Disappointing

Too long and found the characters confusing. The narrator has a pleasing voice but has the worst Welsh accent. Sounds more like Peter Sellars Indian.

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Not her best

Story did not hold my attention and narrator had irritating inflection on some words pity, as had previously enjoyed the Bartholomew series.

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Different Narrator

The story was as good as ever and I like the characters but do not like this narrator as much as the usual one! He changed the characters significantly and even the pronunciation of their names!

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2 people found this helpful

Bitter sweet ending

Is there a book in this series, I wonder, that has less than at least 4 murders? Great fun trying to disentangle all those motives and alibies and to listen to a new take on interpreting the many various characters by a different narrator. Under his interpretation many of the male characters become more suited to the medieval era, in my view. I loved how he shows pomposity, just brilliant. His Brother Michael is also closer to the book’s description of a large man and although I love the camp Michel for David Thorpe, I think this Michael is closer to the author’s reality. Another fab book.

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Not captured by narrator.

The 'feeling' of the times and characters are not captured by this narrator. Belief is lost, as is interest in the 'Mills and Boone' style....

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Great story, terrible narration.

As various other people have said, the change in narrator and producer ruins this, and the following book. The pronunciation of some names is bizarre (or just plain incorrect) and the character’s voices are so different from David Thorpe’s that it just sounds wrong. The chapter divisions are also all over the place rather than the objectively sensible breaks at the end of a chapter… Changing the narrator for the 11th and 12th books in a series is ridiculous but changing but so is changing from Hachette to W. F. Howes. Thankfully, it all goes back to normal for book 13.

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Surprises and Character Development

I really enjoyed this 11th Matthew Bartholomew chronicle, and it was good to see some surprises in relation to characters met before. It feels like a step-change. The story-line was satisfying and held the interest throughout, though I little cared for the journey of the astrolabe. It was also very good to see some existing characters being fleshed out more and this made the novel all the more rewarding. No one following Matthew Bartholomew’s novels should hesitate; read it. The audio-book has a different performer, but Andrew Wincott does full justice to the story. The special relationship between Matthew and Michael loses some of the sense of obvious banter, though the story might have prompted some of that. I wait to see how this plays out in the next instalment with the same performer. Given the dramatic way this novel ends I am breaking with my self-imposed rule of not reading novels in a series straight after one another.

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Disappointed by narrator change

I have enjoyed all the previous books in this series very much. This book was very entertaining and the story line was intriguing. However the change of narrator lessened my enjoyment of listening to this book. This new narrator's tone used for familiar characters changed their familiarity completely for me, as well as the names of several characters being pronounced differently than previous books. I hope the previous narrator will resume the narration of the newer books.

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A good read

There are other books in the series featuring the same cast of characters, but this was my first (and the only one in the series available from Audible). I don't think it made a difference; the characters are very well defined in this book.

The story is set in 14th century Cambridge, but they could almost be walking round a dirty version of a modern town without cars. And there's a lot of walking! For all that, it's pretty good: the story unfolds gradually through the book, new twists appear and are resolved, and the ending is entirely satisfactory. No quibbles with the narration, either.

So why don't I give it all five stars? I suppose it's just because it doesn't stand out as the most gripping or wonderful or unmissable book. It's good enough, though, and I'm glad I listened.

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21 people found this helpful

Please give up Andrew Wincott as a reader

Another great instalment in the Matthew Bartholomew stories. But, oh heaven's Andrew Wincott just isn't a patch on David Thorpe. Aside from his singular lack in ability to do accent, his delivery is just not up to the task. This is a long, multi-charactered story and Wincott's voicing isn't sufficient to do it justice. Please bring us this with David Thorpe narrating.

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