively and accurate history lesson and a well-crafted suspense novel, this production will satisfy an array of listeners, keeping them enthralled for hours.
Pub Date: March 24, 2015
Duration: 13 hrs, 15 mins
DD ISBN: 9781622316656
Publisher: HighBridge Audio
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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