Don't get along with the reader

Stories fine but the somewhat monotonal delivery puts me to sleep. Very cheap so wasn't expecting much and that's what I got.

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Entertaining, but Google is your friend!

Loved the stories, but narrator needs to learn how to pronounce English places/names. Use Google!

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Collection of old fashioned horror stories

Good value however narration was a bit sketchy and some stories were too oldly worldly.

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2 people found this helpful

You get what you pay for

This collection is dirt cheap -even more so during 50% off sales. Because of that, criticism seems a bit ungrateful. I do have some, though. First off, the narration is really not that great. It is tolerable for me, but I can imagine people tuning out because of it. The tales themselves vary in quality. Obviously Poe and Lovecraft are the stars of this collection, but there are others worth listening to as well. Some of the stories are very dated, though. They were written over a 100 years ago, and contain sexist and racist tropes/words. Almost all are written from a male perspective, mostly the 'English gentleman' discovering something spooky. Some of the stories are just bad regardless. Another point of criticism is the mismatch between cover/title and contents. I knew most of these tales going in already, so I was not surprised. But a title like 'classic tales of the macabre' would have been much better. This is not horror in the modern sense. The image used for the cover art does not catch the vibe at all.

Positive points are the low price & the fact that you get a lot of classic stories. There are bound to be a few that interest you. If you have a job where you can listen to long stretches of audiobooks or just want something on in the background it may be an OK deal for you.

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not so good

I was looking forward to this as I love old scary stories but found myself bewildered. The reader doesn't appear to be aware of pace, pronunciations or even when the story will end so it becomes rather confusing. I was quite disappointed when, thinking there was going to be a climax, the story ended as his inflections didn't indicate it was ending. I ended up listening to it at a faster speed as I hate not finishing books and at least this made some of it funny. Next time I think I'll just read the stories.

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Mispronounced

Personally I don’t believe these stories to be horror or scary in anyway but I enjoyed them nonetheless the only issue I had with it was the pronunciation from the narrator as quite a few words were mispronounced once you get passed that you can find yourself enjoying the stories

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Some Good Stories With Bad Narration

I quite like traditional weird fiction and ghost stories, of which there are some good ones here but the collection is seemingly narrated by a semi-literate. I can forgive the bad pronunciation of British towns and counties, as painful on the ear as they are, but the narrator's inability to read "anecdote" as "anecdote", instead repeatedly using "antidote" is shameful.

There are many occasions where words are mispronounced. This was initially quite amusing but coupled with the monotone reading and horrendous attempts at accents it all serves to grate. I appreciate this was a cheap buy but I can't believe just how bad the narration is.

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4 people found this helpful

poor performance

The performer is unfamiliar with the pronunciation of a lot of British towns and cities (a shame, since many of the stories and writers are based in the UK).
There were also many mistakes in the pronunciation of words that are fairly common in the English language, that unfortunately interrupted the flow of the story

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3 people found this helpful

Food for the inactive brain.

As I work nights ,filling shelves I needed something apart from the inane twitter of the radio to help me get through,fortunately I invested in an Audible subscription.

This is the best few pounds spent and this collection of Classic Horror stories kept me well entertained. Huzzah.

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Not real horror.

I wouldn't say these are horror stories but interesting tales.
With 50 stories to choose from I don't think one could be disappointed with this book of short stories. Great stuff to listen to at bed time 😴

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2 people found this helpful