Customer Reviews

Treason's Harbour (Aubrey Maturin, No. 9)

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I have been listening to Simon Vance's narration of this series since book 1, Master and Commander. I have listened to many audiobooks including many free ones from Librivox.org read by well-intentioned, very generous people from around the world for whom English is a second language, and by Americans who don't look up the pronunciation of specialized terms. The stories have been marred and interrupted by these simple errors, and further magnified by chapters extraordinarily rendered by people who really know what they're doing.

When I started this series, I really had no idea how much fun it would be, and how alive Vance's narration could make the stories. Vance is a virtuoso. He uses timbre, force, accent, nasality, cadence, and pitch to consistently represent the characters across the volumes. I had first encountered such supreme rendition listening to John Lithgow's narration of Michael Crichton's "Disclosure" and have enjoyed it again just this past summer. I've seen the movie twice, but Lithgow's performance is unique.

Although I've been enjoying Vance's narration, I really had no idea how gifted he was until I listed to this same volume narrated by Patrick Tull. Tull's diction and vocal insinuations are amazing, and well worth the experience. But I have come to "see" Maturin as a refined, sensitive, almost effeminate man of extraordinary intelligence through Vance's voice, and O'Brian's prose. And after 8 volumes of "pictures" rendered by Simon Vance, I just wasn't able to follow Mr. Tull's depiction of him in this story as well as I have the previous stories by Vance. I have been spoiled.

I ended up getting this version by Vance, and re-listening is so comfortable and effortless.

I have found a man with an extraordinary talent who has recreated hundreds of books: classics, Ian Flemming's Bond, Books That Changed The World series; and I intend to enjoy them all.