HERESY

Richly drawn characters from every walk of life become involved with conspiracy and murder at Oxford University in the sixteenth century, allowing narrator John Lee free rein to exercise his talents. Flawlessly switching between British and European accents, he individualizes each of the myriad characters with a distinct nuance: Cockney twang for a groundskeeper, pompous tone for a campus official, or flat and unaffected intonation for a barmaid. Lee's most effective technique is to selectively thicken protagonist Giordano Bruno's Italian accent to help listeners easily distinguish between dialogue and narration. A full cast of readers, each with a native accent, could hardly do better. A.Z.W. © AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine [Published: APRIL 2010]