THE DANTE CLUB

Here’s a recording guaranteed to distract the most focused driver. Boston, right after the Civil War, is the setting for this complex and terrifying mystery. Only geniuses could possibly solve this series of horrific murders, and here they are: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and the other eminent members of the Dante Club. Longfellow has gathered this elite group together to help edit his translation of The Divine Comedy. Simultaneously, however, someone is killing Boston Brahmins in the manner in which they might be punished in Dante’s Hell. Brilliantly written historic and personal details, which do not intrude but enrich, are persuasively read by John Seidman. The elegance of Pearl’s sentences is echoed by the timbre and cadence of Seidman’s voice. Seidman introduces us to these literary giants, and as he continues, we become intimate with them, with their families, and with their moral makeup. It is a consuming journey into nineteenth-century New England. This novel should be at the top of everyone’s list. B.H.B. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine [Published: AUG/SEP 03]