David

Beautifully read but shamefully abridged

Reviewed: 03-14-24

"The Wind in the Willows" is to me an absolutely perfect book. Every line is charming, and every step of the plot is beautifully choreographed, compelling, and joyful. And it is certainly not a long book, so no one can complain that Kenneth Grahame was prone to unnecessary rambling. So why, why, WHY do publishers insist on abridging it so drastically? It is so jarring when one is familiar with the prose to have lines disappear, like ugly potholes in the road. And two entire chapters left out??? Why? The only point in favor of this edition is Martin Jarvis reading, which is wonderful ~ as always! So kudos to Martin Jarvis, but a crate of rotten tomatoes to NAXOS for putting out such a hashed-up recording of a beautiful book ~ and for not even announcing it in their description. Shameful.

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1 person found this helpful

Fascinating topic, but needs editing

Reviewed: 12-02-14

Would you consider the audio edition of Mysteries of Modern Physics: Time to be better than the print version?

N/A (I have not read the print version)

What did you like best about this story?

The coverage of the material was well done. It is a fascinating topic to begin with, and the speaker clearly knows his field. He presents many aspects of time, and provides the listener with an intriguing journey. Furthermore, his style of speaking is entertaining and engaging. You won't be bored!

Have you listened to any of Professor Sean Carroll’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

I have not listened to any of his other lectures.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

N/A

Any additional comments?

I had two difficulties with these lectures. The first and least important is that the presenter seems to be speaking, rather than reading, which is fine--except that he makes frequent grammatical mistakes so that his sentences sound sometimes unprofessional. He would have done better to have written everything out clearly, and then followed his notes more closely.The more substantial problem is that the presenter frequently uses the teaching style of giving what he knows to be incorrect information; not telling the listener that it is incorrect; and then sometime later (perhaps many lectures later) correcting his earlier misinformation.For example: When he first introduces entropy (one of the central themes of the lectures), he defines it as a measure of the amount of disorder (paraphrasing here). As a physicist myself, I knew that this popular idea is entirely incorrect, and was appalled that he was actually putting it out there without comment. Sure enough, roughly 10 lectures later he provides an entirely different definition of entropy (the correct one), and tells the reader that what he said before was not correct. I consider this method of teaching to be at best unfortunate, and at worst inexcusably sloppy.I would not say that this problem overrides all of the good in these lectures (hence the 4-star rating), but Professor Carroll should definitely know better.Summary: A fascinating topic, presented by an engaging speaker. Just don't believe everything he says, until you're sure you've reached the end!

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45 people found this helpful

Wonderful book, but missing pages

Reviewed: 11-05-12

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

I am giving this recording 1-star overall simply because it ends before the book is finished. Practically mid-sentence the recording cuts off, leaving the last 3 pages or so unread -- pages which are critical to the story! I checked the playing time carefully, and it agrees to the second with the total time for this recording as indicated on the audible site, so it is not just a fluke of my computer or a mistake in my downloading.

What did you like best about this story?

Except for the clipped ending, I enjoyed the book very much. It has the feel of a 'first novel,' being somewhat undeveloped. But I was much impressed by Anne Bronte's writing, and the story is engaging.

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2 people found this helpful