THE POISON BELT

Audiobooks sometimes recall our attention to works that have fallen into undeserved obscurity. Producers may simply be looking for material in the public domain, but occasionally they dust off a gem. The science in Conan Doyle’s 1913 tale of global cataclysm is dated but not sloppy. The storytelling is state of the art. The writing has the flavor of the nineteenth century, a time when authors seem to have listened to themselves and tended to produce writing that is friendly to the tongue. The style is somewhat old-fashioned to modern ears and voices, but Paul Hecht sounds absolutely at home as he skillfully guides our rediscovery of a forgotten treasure. J.N. © AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine [Published: JUN/JUL 01]