THE COLLECTOR OF LOST THINGS

Michael Healy’s voice has a ghostly, gothic quality that is remarkably apt for this Victorian-era story of Arctic exploration, extinction, and chaste romance. Naturalist Eliot Saxby is a passenger on the Amethyst, searching for the remains of the great auk, already believed to be extinct. Healy’s softened and slightly awkward tone clearly renders Saxby’s naïveté. He is thrilled to discover seven live birds on a rocky outcrop, but despair quickly follows with the discovery that the crew is motivated by profit and there is more value in bringing the carcasses to museums. The ship is populated by the peculiar Captain Sykes, a bunch of sailors with rough Irish accents, and the beautiful and mysterious Clara, who becomes Saxby’s confidante in preserving the natural world. A.B. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine [Published: MARCH 2014]