Sheltering Angel

By: Louella Bryant

Narrated by: Melinda Cumming

From a working-class family, Scotsman Andrew Cunningham stewards for wealthy travelers aboard elegant cruise ships of the early 20th century, but he resents those who flaunt their inherited wealth.

New Yorkers Florence and Bradley Cumings, first-class passengers traveling aboard Titanic, are the exception, and the three discover an ancestral connection.

As the ship sinks on the fateful morning of April 15, 1912, Florence watches in horror from her lifeboat. In the darkness of night, she searches the water for her husband and recognizes the man swimming through the frigid water toward her is Andrew.

Based on a true story, Sheltering Angel is a must-listen!

©2023 Black Rose Writing (P)2023 Black Rose Writing

The narrator is OUTSTANDING

One of the best historical fiction novels based on the sinking of the Titanic. The Audible version has an outstanding narrator!

very personal, good character development

overall I liked it alot! good narrator with good voices. I would recommend to history book enthusiasts?!

Average

The story line was slow. Would have enjoyed knowing more about the lives of people below. Good details of 1st class, at that time.

I LOVED this book!

Wonderfully written and narratored book. Heartwarming, interesting, and a little romance and some historical facts all rolled into this fabulous book. Well worth sharing and look forward to finding more from this author and narrator.

All of it

Took a little too much time developing the characters but was still very good and held my attention

Audible "Chapters" Don't Match Kindle ...

Well, unfortunately, my overall experience with this was negative. Still rating it 3* , as the story/writing wasn't bad, but there were some pet peeves that just rubbed me the wrong way.

The text was included in KindleUnlimited, with audio available for an add-on of just over $3. I went ahead and paid for the audio. The narrator wasn't bed, but I didn't really care for her voices. Moreover, as the book shifted from Florence's 1st person narrative, to Andrew's third person POV ... it just felt strange to be to have it be in the exact same voice. I think having a different narrator for Andrew's portions would have improved things for me. I'd find my mind drifting, and the "voice" in both the writing, and the narration, was so similar that as I'd come back to the book, it would take me a while to figure out if it was Florence or Andrew's POV. I had to wait for the "I" statement, or the "Andrew ..." to determine. There were no headers for POV shifts, and further in the book, a single chapter would feature both. Looking at the Kindle, when this happened, there was a *-----* visual to separate (just a pause in the audiobook).

I really didn't like the shift between POVs, one 1st person one 3rd person. I didn't care for the whole Book 1 and Book 2 buildup ... I mean I guess we needed to get to know the characters to care about them, but ... I just never really connected. There seemed to be too many attempts to connect it to the movie Titanic ... the having Florence painted, and he wants her to shift her shirt to see her true skin tone (make us think of Jack sketching Rose naked) and Florence grabbing a certain piece of jewelry (similar to the one featured in the movie?) As with all historical pieces, I do appreciate learning little factual (or I assume they are, should research) tidbits ... I'm not remembering which here, but there were some data drops that were of interest.

All past tense, until the very end, when there was an awkward shift to present tense.

There were "three books" or sections, with multiple chapters in each part. HUGE PET PEEVE ... the Audible "chapters" hardly paired to the Kindle copy ... in Audible, there are just numerical chapters, chronological 1-57. No distinction of the three sections, no indication that "chapter 57" is actually the "Afterward" ... as something happened that I wanted to reference in the text, I noted it was "chapter 48" only to turn to the Kindle copy and have that be absolutely useless information in helping me find that spot. In Kindle ... there are NO chronological chapters listed at all, just the three "books" and chapter headings. The chapter headings seemed to be newspaper headlines (A quick info/title grabber with a date) ... were these real newspaper headings??? I felt sure that the author's note at the end, where it was told a little which characters were based on real people and or the real events of our MCs ... but the headers weren't addressed. The headers would have been better in the Audible version than the useless "chapter" numbers.

One thing I note in books, is if a song is sung by the character, is it sung or spoken by the narrator. I can understand the issues either way. Here, there were a number of musical moments, all spoken. While I'm not sure I would have appreciated a sudden switch to singing, the spoken songs definitely felt lacking.

It was clean, no proFanity, nothing explicitly sexual, although Andrew does get dragged to "a den of iniquity" where "her breasts pressed into his chest like boules" ...I noticed the word "boules" (and the correct pronunciation, bool rhymes with fool) as it's a sourdough term (the round loaf). "Carnegie" was also stated several times, with the traditional pronunciation. Quite a bit of smirking and scowling going on. No "roiling" of ocean waters or emotions, which surprised me a little (it's in 80% of reads).

So while I can see that many would enjoy this book and appreciate the history set in an easier to read novelization, I was pushing to finish and was glad I was done. I would have appreciated some discussion questions, maybe to bring out some things I hadn't thought of, make me delve a little deeper. I felt like there were unanswered questions, things we were left wondering.

Real life

Well told and very true to life, enjoyed narration and fact based, Reccomend to all

Boring monologue

I kept skipping chapters hoping something interesting would occur enough to keep me listening. Never happened. Just one of the most uninteresting books I wish I never bought and Audible doesn’t refund your money which I think is wrong. Sometimes other high positive reviews are so wrong ! Don’t waste your money (or credit). Narrator was the worst !!! torture to listen. Can’t recommend!!!!

very slow and boring

the narrator destroyed the story in her slow boring reading.
it just droned on and on like watching paint dry. completely a water of money and time