THE LAST CROSSING

Canadian Guy Vanderhaeghe's latest book is finally getting him the attention he deserves in the U.S. THE LAST CROSSING is set in the late nineteenth century and follows two Englishmen, Charles and Addington Gaunt, who travel to the American West to seek their vanished brother. The novel shifts point of view among several characters, and the producers have handled this by using a different narrator for each. The casting is good--Keating is particularly strong as Charles--and the technique generally works well, but it's applied inconsistently, and the result is disorienting. At one point, the narrators exchange lines as in a full-cast adaptation, while in other sections they do not. (The latter is more effective.) But this flaw is not fatal. The abridgment has wisely been kept light, and the performances of the narrators are strong enough to make this recording a faithful and entertaining audio version of an outstanding novel. D.B. 2005 Audie Award Finalist (c) AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine [Published: JUN/ JUL 04]