New Reviews: Classics

Edoardo Ballerini shines as he performs a new translation of one of literature's most famous stories, the tale of Aeneas, son of Venus, hero of Troy, and legendary progenitor of the Roman people. Emily Wilson reads her introduction with an academic's sense of grandeur and dry humor. Ballerini's narration demonstrates his range; as he delivers the translator's note, he uses... Read More

Ten narrators lend a contemporary feel, intimate tones, and a nice sense of reverence to 15 well-crafted stories of gothic hauntings and insistent apparitions by twelve of the 19th century's most accomplished women authors. These are stories of longing and loss. In Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper," Amanda Stribling builds a strident sound of obsession when a woman's husband... Read More

Golden Voice narrator Simon Jones takes a well-cogitated approach to his performance of Doyle's famous tale of a frothing hound on the Devon moors. Dr. Watson, our narrator, eases into the account with a measured pace, rotund vowels, and a refined, somewhat high-pitched tone that conjure an older gentleman settling back after dinner to tell a scary story. Sherlock Holmes' deep... Read More

Classically trained British actor Alex Jennings effortlessly captures the urbane tones, cutting intelligence, and stoic wit of a gay English-born English professor dealing with the loss of his longtime partner. It's the early 1960s, and seismic change is in the air at the professor's suburban California college--from the Cuban missile crisis to his students discovering sex and... Read More

Three capable narrators blend seamlessly in this audiobook performance. As the title implies, the two main characters--devoted to one another from childhood--endure trials that force their destinies apart. This story explores their star-crossed experiences against the backdrop of Victorian society and tinges the tale with the drama and spiritualistic air of the time period. The... Read More