Julia Irzyk

Truly World History

Revisado: 05-08-22

I often tire of world history overviews that are VERY Eurocentric. This is thankfully not that. I felt it was an excellent overview that helps give you perspective about the evolution of different civilizations at the same time. She has a conversational style that reminds me of having a chat with your favorite teacher about the topic they are passionate about. Very engaging. Highly recommend.

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Another Brilliant Mystery

Revisado: 03-10-19

I thought after Plague Pit and River Bones, I wouldn't like another one of the Det. Lavender mysteries as much, and I was thankfully wrong. The series keeps getting better.

The books are terrific and made even more wonderful by the terrific narration of Michael Page.

If you like a mystery, where you don't need to have Sherlock's deductive powers to solve it, you will enjoy this. Just follow the evidence!

My only regret is that Karen Charlton can't turn these books out faster. More please!

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Best in the series... so far

Revisado: 01-10-19

I was really sad when this book came to an end. The sign of a great audiobook is that I immediately look for other titles by both the author and the narrator, and in this case I did both.

If you love Sherlock Holmes, you'll love this series. If you love strong women, you'll love this series. And the voices are distinct, and you'll fall in love with the characters.

I cannot wait for the next book in this series! I wish they came out more often!!! BRILLIANT!

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Edge of your seat with familiar characters

Revisado: 12-02-18

Even if you aren't a fan of Bram Stoker's "Dracula" you can enjoy this audiobook. The reader is excellent, the characters are compelling, and the historical figures depicted will be very familiar if you like the Victorian Era. Very exciting, full of mummies, soul suckers, vampires, and adventure. I highly recommend it!

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Hope there are more in the series

Revisado: 11-17-18

Loved it with one notable exception (below). Stephen Fry lends his considerable talents to a very enlightening and amusing history of those quirky Victorians.

One section I very much disagreed with, as a disability law attorney and author: In the chapter on the Freak Show, the expert says that the "freaks" were not people taken advantage of because of their disabilities because they "didn't have disabilities because they had the ability to earn a living." Unfortunately, she misrepresents what it is to be a person with a disability. A disability is a "substantial limitation on a major life activity." You can most certainly be a person with a disability and have the ability to make a very successful income. But when your living depends on people poking and prodding your body or throwing things and/or heckling you because of your physical disability, you are very much a person with a disability being exploited by reason of that disability. And saying that because the "freaks" chose the freak show instead of the workhouse is hardly as though they had a lot of free choice. This one "expert" aside, the book is otherwise excellent, and I didn't wish to in any way penalize the rest of the book for a poorly thought out and reasoned opinion by someone who has misdefined the terms.

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Takes awhile to get into it, but worth the wait

Revisado: 11-14-18

The book starts a little slow, and I could have skipped the perspective of the Legion as they are planning to go on their raid, but once we got to the Ludus, it really picked up steam and I was very invested.

The characters could have been a little more well rounded and less one dimensional, but it was very clear that the author did extensive amounts of research all the way from the big points about the Roman Emperors to the small things like Romans eating stuffed doormice (true, and gross). As a history nerd I really appreciated the amount of detail that went into the book.

The reader was solid, although his pronunciation of the Danube is bizarre. And a couple of other words were pronounced strangely. But that aside, I really appreciated that his female voice for the "Lady of the Sands" wasn't a caricature. I usually don't like men attempting women's voices, but this was very well done.

Overall I recommend, but you need to give it a couple hours before it really picks up steam. I would definitely give a sequel in the series a listen.

I received this book in exchange for my honest review.

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Did I miss something?

Revisado: 10-29-18

The story is fine, engaging, interesting, unique. The reader is very over animated, sometimes a little over the top, and pretty bad at American accents, but I appreciate the difference in the voices and the excitement he brings (even if it can be a little much).

The problem I had is that it seems like there were definitely previous installments in the series, although nothing in the description of the book indicates that this isn't the first. There are characters with VERY complex back stories that they all seem to know about each other, or in some cases not. Powers and artifacts and stones and whatnot that are very complex and seem like they must have been explained in some other book and are quickly summed up, the way they sort of catch you up to speed at the beginning of a third book in a series, just in case you started with that book or haven't read the first two in a long time. But I think in this case without the previous story about Luke, it's just confusing. I think with that story under your belt, this could make a whole lot more sense.

So, if there are previous books in this series, I think that needs to be more clearly explained in the description of this book. (e.g. Book 3 of the Dragon Man Series) If there aren't, I think there should be.

Not bad overall, but a little too much en media res for me.

I was given this book in exchange for my honest review.

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Very Clever

Revisado: 10-27-18

I am angry with this book... because I got no work done until I finished listening to it.

It was fantastic!

I always like Michael Page as a narrator, this was absolutely no exception. Brilliant as always. Very different voices for the characters and great pacing. In fact, I only bought the book initially based on the narrator. I'm so glad I did.

I don't want to give away any plot points, but the twists and turns were fantastic. And I especially liked the device of getting the story from the Ripper's viewpoint. Brilliant writing choice.

If you like Jack the Ripper, you will get a lot of little gems from history, such as the origin of the Dear Boss letter. They were a treat.

Highly recommend if you like suspense, don't mind gore, and like Victorian era historical fiction.

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Too much in the weeds

Revisado: 10-27-18

I really wanted to love this book, because I am a student of history and my late grandfather is from Salem... However... it came across like a graduate thesis that became a book. I'm not sure if it was because the reader was so monotone or because the material was so dry and heavy on what were essentially footnotes within the material.

In addition to the reader being incredibly one note, she over enunciated most of the words in the book, with a couple of strange exceptions, such as Satan, which she pronounces Sa-en without the T. That sort of thing doesn't usually get to me, but a book about witches was heavy on Satan, and so it was really noticeable.

I don't think I would have found the material so dry if the reader had put more inflection into the narration. I think even quote and reference heavy history can be made less dry by a good reader and I think the combination of the narrator and the material made it pretty dull.

I found the central thesis of the book fairly compelling, although again, it seemed a bit like a graduate thesis in that she has a viewpoint and in addition to explaining why she doesn't agree with scholars with a different viewpoint, she stuck heavily to her argument. I find that history this complex is rarely single factor, and while I think she is correct that the way Puritan religion in New England was structured, women were likely to find sin in themselves easily and self blame as well as the community being set up to blame them, I think it is probably not so one dimensional. I think a lot of the other factors, which she attempts to disprove were also probably contributing factors such as women acquiring property against normal social order. I found the book a little one dimensional.

I wish I could be less critical, but I was given this audiobook in exchange for my honest review, which is what I have given.

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Yaaaassss Queens

Revisado: 10-05-18

Can't shout out my love of this book enough (mostly because my husband may hear me and chastise me for my loudness of volume). A hilarious and horrifying trip through time. Please make more of this series. I will buy them all. I will force "allies" to listen to them. And I will quiz them relentlessly. As a former stand-up comic and current talent agent (and lawyer), I could 100% relate to the entertainment industry section. Nothing like being mansplained my job by some dude half my age with a tenth of my education and life experience. There is nothing about this I didn't love. Except putting the laundry away. The songs were great, the idea of putting laundry away, not so much.

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