OMG - Don't buy this audio book

If you have been going through the whole MC Beaton Hamish MacBeth audiobook series you'll be horrified to get to this book and find it's narrated by someone completely different, in an English accent. Thankfully Book 29 goes back to the wonderful David Monteath. THIS REALLY NEEDS TO BE RE RECORDED BY DAVID MONTEATH!

15 people found this helpful

bring back David.

Graeme Malcolm did NOT sound anything like Hamish. terrible narration. wierd accents. boring voice. zzzzzz

12 people found this helpful

Sorry but didn't like this narrator

Not one of my favourites I'm afraid I did not like this narrator it detracted from the story and I didn't enough the book. Please bring back David Montieth he captures Hamish Macbeth for me.
Very disappointed.

9 people found this helpful

Please bring back David Monteith as the narrator

The pleasure of this book was diminished by the lack of David Montieth's narration. If the first audio book had had this narrator I would probably stopped listening then.

8 people found this helpful

Please ask David Monteath to record this book

The brief change of narrator (for one book in a series of over thirty) does not work.
We may never know why David Monteath was not available to narrate but the publishers should have waited or him.
Graeme Malcolm’s characters are unconvincing and unsympathetic to the body of work which precedes this book. Did he even listen to any of David Monteath’s narrations to get a feel for the characters accents and pacing? I doubt it.
Hamish is unrecognisable. Jimmy sounds like Blair. The female voices are particularly unconvincing. Most dialogs between Hamish and another character left me wondering who was saying what. So bad were the characterisations.
We can only HOPE that the publishers do the right and re-record this book with David Monteath at the microphone ... but of course, they’ve already got our money / credits.

7 people found this helpful

Boringly Narrated

If this book wasn’t for you, who do you think might enjoy it more?

Disappointed with the narration

What was most disappointing about M. C. Beaton’s story?

M C Beaton's story is fine but not brought to life by the narration.

Who might you have cast as narrator instead of Graeme Malcolm?

David Monteath

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Death of Yesterday?

None

Any additional comments?

Accents, dialects, pronunciation and empathy for the characters is missing - if this is your first look at Hamish Macbeth - don't! Start with book one and work your way to this book, which will help in listening to it.

7 people found this helpful

Narration not up to standard.

David Monteath does a much better job on Hamish MacBeth & the characters of these novels. This reader hasn't the range of convincing, differentiated, Scots & foreign accents, and lacks the relaxed gentle voice which fits so well with the Highland setting and pace of life. (This one reads very fast, which is probably a good thing: it avoids closer evaluation of his accents/acting!)

Story is OK, and the trouble is, that when you get into a long series of novels, you don't want to miss out on developments in the life of the recurring characters.

I wouldn't go so far as to avoid a book I wanted to hear on account of this narrator - there are some over-exposed readers I've learned to avoid - but it's just not the same. This bloke sounds English, or Anglo-, so I don't get the same feeling of being back home, or of the same comprehension of that culture and landscape, and WEATHER. Maybe this was designed to appeal to the US market. I've noticed UK, even Scots, writers will use American English (like "pants" for "trousers", a false friend if ever there was one!). Beaton doesn't do this, thank the Lord, although she left home so long ago, you have to wonder how much grasp she's got on 21th century Scotland.

7 people found this helpful

New narrator

awful. spoilt the whole book. The characters were awful, the accents were awful and to add insult to injury several mispronounciations. awful. prepare to be disappointed.

5 people found this helpful

read reviews before buying

the narrator was wrong first book i struggled to finish glad it wasn't my first

5 people found this helpful

Awful!

The narration of this story is so poor that it completely ruins the experience.
I will be asking for my money back.

5 people found this helpful