A perfect pairing of a remarkable performer and an excellent text makes this intriguing audiobook powerful listening.
With a regal voice, Adjoa Andoh presents a scintillating rendering of the famed beauty, which focuses on Cleopatra’s life, not her death. Melding history and speculation, El-Arifi’s storytelling is detailed and believable. Andoh makes it all feel real. Chronicling Cleopatra’s earliest days as Princess of Egypt, Andoh highlights her bond with her father, brothers, and sisters. Andoh illuminates Cleopatra’s relationships with Julius Caesar and Marcus Antonius, her fierceness as a mother, and her statesmanship and loyalty to Egypt. Andoh gives the Romans credible Italian accents and strong personalities, and with a conclusion guaranteed to surprise, there is no doubt that Andoh is Cleopatra.
A perfect pairing of a remarkable performer and an excellent text makes this intriguing audiobook powerful listening.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
Duration: 10 hrs
DD ISBN: 9798217158911
Publisher: Random House Audio
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 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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