Excellent!

A thoroughly good listen. Good Victorian mystery with engaging characters. Several strands of story that flow through the series, yet the writer never gets bogged down in detail and keeps the reader keen to hear more. The narration is clear and the various characters are voiced well without being distracting. A gem of a book.

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You can't go wrong with Anne Perry

I have read all her books apart from the latest which I will do in the near future. Her characters are brought to life in a way which is easy to listen to/read. I love the way she writes as you get into the story straightaway and get to know all the characters, whether it's Thomas Pitt or William Monk. I've also read her short stories which are equally enjoyable. The hardest thing for me is to actually put the book down/stop the audible.

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Setting the scene for further books

I enjoyed this book I love all the Anne Perry books however I did find this one a little drawn out, I know it is the first in the series and so I think it might be because she is setting the scene for others to come and as I have read a lot of both Monk and Pitt books this might be the reason why I found it so. Loved it anyway.

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A very exciting beginning to this series

I know that this is an old series by Anne Perry but a first for me. I enjoy all of her books and came upon this in the Audible catalogue. How pleased I am that I did, the opening clinched it. This is the first book on William Monk and I have already gotten the second one. The story is brilliant and the narrator does sterling work. Excellent read.

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Turgid .

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

Possibly , you need a great deal of patience if you are not to give up before the end .

What did you like best about this story?

The idea was very good and the characterisation well drawn in the main .

What does Davina Porter bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you had only read the book?

Davina Porter has a very professional microphone technic , she avoids sounding like a gurgling drain whenever she has to swallow , unlike a lot of narrators .

If this book were a film would you go see it?

Yes

Any additional comments?

This is not five star for me because it's too long , it's dragged out and soooo slow , the number of times the phrase " if only I could remember " is used is beyond counting , it's like toiling through treacle a lot of the time , needed better editing .

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1 person found this helpful

And an other great Anne Perry listen

I love Anne Perry books. All of her books are a joy to listen to. But I think it would have been better to have just one Narrater for the books ( the monk mysteries).

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Disappointing

Would you try another book written by Anne Perry or narrated by Davina Porter?

I would not read another Anne Perry book. I'm a tolerant reader but this was tedious and with a very unsatisfactory ending. I found it hard to care about any of the characters and the protagonist was irritating and whining. There were also lots of bad plot leaps and assumptions.

Davina Porter is a great reader I only kept going because of her voice.

What will your next listen be?

Back to reliable Scandinavian noir!

Which scene did you most enjoy?

None

Did The Face of a Stranger inspire you to do anything?

Yes - not read anything by this author again!

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Why a story about a male police officer, is read by a woman?

Although I like the story, I won’t be listening to anymore of the series. I found it really annoying that in the whole book the poor narrator who is a woman, and is very good, and would be great reading a book that was about a woman detective, with predominantly women characters and just doing a few male voices, but a book that has mostly male characters, and main character, just doesn’t work, so the whole thing becomes very confusing, because she just doesn’t have the range to do various male voices. Such a shame, because for me it ruined the whole thing.

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