Intriguing saga

A great story beautifully written.
I’m afraid, though, the narration was so inconsistent. The sample gave no indication of this. Changing voice & accent to represent different characters wasn’t very successful I’m sad to say. It did make listening quite frustrating in parts.... if the saga hadn’t been so very intriguing I think I’d have turned off.

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A cleverly crafted book

This is a very gripping tale of three women and keeps your attention all the way through , with a great ending. It flits from 1941 to the 1950s to 2011 to unfold a gripping story.

Unfortunately the narrator seems to have trouble with getting her accents right for the characters, who variously seem to slip into Geordie, welsh and cockney , with a splash of Australian accent thrown in. Apart from this, which somewhat spoiled my listening and made the story a little confusing, this is a great book that I found hard to stop listening to, and I am now going to listen to more of this author's books .

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A nice book

This was a long book but very enjoyable and nicely told. Easy to listen too. Although long it didn't seem so. I would recommend this to some one looking for something gentle to listen too with a good story with a twist.

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6 people found this helpful

Great story shame about the accents

I've listened to Kate Morton books narrated by Caroline Lee before and quite liked her soft tone voice. But in this book she swings through accents with no logic or reason. Characters from Coventry have accents from Yorkshire to Irish with a touch of Welsh thrown in. They vary each time the characters speak and then penetrate the narrative for no good reason. It's really awful, incredibly distracting and impossible to tell who is speaking by the voice she uses.
I only kept going because the story was good enough to have gripped me. I needed to find out the solution to the mystery.
I love being read to and am an avid audiobook listener. But this is the first time the narrator has almost ruined the book.

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1 person found this helpful

Good story, appalling narration

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I would not recommend the AUDIOBOOK to a friend, but I would recommend they read a hard copy. The story itself was good, but the narration is so terrible it distracts from the story line.

What didn’t you like about Caroline Lee’s performance?

Caroline Lee was totally the wrong choice to narrate this book. I have heard her narrate a book set in Australia in the past and that was fine, but her accents are beyond terrible in this book. She seems completely incapable of doing an English accent, and it just gets worse and worse when she attempts regional accents.When the chapters from Dorothy's POV started I was totally confused, did I miss that the character was actually Irish, is Jimmy also Irish? I spent a while rewinding the book to see if I had missed anything, but couldn't hear a mention as to why she had an Irish accent. Later in the book, this accent travels to Scotland and settles in Wales towards the second half of the book. Other characters also have different, terrible accents and it is so distracting and off putting. If I didn't have to finish the book for my book club I might have actually given up on it.

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1 person found this helpful

Wow wow wow!!

I don’t normally leave full reviews but this book was exceptional. I enjoyed every minute. Yes the accents were a little off but it didn’t take anything away from the experience. The story telling, the way all the different strands wove together was amazing and I didn’t see the twist at the end coming.
Thank you. I listen to a lot of audio books and this really was the best I’ve heard for a long time.

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What on earth was she doing?

Well well well... an intriguing story that I thoroughly enjoyed, narrated in the most bizarre manner I’ve ever heard! A perfectly pleasant Aussie accent randomly turns appallingly Irish, northern, Cockney or Welsh, with no rhyme or reason and often all in the one sentence! Just who in the publishing world listened to this production and thought it was acceptable?? I persevered because I really enjoyed the plot, the characterisation, the time changes and the little twists ....but I did so with a perplexed grimace on my face throughout and I do understand those who gave up. Those accents just grated.

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fab story

I really enjoyed this book . what a twist to the end. The characters really came to life .

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reader accents!

Great story which we expect from Kate. terrible accent tour of UK is very distracting.

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Great story, excruciating accents.

I would have really enjoyed this book if the narrator hadn’t tried to give each character their own accent. They mostly ended up sounding Irish.

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