Katherine M Lokken

Not up to the author's usual standard

Revisado: 05-13-17

As a World War I buff and a fan of the author's Glamourist Histories, I expected to like this. This one didn't do it for me for three reasons:

1) The implications of the author's supernatural element in this story were not given their due. The supernatural part of the book (this isn't a spoiler, it's in the publisher's summary) involving spirit mediums being able to talk to the dead to gather military intelligence one last time before they're sent away to whatever the afterlife is has some serious moral, cultural, and spiritual implications, all of which this book completely ignores or brushes aside. I had some very serious ethical qualms with the program described in the book and the way it was handled, which made it difficult for me to sympathize with what the main characters were trying to accomplish.

2) Being the last person a dying person speaks to, day in and day out, should have some serious psychological and emotional consequences - I would figure it would be in a way like being a hospice worker. It never feels convincingly like this matters to the main character until she is personally affected firsthand by what's going on. The main character is not, mind you, a heartless or selfish person, but that only makes this feel all the more off.

3) The core story is, aside from its supernatural element, a pretty standard, competently executed mystery story, and that's part of the problem - it's not strong enough on its own to stand up to the problems caused by 1) and 2) and the distractions caused by those problems prevent the emotional punches this story might have otherwise from landing effectively.

On the plus side, it's great on a technical level - Ms. Kowal's sharp skills at building scenes and structuring stories are very much in evidence, and this is the best narration job I've hard her do. It's not that it's a terrible book, it's just that the implications of the setting don't connect well enough with the characters for the book to be more than ordinary (I would have given this two and a half stars if half stars were available).

If you felt the same way I did about this one, don't let that stop you from exploring the Glamourist HIstories, which do a much better job of connecting the setting and the story. I'm sure Ms. Kowal will have better stories coming down the road.

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A step above the last one

Revisado: 04-15-17

These just get better and better. This one was particularly impressive insofar as the author confronts some of the darker aspects of the main character's personality and the time period in which it takes place.

She still struggles a bit with accents. The accents of the London coldmongers don't quite sound right, but there aren't the odd-sounding French characters in this book unlike the last one.

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Even better than the first one

Revisado: 04-13-17

My enjoyment of the first book in the series surprised me. I was surprised again by how this one managed to top that. The great characters of the first book are placed in a carefully-chosen setting and historical context that adds an exciting new dimension to the story in its last third. The main character in particular is pulled far out of her comfort zone into a situation that shows an exciting heroic aspect of her character that wasn't obvious in the first story and the story caps it all off with a powerfully bittersweet conclusion. The stakes are much higher than in the first book, which made me all that much more invested in what was happening. The author is very good at foreshadowing, maybe a little too good at it for her own good as some aspects of the story are a little predictable, but you'll never be 100% sure how it ends until you get to the end. Make no mistake, despite writing in Jane Austen's style and time period, this story feels much more modern than the last one.

Another huge improvement over its predecessor is the author's decision to dispense with the fake, forced-sounding British accent that she used for the narrator portions of the previous book in favor of her natural American accent. Ms. Kowal's voice is both warm and authoritative and comes across a lot better when she's not contorting it for effect. She still struggles a bit with accents, particularly the French ones (although this will only really bother you if you speak French), but this is far less disruptive when coming from the character voices, since they feel like they should be a little exaggerated anyway. The variety of voices she can do is also rather impressive. With the first book, I recommended reading it rather than listening to it on Audible, this one is a much better candidate for listening.

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Great book, but try reading instead of listening

Revisado: 04-07-17

As someone who had to be forced to read Jane Austen in high school and didn't like her, I was really surprised to have this recommended to me. I was even more surprised that I liked it. It's a charming and well-crafted, and the tender, touching portrayal of the main character caused me to care about her despite the fact that her life and her world are full of things I normally wouldn't care about at all. The ending was incredibly emotionally satisfying and I had a hard time stopping it.

The one big problem is the author's decision to read this with a TERRIBLE fake British accent. Many of the characters voices are sufficiently exaggerated for this not to be as much of a problem when she's reading dialog, but the narration wobbles between sounding Australian (at least, I think that's how it sounds when one pronounces "when" as "whin") and Bostonian. I think she did it to make the experience more immersive, but it just ended up being distracting and taking me out of the story. It's enough of an issue that if you're indifferent as to whether to read or listen to this, read it instead. Fortunately, I just started book 2 and it sounds like she switched to reading that in her normal voice, which was a very good decision on her part.

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Bad audio quality

Revisado: 11-20-16

The story is a good solid one and Nigel Planer's narration is fine (which is why I didn't give this a lower review) but the sound quality is terrible. At around chapter 11 there's a part where the distortion gets really bad. I know they say it's a vintage recording, but I think this story deserves better than this.

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