Lynn

Pitch Perfect

Revisado: 10-07-19

This is a jarring, searing, often heart wrenching tale within a tale. And there is hope and love and wisdom woven in between the moments that make us cringe. It is one of the best tales I have ever had the privilege to have heard. For me, the hearing of this tale being read by the author herself was divine. It is so rare to be able to hear the story as the author heard it - with the actual voices of the characters who crawled about inside her head in wee hours and waking dreams in the creation.

I am saddened that I have finished it and no longer have the pleasure of turning it on wherever I am and listening to the next bit of unfolding. I am truly honoured that I was able to bear auditory witness... for the time being.

An ancient buddha said:

For the time being stand on top of the highest peak.
For the time being proceed along the bottom of the deepest ocean.
For the time being a staff or whisk.
For the time being a pillar or lantern.
For the time being the earth and sky.

~Eihei Dogen

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Read the book rather than listen

Revisado: 10-22-18

The stories presented in this book are powerful and often gritty and that is their strength. That some of these women whose tales we witness were able to live let alone find deep and abiding faith in compassion and loving-kindness is nothing short of a miracle. It is based on this that the story gets my highest rating.

What absolutely does not work is the use of a narrator with a little girl voice with an English accent far better suited to a polite and proper Agatha Christie mystery. I had to stop listening two chapters in because the incongruity made me wince with every sentence read.

I HIGHLY recommend purchasing the book itself and spend your time with these women on your own terms, hearing them speak in their own voices directly to your heart.

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I was right there on the edge of my seat....

Revisado: 07-07-15

...right up until the end. Really - REALLY - dead end. The ending is SO flat, so uncreative, unimaginative and uninspired I wish I had never bothered with listening in the first place. Not sure if the author just gave up, got bored, or just needed to meet the deadline desperately - still no excuse for this half baked blah blah. Skip it.

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Sadly over anticipated

Revisado: 09-06-12

Oh how I waited for this sequel to "A Discovery of Witches." The first book was quite interesting and I looked forward to how Ms. Harkness would work out the timeline shift as Diana and Matthew time traveled. Instead....ick. I got nothing more than a simpy, whimpery, utterly boring attempt at a bodice ripper. Almost all of the auxillary characters were flat but the flattest characters by far were Diana and her insipid Matthew.

Honestly...the first fourteen chapters (FOURTEEN CHAPTERS!!) were so awful I kept fast forwarding to get through them. The exposition about the whole wedding thing was bad enough but the "wedding night" slog was worse than a Harlequin Romance. Boring, boring, boring! We don't even start to get to the meat of the tale until after we are flogged by all the maudlin bits.

The remainder of the tale (which I almost didn't bother with) barely pulled together but not enough for me willing to spend a single sous on the last book of this sadly under developed and lacking tale. I sort of cared about Diana and Matthew in the first book, but lost any interest in them or Ashmole anything well into the first few chapters of this book.

I would love to say that there was a redeeming quality in the narration but really...not so much. I wasn't bothered by Ms. Ikeda's voice and pacing when listening to the first book but, with the lack of any interesting storyline, her narration just added to my frustration.

Skip it. :-(

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Excellent all around!

Revisado: 09-06-12

Beautifully written and performed by the author herself. A tale rich in the history of one family's female lineage across three generation as it parallels the history of the Tibetan uprising and its aftermath on the Tibetan people as they struggle to reinvent themselves in a distant land bereft of the comfort and console of their homeland and spiritual bedrock.

I simply fell in love with all three of these women. I cheered their adventures and wept for their losses. There is grit and grace and unshakeable faith threading its way between all their lives and legacies. Humor is there, too, and, in the end, I was uplifted and inspired. Highly recommended.

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