Lisa Crispin

Interesting, but strange gaps

Reviewed: 03-20-22

The reader gets names messed up at the start, referring to Christie’s father as having the last name Christie. Overall I learned a lot about Christie. But why does the author go on and on about how much Christie’s works have been performed, and never mention the Poirot series with David Suchet, or the Miss Marple series popularized here on PBS???

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Terrible narration

Reviewed: 03-04-22

I bought this after enjoying the Murder in Provence series on Britbox that is based on these books. This might be a good book, but the narration is so terrible, I couldn't keep listening. Why not take the approach of the TV series, and simply have the narrator speak in her normal British accent? Her French pronunciation is appalling and grating.

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3 people found this helpful

Ok, but some issues

Reviewed: 12-20-21

Apparently there was one or more previous books in this series, and not having read them, I missed a lot. Wait, Joel and Flora aren’t married? Who are the people in New York? It was also painful to listen to the descriptions of the abused dog. And puzzling that the dog’s owner ignored him for huge stretches of time, often taking walks around the island without the dog. What dog owner takes walks and leaves the dog in a hotel room? The stories of island life were the main redeeming feature.

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2 people found this helpful

Pleasant, but odd timeframe

Reviewed: 12-19-21

It’s a nice holiday listen. The weird thing is that the characters arrive at an inn on Dec. 23, with the initial character musing about how she has several days to write a children’s book. Yet all the inn’s guests hare off early on Christmas, including the children’s book author. Who would do that? Why? No rationale is given.

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Narrator unbelievably terrible

Reviewed: 10-04-21

She has a British accent, but cannot pronounce British place names like Reading & Gloucester or Worcestershire. She can’t pronounce common words like invalided out. If this weren’t free with my Audible plan & if I had to pay extra for it, I’d return it. Seriously, are there no British actors available for this series? It’s too bad.

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Virtual travel at its best

Reviewed: 02-25-21

Rick Steves has a great turn of phrase and made me feel I was there seeing the people & sights and enjoying the food and drink. The only disappointment is how he describes the objectification of women - and indeed, in the case of Italian men groping and kissing women tourists, sexual assault- as harmless amusement. It may be their culture, but that doesn’t make it less offensive and harmful to women.

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35 people found this helpful

Are there no actors with correct French pronunciation?

Reviewed: 10-12-20

It was grating and distracting each time the narrator attempted French words. Predictable story but the history of carousel animals was really interesting.

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3 people found this helpful

Needed a narrator who could do accents and pronounce French words

Reviewed: 07-26-20

Story was nice, but the narrator’s abdominal French pronunciation and inability to do French or Irish accents spoiled the journey around Paris and made listening painful. Why they didn’t choose someone who could speak some French is a big puzzle.

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Not funny, & got old after awhile

Reviewed: 11-02-17

Seriously, she’s an advice columnist, marries a religious climate change denier after a brief courtship, rather than let his kids grow up & adjust to the idea, and doesn’t make sure her 18 year old stepdaughters are using birth control ? I listened a long time but couldn’t stand her angst anymore.

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2 people found this helpful

NOTHING like a Joanna Trollope or Maeve Binchy nov

Reviewed: 09-12-15

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

I found this in a search for books similar to those by Joanna Trollope or Maeve Binchy. This was a huge disappointment. The plot wanders, there is no character development. Every so often, right in the middle of the 'action', the reading stops and three distant bells and music are heard. What?

Would you ever listen to anything by Rebecca Shaw again?

NO

How could the performance have been better?

The performance couldn't fix the bad writing, but really, the bells and music are just terrible

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

Anger

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