Narrators Preston Butler III and Mela Lee beautifully portray a modern-day love story with deep connections to the Harlem Renaissance. Lee's upbeat tone and expressive voice embody Ricki Wilde, a bright, impulsive young woman who is opening a flower shop in Harlem with the help of her feisty 96-year-old landlady, Ms. Della. Lee has an uncanny way of adding and removing years from her voice as Ricki and Ms. Della become more like family. Ricki soon finds herself preternaturally drawn to Ezra Walker, a mysterious musician whose secrets lie 100 years in the past. Butler's smooth voice transports listeners as the story moves through time. Butler's performance exudes the quick pace and rhythm of 1920s slang. Listeners will be captivated by this time-defying romance, which could end in peril.
Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
Duration: 11 hrs, 45 mins
DD ISBN: 9781668623473
Publisher: Hachette Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
After her divorce, Roberta Jewett, with her three daughters, returns to Camden, Maine, to start a new life. Such an independent move in 1916 brings difficulties with her mother, her in-laws and the townspeople. Dukes's performance, while skillful, sometimes suffer in scenes of emotional content. His pace slows, and his reading acquires the peculiar emphasis of someone trying to get instructions across to a non-English-speaking person. The effect is disturbingly laughable. When he resumes his normal pace, the story revives and personalities emerge again, but the awkwardness remains as an odd interruption to Spencer's drama of pain and love, dispelling Dukes's carefully constructed characterizations.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 3 hrs
Publisher: Dove
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
A young Southern woman marries into an aristocratic Boston family and spends her summers at a vacation community on the Maine coast. Heavy-handed abridgment reduces this novel to an outline which denies the listener any character development. Judith Ivey offers stereotypical dialects which are discordant to a New Englander's ear. In her interpretation the Down East Mainers speak like thugs in raspy voices. Her presentation of a Boston accent is phonetically erratic and also spoken in gruff tones. The color and flavor of Maine are missing from this tasteless rendition.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 3 hrs
Publisher: Harper Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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