Tag: AudioGals (Page 3 of 68)

Shanna by Kathleen E. Woodiwiss, narrated by Robin Miles

October 31, 2023 / Kaetrin

Shanna by Kathleen E. Woodiwiss, narrated by Robin Miles. I did not love the narration but the story held up pretty well, considering.

Story holds up but narration was a little disappointing.

I have a confession. Shanna is on my keeper shelf. First published in 1977, it was one of those novels I cut my romance-reading teeth on, before I knew much of anything about anything. It’s, obviously, “old skool” romance. But, as these books go, it has much less of the more egregious or objectionable content than others and is, while still problematic, it is at least far less so than others from this author or of the time period.

Harper has released Woodiwiss’s novels on audio with new recordings. Each has a (long) foreword which talks about how the book is of it’s time etc etc. I didn’t listen to it. I know the book already so I knew what I was getting into.

Shanna is also a long book – the kind of sweeping story you don’t get much these days (there are reasons for that – some good, some not so much IMO) – my paperback is 656 pages and the audiobook, complete, with foreword, tops out at nearly 30 hours.

Shanna Trahern is the young, beautiful and wilful daughter of Squire Orlan Trahern (who is Welsh but you wouldn’t know that from the narration – more on that later). Squire Trahern owns a small island “Los Camellos” somewhere not terribly far from England. It takes about a week to sail there in an old-timey ship but it’s tropical. That’s what I know. He’s a wealthy and widowed merchant with a longing for grandchildren and so he’s very keen for Shanna to marry. Unfortunately for him, Shanna is picky and he eventually gives her an ultimatum: find someone she wants to marry within a year or he will do the picking for her. Shanna is not having it. She has found no-one suitable and so comes up with a scheme to flout her father’s will. There is a condemned prisoner in Newgate with the impressive surname of Beauchamp (pronounced “Beacham”; something I only know because of Outlander – English is stupid) but due to hang within the week. She offers a bargain to Ruark Deverell Beauchamp, a colonial from Virginia: in return for his name, she will make his final days easier. Ruark, makes his own amendment to the deal. He will marry Shanna, but he wants a true wedding night. She agrees.

The only dubious consent (between the love interests at least) in Shanna arises from this bargain. Shanna makes the deal but plans to renege. Her plan was for the reneging to occur before any hanky panky in the carriage after the wedding, but she mistimes her “rescue”. As it happens, Ruark takes her virginity but is unable to, er, finish, let’s say. Ruark doesn’t exactly force Shanna to consummate the marriage – he is far more persuasive than that and she is not immune to his charms. Still she doesn’t exactly give enthusiastic consent either. I viewed it as a kind of sex work – the book certainly references it as a bargain struck. YMMV.

After that, the sex is all fully consensual. And, for a mainstream book from 1977 there is a lot of it. It’s not explicit – there is an abundance of euphemism and the prose is a little purple but Shanna and Ruark are boning down pretty regularly throughout the story. There’s probably something a bit revolutionary about that deserving of its own op-ed but I don’t have time for it here so I’ll move on.

Shanna, believing Ruark duly hanged, returns to Los Camellos and her father a “widow”. Squire Trahern thus thwarted must respect her bereavement.

Only, Ruark, due to the machinations of a greedy gaoler and a corrupt man of business, has escaped the hangman’s noose and has instead been sold as a “bondslave” (a kind of indentured servitude) to none other than the squire himself.

It does not appear that Squire Trahern is a slave owner in the sense of the African slave trade. He does buy “bondslaves” by paying their debt following an auction and then, in return for their labour, paying them a wage and keeping some of it until the debt is repaid. The squire’s bondsmen are, from what I could tell, fairly well looked after, have autonomy in many ways and are not locked up (at least not once on Los Camellos) or restricted in a cell or anything like that. They can’t leave the island until their debt is paid but they have the run of the place. They are provided with clothing and a wage which I gathered was fair for the time (?) and they are given the ability to earn more if their work is good.

(Ruark is a very good worker and he quickly gets a number of pay rises. It doesn’t take long for Ruark to become the squire’s right-hand man when it comes to farming, and he is often found at the squire’s table for breakfast or dinner. The squire doesn’t have any qualms about sharing his dinner table with Ruark and demands Shanna treat him as a guest when he is there.)

There is talk in the book of “slaves” but they are, for the most part, indentured labour who are not permanently enslaved – here is how Wikipedia differentiates the two: indentured servitude of Irish and other European peoples occurred in seventeenth-century Barbados, and was fundamentally different from enslavement: an enslaved African’s body was owned, as were the bodies of their children, while the labour of indentured servants was under contractual ownership of another person.

Indentured servitude is definitely not something I endorse but in the setting and the society of the time, I give the squire some points for not using enslaved people from Africa which was sadly common at the time for landowners growing sugar cane.

Later in the book, there is one reference to “slave quarters” at the family home of Beauchamps but there is no other reference to slave labour, so it seemed to me this was a reference, again, to indentured servitude. I’m a bit rubbery on this though as there is a dearth of information about this in the text.

There are certainly problematic things in Shanna. Indentured servitude is bad. Owning a person, even “temporarily to pay off a debt” is bad. There is no such thing as a “good slaveowner”.

There are people of colour in the book, some of them servants. They all appear to be free people, treated well, respected and valued.

There is some language in the book which is objectionable, particularly in one section where there is a reference to a biracial person of colour by use of a euphemism which is not okay (starts with “m”, ends with “o”).

There are also repeated references to Native American people as “s__ages”. For the most part this notion is strongly refuted so there’s that, but still.

What I’m saying is that this book is not going to be for everyone and that’s totally fair. Possibly my love for the book stems from when I first read it and the ignorance I had then. But I felt like this book held up reasonably well, all things considered.

Anywho, Ruark comes to Los Camellos and there is a constant reminder to Shanna of a “bargain fairly struck but unmet”. Ruark doesn’t press her exactly. He’s just there, reminding her of her promise and that’s enough. He’s also gorgeous and she remembers those pants-feelings he gave her and is curious about where they may all lead. He’s also clever and quick. He designs things that make the worker’s lives better and make more money for the squire. He does odd jobs for locals in his free time. He’s actually a good guy she comes to admire for himself apart from anything else. Had they met in a more traditional manner she probably would have fallen head over heels for him.

Shanna’s battle isn’t really against Ruark. It’s against herself. Shanna had the idea of marrying a nobleman. Ruark was a convicted criminal. He denies powerful relations. He is currently a bondsman. That is not the ideal husband Shanna had in mind. Even after Shanna gives into her physical desires, she holds herself apart from him emotionally. It takes her an eon (well, about a year but it‘s a really long book!) to get with the program and admit her love. Ruark, for his part, loves her almost from the first (that is one of the best parts of the book.)

There’s a capture by pirates, travel to Virginia and revelations about whether or not Ruark was fairly condemned to hang (spoiler: he wasn’t) and who the bad guys are, revelations about connections between other cast members in the story, revelations to the squire about Shanna and Ruark’s true relationship (Orlan has no idea and it’s a messy story that starts in a gaol so that’s not a conversation Shanna has been looking forward to at all). And there’s a HEA. Of course.

The language is of its time, a little on the flowery side. Possibly I’d struggle to read it for the first time now, but the nostalgia is powerful and it brought back fond memories of the first time I read the book.

I had heard excellent things about Robin Miles and I had high hopes for the narration. I was disappointed. The narrative and her voice for Shanna were the best parts of it. She certainly had good pacing and delivered with expression and emotion. But there were many many accents required for this book and most all of the others were terrible.

Shanna was “shah-na” or “shan-a” (rhymes with manna) interchangeably for a while before settling on the latter (yay – that’s how I think it should be said). Ruark’s accent changed too – although to be fair, one of those changes was textual – he “affected an Irish brogue” for the squire when they first met. The Irish brogue was terrible though and it disappeared later without a trace. If the squire thought anything of it, it was never mentioned.

Ms. Miles is good at posh English accents. I’ll give her that.

Whatever accent she gave to Squire Trahern was like nothing I’d heard before – and not in a good way. It was certainly nothing approaching Welsh. It’s difficult to describe other than to say it wasn’t good. Squire Trahern is a large part of the book so it was impossible for me to get past it.

Hergus, Shanna’s maid, had a Scottish accent which was okay sometimes and very much not other times. Berthe, the housekeeper was Dutch but the accent given to her did not sound so to me. There were others.

The bad accents got in the way of my enjoyment of the listen. I admit I turned to my paperback for some of it and skipped ahead.

Ruark’s voice was okay sometimes and I got used to it. Shanna’s tone was a little older than her years, but I could get past that. What Shanna needed was a Davina Porter (sadly, retired, but all the best to her) or a Nicholas Boulton.

For those who want to revisit the story or try it for the first time, I’d recommend the paperback or ebook over the audio, sadly.

Grade: B-/C+

Hello Stranger by Katherine Center, narrated by Patty Murin

October 24, 2023 / Kaetrin

Hello Stranger by Katherine Center, narrated by Patty Murin. A new favourite author/narrator pairing.

Last year, The Bodyguard was in my best of list – not only did I enjoy the story but I adored the narration by Patti Murin – so it was a no-brainer for me to review this year’s release Hello Stranger.

Sadie Montgomery is a portrait artist, broke and desperate to get her big break. She barely squeaks by with the earnings from her Etsy shop. She lives in her studio which she’s not supposed to do as her landlord, Mr Kim, (her BFF’s father) assures her it’s not “fit for human habitation”. She refers to it as her “hovel”.

Her father is a very successful cardio-thoracic surgeon who is disappointed with Sadie’s career choice. When Sadie’s artist mother died when she was 14, he remarried very quickly thereafter. Sadie does not get along well with her stepmother, Lucinda, and positively detests her stepsister, Parker, – who is a very nasty piece of work indeed.

But things are finally looking up! Sadie is a finalist in a national portrait competition – one of 10, out of a pool of 2000 entrants. In six weeks, she has to deliver an original portrait and she has the chance to win $10,000 and finally get some success.

On the way home from buying party supplies to celebrate her making the cut, she has a seizure and is rushed to hospital. There, she is diagnosed with a venous malformation in her brain which needs to be fixed or it could be fatal. It is the same thing that killed her mother. Following surgery, Sadie is left with a condition known as “acquired prosopagnosia” – acquired face blindness. She not only cannot recognise faces (something those who are born with prosopagnosia cannot reliably do to one degree or another), but the faces themselves are a jumble of pieces, like a mixed up jigsaw puzzle or a Picasso painting. For a portrait artist, this is a disaster. The condition may or may not spontaneously resolve. It’s a lot for her to cope with.

Sadie is comforted by her beloved dog, Peanut, who is a “gentleman of certain years” and her sudden crush on Dr. Oliver Addison, the new vet at the clinic where Peanut was boarded when she was in hospital. She can’t see his face of course but she just knows he’s a looker. He’s also very kind and loves animals. Check and check.

Meanwhile, her neighbour, Joe, moves from “weasel” category into the friend zone. She thought he was a womanising creeper but as she gets to know him she realises that’s not what he is at all.

Sadie is a person who does not like to ask for help. She is always and ever “okay”. Great, even. Joe is the guy who is always willing to help. He helps anyone – even Parker, when she moves into the building largely to mess with Sadie, because she really is awful.

Over the weeks leading up to the portrait competition, Sadie has to find a way to paint a face that doesn’t look like a police sketch or a ghoul and, she has to ask for help. Both of these things are incredibly hard for her, especially because she refuses to tell most people about her face blindness. She thinks of it as a failing or a weakness and is embarrassed by it.

It’s not difficult to guess the gimmick of the story so I don’t necessarily give myself points for picking how things ended. What makes it so fun is the characters and the way the story is told.

Sadie is wonderful. She’s funny and interesting. Her flaws are realistic and understandable. She has had to learn to rely on herself since her mother died and her father essentially abandoned her (emotionally at the least) and now it is a point of pride to keep doing it. She wants to honour her mother and find some further connection to her with her painting. Just before she died, Sadie’s mother was also a finalist in this same portrait competition.

And Joe is the best. I never believed he was a creep – I figured who he was talking about in the elevator that time. He’s kind, generous, smart and good-looking. Mr Kim calls Joe “helpful” because that’s what he is. But he’s no doormat either.

The only thing I’d say is that I think the “gimmick” went on just a little too long. I began to get impatient for the big reveal. For me, it tipped over from tension to the wrong side of frustrating. But this was only very close to the end and it’s a small thing in the bigger picture (heh, see what I did there?).

Patti Murin is fantastic. I just love listening to her. She has wonderful comedic timing and perfect intonation. Katherine Center writes with humour but its often about the delivery in audio and the jokes land every time here. But it’s more than just jokes. It’s the amusing asides, the whip smart turns of phrase. Ms Center writes them and Ms Murin delivers. It’s a perfect author/narrator pairing.

Ms Murin has a great range of character voices, excellent pacing and wonderful emotion in her performance. I enjoyed listening to her so much I immediately went to Audible to find more of her work.

Grade: A

Fly Bye by CW Farnsworth, narrated by Courtney Patterson & Neill Thorne

October 17, 2023 / Kaetrin

Fly Bye by CW Farnsworth, narrated by Courtney Patterson & Neill Thorne. The narration was stronger than the story.

(received review copy from Podium Audio.)

Everly (Evie) Collins has just finished medical school in Boston. She’s returned home to Charleston to do her residency. She’s super smart so was able to graduate early. When she was five years old, Grayson Phillips and his parents moved into the house next door. Gray and Evie’s brother, Noah, became best friends. Evie never got over her crush. Fly Bye is their journey to a HEA.

Gray is a pilot in the Air Force and even though he is not based in Charleston, nonetheless has an apartment he shares with another friend. I don’t know why. There are quite a few things Gray does or says which didn’t make sense to me or strike me as plausible. For instance, one of Gray’s favourite things is “surfing a flat sea” (I believe that’s called “paddling”). I don’t think a fighter pilot is allowed to bring his girlfriend onto base and take her up for a joy ride in a jet. I don’t think fighter pilots on deployment get come home for 24 hours as “co-pilot” for a fellow pilot who has a family emergency. (It wasn’t stated explicitly but it was strongly implied that they flew a fighter jet 5000 miles for this.) So, yeah, there were things which were all for plot and not because they made actual sense.

Anywho, Gray is in town and Evie and he decide to have a fling. She’s a virgin because of course she is. He balks at first but then changes his mind and they bang a lot for about a month but from the beginning, Gray makes it clear he’s not a long term option. However, Gray’s words and actions don’t always line up and Evie becomes, understandably, confused. After Gray is deployed he calls her and tells her she is on his list of people to contact if something happens to him. That’s not what you’d expect from a fling.

Evie graduated early but she’s not Doogie Howser. Much of the time she came across to me as emotionally immature and this didn’t really gel with the rest of her character and the mettle it takes to succeed in medical school.

There was a little too much of nothing happening – a whole bit about Evie having lunch at work one day for example where nothing happened except she didn’t enjoy the anchovies repeating on her afterwards and bought an iced tea afterwards – that made my eyes glaze over.

I struggled with this listen. I was tempted to DNF it at times. However, I did listen until the end and there were some entertaining and engaging things in the book. Gray and Evie did have good chemistry and the section when they were in Beaufort (I’m guessing at the spelling here but it was pronounced Byew-fort in the book if that helps) was my favourite. Gray could be a real jerk at times but he could also be sweet and he did give good grovel.

The narration, by Courtney Patterson (except for the epilogue which was read by Neill Thorne), was very good even though at times I thought the material she had to work with was not. Her character voices were well differentiated and she had good tone, pacing and emotion. I’d happily listen to her again.

Neill Thorne’s narration was so brief it was difficult to really have an opinion on it. Good, I guess? The grade here is for Ms. Patterson though as she did the bulk of the book.

Fly Bye didn’t turn out to be my cup of tea but it has a 4.17 rating on Goodreads to I seem to be in the minority.

Grade: C

Knockout by Sarah MacLean, narrated by Mary Jane Wells

October 12, 2023 / Kaetrin

Knockout by Sarah MacLean, narrated by Mary Jane Wells. Fantastic. Loved it.

I enjoyed last year’s Heartbreaker so much that I was eager to listen to Knockout, the third book in the Hell’s Belles series (and I have Bombshell, book one on my TBL). That they are all narrated by Mary Jane Wells, a favourite narrator of historical romance, only made me more keen.

Knockout was even better than Heartbreaker and I loved every minute of it. Detective Inspector Thomas (Tommy) Peck and Lady Imogen Loveless have been circling around one another for 14 months. Imogen is the daughter and sister of an Earl, so is far above Tommy’s touch. But Imogen is attracted to Tommy’s wonderful muscles and his dark beard. It’s fairly obvious that Tommy has been gone for Imogen for ages. Their flirtation is sizzling and very amusing. Imogen is smart and funny, always ready with a quip. I laughed out loud many times during the listen.

A series of fires in the East End have both the Belles and Scotland Yard (most particularly Tommy) investigating. But the likely culprits are too close to home and the Belles aren’t sure whether they should trust Tommy with the information they have put together.

In the meantime, Imogen has acted outrageously one too many times for her brother, Charles, and he has decreed that she should marry. Imogen, not interested at all in an aristocratic marriage, decamps. Tommy is asked, by the Home Secretary at the request of the earl, to locate Imogen. Imogen is not hard to find if one knows her at all and Tommy does – so that’s pretty easy. But an attempt on her life convinces Tommy that Imogen needs protecting and he offers to do just that for the earl until the lady is safely married. Imogen, for her part, agrees to participate in the marriage mart in order to flush out some of the lords the Belles believe are involved in the fires and this puts the lovelorn pair in close proximity.

There is risk and adventure and tension as the lovers are in danger from the shadowy and powerful men who wish to shut down all investigation into the fires. Tommy has a chance to rescue Imogen and, in true Pretty Woman style, Imogen has a chance to rescue him right back. Anyone who knows me, knows I love a good rescue!

Mary Jane Wells has the chance to show off her accent work in Knockout – with a large cast from various classes, counties and countries. I particularly enjoyed how well and how consistently Ms. Wells differentiated between the Belles – Sesily, Adelaide, Duchess and Imogen. They each have a distinct sound and can easily be identified by ear alone.

Imogen has a pert and razor sharp wit and Ms. Wells’ comedic timing assisted the text to deliver it to my ears. Tommy is a delightful mix of pushover (so gone is he for Imogen) and tough guy and Ms. Wells added to that characterisation with her performance.

I hadn’t expected Knockout to be so funny. I’m not sure exactly why. But, apart from the swoony romance between Imogen and Tommy, the humour was my favourite part.

There is also a wonderful teaser at the end of the next book (Duchess’s book) which also promises to be a cracker.

Knockout is great. Recommend.

Grade: A

The Honeymoon Crashers by Christina Lauren with full cast narration

September 14, 2023 / Kaetrin

The Honeymoon Crashers by Christina Lauren, narrated by Adriana Sananes, Cynthia Farrell, Deacon Lee, Harry Shum Jr., Inés del Castillo, Jennifer Aquino, Jessica Marie Garcia, Kimberly Woods, Lee Osorio, Shaun Taylor-Corbett, Stephanie Németh-Parker & Tim Paige. The full cast recording was not what I expected (not in a good way) but I loved Harry Shum Jr’s performance.

I read the The Unhoneymooners recently and queued The Honeymoon Crashers up very soon after. In The Unhoneymooners, Olive and Ethan, the maid of honour and best man, respectively for their siblings Ami and Dane, end up on the honeymoon in Maui instead as the rest of the wedding party and all the other guests get horrible food poisoning. (Spoilers for The Unhoneymooners follow by the way.) Unfortunately, Dane ended up being a cheating dirtbag so the marriage went into the toilet too.

The Honeymoon Crashers takes place four years after the events of the first book and now, Olive and Ethan are getting married. Worried about the “Torres wedding curse” they decide to elope to Maui. But that’s not really what the couple wants and it’s certainly not how the Torres family works. Ami, ever the organiser, springs into action to get the family to Hawaii and organise a wedding in less than two weeks. In Maui, she meets Brody Keeton who is a friend of Ethan’s and who will be Ethan’s best man (Dane not being welcome in the wedding party for obvious reasons). Olive and Ethan ask that Brody help plan the wedding as he knows loads of people on the island and will help smooth the way given the tight budget and short notice.

Ami is initially less-than-thrilled to share the organising but Brody wins her over pretty quickly with his laid-back attitude and his buoyant sense of fun. There’s more to Brody than that – something has had him hiding in Maui for the previous six months and licking his wounds. In Ami and the wedding planning, Brody finds a delightful distraction and feels more like himself than he has in months.

The audiobook is novella length – just under five hours – and there is not a lot of time to fully develop a relationship. This is especially the case because it’s clear Brody is dealing with some heavy things. Those things are really only canvassed right near the end. To be completely honest, at about 38 minutes to go I was seriously wondering if this audiobook was going to be a kind of prequel. It wasn’t – there’s a solid HFN – but things were wrapped up very quickly. Brody and Ami could have used a little more time.

I usually enjoy a full cast narration and I expected to here. But I ended up being really confused by it. Usually in an audiobook, there is one narrator who does all the character voices or, two narrators who swap by POV – whoever’s POV the story is in, that narrator does all the narrative and dialogue for everyone and then when the POV shifts to the other protagonist, the other narrator takes over. Usually, with a full cast recording, the POV character’s narrator is responsible for the narrative/text and their own dialogue but all other dialogue is performed by a specific narrator cast for that particular role. And that’s what happened here – sometimes. I cannot for the life of me work out why this was so, but there were other times in the listen where Harry Shum Jr narrated entire sections including all dialogue (ie Ami’s too) or when Jessica Maria Garcia read another section and did all the dialogue (Brody’s, Diego’s). Then it would swap back to the full cast and vice versa. It wasn’t even chapter by chapter! It was just… sometimes it would be one way and sometimes it would be another and it was super weird.

I very much enjoyed Harry Shum Jr’s performance. He nailed Brody’s laid-back nature and sense of humour and, even though I was confused it was even present in the audiobook, I liked his female character voices. Mr. Shum Jr should definitely narrate more romance audiobooks is what I’m saying.

I didn’t feel the same way about Jessica Maria Garcia. (I believe she narrated Ami – except when it was Harry Shum Jr doing it that is. There’s a short video clip on the author’s website where Harry Shum Jr and Ms Garcia introduce themselves so it stands to reason they voice the main characters. I can’t be 100% sure though so apologies if I’ve got that wrong. I couldn’t find anywhere an actual cast list (Graphic Audio does this really well publishers please note). Anyway, Ms. Garcia’s volume was all over the place; sometimes she was too yell-y and other times her volume was less than a whisper, making it impossible to hear. Still other times, her voice trailed off so words were lost. Sometimes she spoke too quickly (seriously, one time she said “raw seafood” and it sounded like “rossi food” and it took me a minute to clue in).

The other narrators were all fine; there wasn’t a great deal from any one of them so I can’t really say more than that they did a good job.

I would like someone to explain to me the decision making involved in the way the narration style chopped and changed throughout the listen – I don’t even know what to call it. I mean, if you have a full cast – why not use it??

Grade: B-

Even if the Sky is Falling by Taj McCoy, Farah Heron, Lane Clarke, Charish Reid, Sarah Smith & Denise Williams

September 7, 2023 / Kaetrin

Even if the Sky is Falling by Taj McCoy, Farah Heron, Lane Clarke, Charish Reid, Sarah Smith & Denise Williams, narrated by Adenrele Ojo, Soneela Nankani, Karen Murray, Marissa Hampton, Donnabella Mortel, Joy Beharie & Teddy Hamilton. Loved the premise and there were some real gems in the anthology.

Even if the Sky is Falling is an anthology of stories by BIPOC authors which all have the same basic premise: an alarm blares alerting everyone that some space junk (or worse) is imminently going to crash into the earth and everyone should take shelter. Only the people in the first story know that it’s a false alarm and there’s no risk. Each story takes the forced proximity trope and the setup and takes it somewhere different. I love this idea; it’s illustrative of how romance itself is so diverse – just because the ending is the same doesn’t mean the stories are. Here the premise is the same but the stories are all very different.

Some of the stories are Black romance, others feature at least one character of colour, most are MF, one is FF. It’s difficult to talk about each story in detail here but I’ll at least mention each one briefly.

Taj McCoy’s All the Stars, narrated by Adenrele Ojo, kicks things off and sets up the world. NASA employees are putting the finishing touches on a nationwide emergency alert system for space debris, part of a wider worldwide effort. An accident happens and the alarm goes off. This story was the weakest of the anthology for me; the incompetence of the character who messes up (neither of the love interests fortunately) was astounding; I didn’t get how, in a team of four, the FMC and the MMC had so much downtime; especially as the FMC was the Team Leader. When the crap hit the fan why was she able to go for a nap rather than pitch in to help? This novella also featured a second chance trope and I found the reason for the break up unconvincing – I’m not sure the MMC deserved to be given that second chance. The narration was very good though.

Keep Calm and Curry On by Farah Heron, narrated by Soneela Nankani, was in my top two novellas from Even if the Sky is Falling. Set in a large undercover market, the protagonists, both of Pakistani heritage and the children of immigrants and former best friends each have a food truck. Their dads are no longer friends but can Tariq convince Maya that their generation doesn’t have to be at odds? Can Maya’s Masala Girls food truck coexist beside Tariq’s Curry Junction? Do they need to be in competition? There is also a hot guy in a Henley with the sleeves pushed up and a (the same) hot guy reading a romance novel! (I believe it’s a Tessa Dare book but it’s never named). There’s also a cat. I haven’t listened to Soneela Nankani before but her narration was excellent. She had great characterisation and bought into the somewhat meta nature of the story, adding a touch of humour to those beloved tropes so it never edged into too much.

My Lucky Stars by Lane Clark, narrated by Karen Murray is the only queer romance in the anthology. The only two Black girls in their law school class do not get along. Jones is prickly and aggressive, Diana is not. Enemies to lovers is something of a tricky trope for me at the best of times; I don’t like it when characters are mean to each other. Here, Jones was pretty mean to Diana and I didn’t really like her which made it difficult for me to root for them as a couple. I figure that people who don’t struggle with E2L will like this one a lot better than me. The narration was good though. Karen Murray is also a new-to-me narrator but I’d happily listen to her again.

Bunker Buddies by Charish Reid, narrated by Marissa Hampton was my other favourite of the anthology – my first story from this author. A bookshop owner with a bunker underneath (inherited from his prepper grandad) has been crushing on a customer for months. A university professor who keeps coming to the bookshop to order obscure books just to have an excuse to see said hot bookseller happens to be the only customer in the shop when the siren sounds. All alone together in the bunker while the world may or may not be ending. All that unresolved sexual tension has to go somewhere, right? The only thing that let this one down was the speed of the narration. Ms. Hampton’s pacing was too fast for me. Otherwise, her characterisation and voice differentiation were very good.

Interlude narrated by Sarah Smith, narrated by Donnabella Mortel – a composer and jingle writer spends the maybe-end of the world in her basement with her cat and the hot contractor who, when the alarm went off, was at her house to give her a quote on replacing her kitchen cabinets. I found this difficult to get into because precious word count was wasted on things which didn’t really matter. There was too much time spent on things which didn’t really impact the story and it made my eyes glaze over a bit. On the other hand, the narration was great. Ms. Mortel is another narrator I’ll be looking for again. The story didn’t work super well for me but she kept me entertained nonetheless.

Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better by Denise Williams, narrated by Joy Beharie & Teddy Hamilton was another that suffered (for me at least) as a result of the enemies to lovers start of the story. I’m not sure I really bought why she didn’t like him in school when he didn’t do anything beyond being related to the founder of the university. Trapped in an empty college together, the pair eventually work their way through the misunderstandings that plagued their school years (I’m also not a fan of the Big Mis) and find their way to a HFN – and likely HEA. The narration by both performers was very good, with solid tone, pacing and emotion. It’s difficult to say new things about Teddy Hamilton – AudioGals readers know he’s a favourite here!

Like many anthologies, Even if the Sky is Falling was a bit of a mixed bag but I loved the premise and I did find some new-to-me authors and narrators to follow which was an even bigger plus.

Grade: B/C