Sam D.

Schlockola

Reviewed: 02-27-25

Unfortunately the book is as dreadful as the horror movies it parodies, both in story and writing. Starts fun, then becomes a dreadful slog. Could’ve been an OK comic book.

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Favorite book of all time

Reviewed: 11-17-23

I had devoured this incredible book many times, but had never heard it read aloud. As the reader with his moving interpretation of each character led me deep into this ancient world, I closed my eyes and was often moved to tears. I highly recommend taking a pilgrimage to Kingsbridge and The Pillars of the Earth!

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Terrible audio editing

Reviewed: 07-17-23

Jeff Cummings' narration style and voice are fine - he's a good storyteller. However, the audio editing on this recording is atrocious! Zero effort has been made to match levels or EQ of the frequent pick-ups that sound like they were recorded on a phone. This particularly poor production quality is a gross disservice to a masterfully written book.

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Tedious, predictable, full of filler.

Reviewed: 05-09-23

The cluelessness of the central characters strains credulity as the reader is forced to slog through endless filler in the form of petty family squabbling. Rimmer teases mystery, righteousness, and feminism here, but fails to deliver in any meaningful way. What an annoying read.

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An ambitious dissertation that does not convince.

Reviewed: 07-23-21

I'd thought that an erudite treatise on Sondheim's oeuvre might cheer me. Revisiting the music certainly did. Listening to a stack of brilliant original cast recordings is a reason for joy, and listening to familiar ones with a deeper appreciation of context, even more so. But McLaughlin contorts meaning to find connecting threads that strain credibility. Sometimes there is simply no "there" there, genius can exist on a purely emotional level, and it can be argued that a finite limit exists to the number of times one can hear the word "epistemological" in an essay.

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1 person found this helpful

Basic survey of technology, Muddled presentation.

Reviewed: 07-23-21

Carlson's rudimentary script contains no earth-shattering revelations. This is a basic history of technology, condensed at a twelfth-grade level. It would be fine for light listening, if it weren't for the narrator's constant stumbling over his words, restarts, and embarrassing mispronunciations too numerous to mention. I assume this is a re-purpose of a video presentation, but as an audio-only product, it is inexcusable to leave so many verbal mistakes unedited. If I'd paid college tuition for this course I'd complain to the dean, but I got this Audible version as a bargain (of sorts). Sadly this is not the first time I've been underwhelmed by a Great Courses title.

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Ambitious structure doesn't live up to its promise

Reviewed: 03-19-21

While Powers makes a cogent argument for embracing a long view of nature and a parasitic view of humans, his penchant for grandiosity diminishes the book's mission to make me care. That said, it does offer big ideas to ponder, and no matter how one might try to will the words, all language is puny when trying to describe a stand of redwoods.

A note on the performance: the choice of having one reader-actor perform an ethnically diverse cast of characters, as opposed to merely reading the book in her narrator's voice, is a risk. Aspects of this performance were borderline offensive and certainly colored my perception of the book, which I think has its own issues with stereotypes.

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Hire an editor, then re-record this.

Reviewed: 03-01-18

What would have made The Radium Girls better?

I anticipated the release of this book, and had really hoped to like it. The true story of these women is fascinating and tragic, but Moore cannot decide whether she is a reporter or a dime store Jane Austen. The writing is at times prosaic, and at others, incongruously romantic. Too often, sentences simply go off the rails (see below).

What could Kate Moore have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?

Edit! Here are some examples of Moore's sentence structure, as interpreted by Brazil's reading:"As a mechanic, Theo Cuzer was not wealthy and nor was his family.""It was perhaps, then, when they tried to think of Hazel and put her first, the biggest blessing of all, when, on Tuesday December 9th, 1924, she finally passed away."

How could the performance have been better?

Angela Brazil OV-er-pro-NOUN-CeSS e-VER-y-thingGG. For me, this reader ruins the storytelling with her bizarre emphasis and inflections with that seem to counter the text. By making every consonant so very criSPP, the delivery is anything but conversational.

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1 person found this helpful

Mean-spirited takedown of an American icon.

Reviewed: 03-28-17

What would have made Johnny Carson better?

This should not be marketed as a biography. It's more of an expose' designed to destroy a legend. Henry Bushkin has some SERIOUS issues with his once-friend Johnny Carson, and he's going to try to get even for eleven long hours. It's tedious, humorless, and sad as he paints Carson as a cold, vindictive manipulator.

How did the narrator detract from the book?

Yes, Dick Hill was obnoxiously bombastic, which might be a reasonable match for Bushkin's braggadocio, but Hill's characterization made this a less than enjoyable listen.

Any additional comments?

I did learn a lot about the power structure of the American television industry of the 1970-1990s, but always from Bushkin's extremely negative point of view.

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A compact and dramatic history of Apollo 11.

Reviewed: 03-28-17

Any additional comments?

Not nearly as complete as Andrew Chaikin's A Man on the Moon, but this is a fine primer, in story form, about how astronauts landed on the moon in 1969. If you are already well-versed into the history of the American space program, you won't find anything new here.

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