MAN IN THE IRON MASK

This 1846 classic brings Dumas's saga of the Three Musketeers to a close. It contains everything from the suspense of a plot to displace the king, to the low comedy of the portly Porthos's inability to get a suit made that fits him. The high point, as with all of these swashbuckling tales, is in the action and the emotion, specifically a battle between Porthos and Aramis and more than eighty of the king's guard, and the deaths of the heroes that follow. The pace is leisurely, the narrative rich, and Christopher Cazenove performs the novel's more than twenty characters with a grace and agility worthy of a Musketeer. G.T.B. (c) AudioFile 2002, Portland, Maine [Published: AUG/SEP 02]