FRANKENSTEIN

The first thing listeners will note about Shelley's seminal novel is how different it is from the more familiar Hollywood film. Truthfully, listening to the book will likely inspire a desire to watch the Boris Karloff interpretation. Narrator Richard Pasco never grunts "Fire, bad" in his performance, but, rather, portrays a more intelligent, tragic monster, as Shelley intended. Actually, the monster is a bit of a yakky whiner. Pasco goes over the top several times, making the monster speak like a tragic Shakespearian hero. The effect is not so much unsettling as unpleasant. M.S. © AudioFile 2005, Portland, Maine [Published: DEC 05/ JAN 06]