HORSE HEAVEN

Jane Smiley's insightful and good-humored novel about horseracing is heavily populated. Grooms, trainers, owners, gamblers--they're all warmly portrayed here, some honorable, some scoundrels, some two-legged, some four. Toren distinguishes all these characters, some of them with convincing foreign accents. What's more, she is one of the rare readers who manages to make a conversation sound like a conversation. Her characters actually seem to be listening to one another and reacting to the content of what is said. It takes a special brand of imagination and concentration to pull off such a feat. In this audiobook, so sly and clever, Toren's skill beautifully mirrors Smiley's rich portrayal of the denizens of the track. M.O. © AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine [Published: JUN/JUL 01]