Please note: this review is for both the plot and the audiobook performance.
I mentioned on a recent podcast that I’ve been listening to the Evan Evans series by Rhys Bowen on audiobook while I cross stitch and cook (not at the same time – too many stains on the aida, I should think). I realized that listening to an audiobook is both very soothing and avidly addictive for my brain as long as two important requirements are met:
- The speed is turned up to about 1.4-1.5x normal speech. Faster talking means my brain needs to pay attention and doesn’t get distracted.
- The narration is in Not-American English. The accents, dialects, and linguistic rhythms also grab ahold of what I call the “Jack Russell Terrier” part of my brain and force it to pay attention -which it does. Avidly.
This series is both supremely enjoyable and very frustrating, but I’m still listening, despite the parts that drive me bonkers. Evan Evans is a young constable in Llanfair, a very small village in Wales. He’s relatively new to the job, but not to Wales nor small village life, though he was in training to become a detective in Swansea before a tragedy changed his chosen direction in his profession.
Surrounding Evan are an assortment of recurring characters who are both relentlessly the same (it is a small village, after all) and yet still entertaining. There’s Evans-the-Meat, Evans-the-Milk, and Evans-the-Post, and other village inhabitants who are identified by their names and then their jobs, and plenty of world building that includes a bit of Welsh nationalism, the political balance of very different languages in a rural place, and the typical suspicion of newcomers and outsiders as well.
In this story, two hikers are found dead on the mountain range, and both appear to have been victims of climbing accidents. Evan, however, immediately suspects otherwise due to the way the bodies are positioned and his own experience climbing the mountains as well. Characters in this series, especially Evan, spend a tremendous amount of time outside hiking, climbing, and walking so there’s ample scenery description porn. His suspicions are met with derision from the nearest detective inspector, and he’s told to not investigate. Of course he does anyway. Evan has to evade notice as he investigates, manage the tempers and ruffled feathers of various villagers who imagine heinous crime where there is none, and do his job while staying mostly on everyone’s good side. As with any small community cozy mystery series, the people around Evan are as much a part of the world building as the place they inhabit.
One frustration that makes me reach for the skip-ahead button (if my hands are clean or if I’m not in the middle of stabbing something) is Evan’s interactions with women. There are two women in the village who regularly interact with Evan: Bronwen, a teacher who clearly likes him but is shy and circumspect about it, and Betsy, a local barmaid who is not at all shy or circumspect in her attempts to attract Evan. Through the first book and the rest in the series, there is a teeth-gnashing lack of progress and a fair amount of sexism and ignorance that marks Evan’s relationships with each. Do not read this or listen for the romance, as it is terribly unsatisfying. Evan’s thoughts about Betsy and about Bronwen are repetitive and often steeped in a passive sexism that makes me sneer at him. A few times my sons have asked me, “Who are you mad at?” when I snarl aloud at Evan for taking a giant leap backwards in my estimation in the way he talks to Bronwen and talks about Betsy. A series that prompts the humans to ask, “Are you talking to your book again?” is not necessarily a good series to continue.
But I’m still listening because the narration is delightful. Roger Clark’s performance differentiates between the characters well enough that I can tell who is speaking – and his falsetto for the occasional female character isn’t grating. The aspect I like best as an unabashed language nerd is the intermixing of Welsh and English. Characters speak Welsh to one another, though most of the time the dialogue is in English, but when there is Welsh – and yes, the plot of the second book in the series does involve multiple pronunciations of Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch to my everlasting delight – Clark handles the shift in language superbly. There are subtle differences in regional accents, which I also appreciate.
The mysteries aren’t going to stump anyone used to small town community stories of the cozy variety, especially with a limited cast of recurring characters and a handful of extras in each book. But Evan’s repeated discovery of murder in what looks like an accident (seriously, the death toll in Llanfair by book four is preposterous, but I supposed that’s typical for a series) and the manner in which he both identifies anomalies and investigates when he’s been told not to by his neighboring-village superiors is pretty entertaining for me. Evan has to manage his very small community and his neighbors and navigate the petty and massive political entanglements in such a small group while also solving crime and protecting everyone in the process. It’s the interpersonal development (aside from his terrible romantic progress) and the world building that comes from within a very old place with a very old language that keeps me listening.
So basically, I’m listening for the language and the narration, and most of the characters, because the mystery won’t surprise me much at all. That makes this book difficult to grade. I am consistently happy with the narration and the performance, and would give that part a B+, but the story, the sexism of Evan’s interactions with Betsy and Bronwen, and the somewhat clunky plot development that reveals any clues would be a much lower grade. So I’m averaging to a C: terrific audiobook performance in this case makes up for some consistently bothersome character habits and obvious killers, and keeps me listening. If I were just reading, I wouldn’t have continued.
Alas, to my eternal frustration, the audiobooks recorded by Roger Clark end after book 3, Evanly Choirs. There are no more audiobooks in the series until book 10 -?! – which is narrated by a different person. Time for some mental audiobook fanfic!
NB: I’m curious if you have any recommendations for similar series, especially with excellent narration. Please drop them in the comments if you do!
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Sarah, you might try the Hamish MacBeth series by M.C. Beaton. I found the first 10 or 12 really satisfying, then the quality dropped off a bit or maybe I just got tired of the formula. My dad used to say “these are like candy. You read one and love it and a week later, you can’t remember what you’ve read.”
It’s cozy small town Scotland and Hamish is the policeman who is quite good at solving crimes, but he’s also fairly lazy and doesn’t want to attract so much attention that he’s given more work. đ They don’t all have the same narrator, so you may want to skip ahead to find one you like. The series is popular enough that they’re widely available. Sadly, I think there’s very little Gaelic, but the setting of Lochdubh is one of my favorite things about the series.
Hamish is also lazy on the romance front, so yeah, his romances never progress in a very satisfying way. So if you read out of order, there won’t be too many spoilers (I believe, since I haven’t read all of them).
My fave English narrator is probably Steve West. I have listened to many books for no other reason than heâs the narrator. Try Strange the Dreamer. IMO he handles both male and female parts well. He co-narrated the Ember in the Ashes series with Fiona Hardingham, with whom he also co-narrated Scorpio Races which I believe was the first book I listened to with either of them.
Seconding Steve West as a reader with one exception. His one clunker for me was The Little Paris Bookshop in which he reads all the voices in French accented English. This makes no sense since every character is French and in France. I am giving him the benefit of the doubt and assuming that regrettable decision was made by someone else.
Another excellently read series is the Dublin Murder Squad series by Tana French. My Dublin based friend says the accents are spot on.
I read at least part of Evans Above but I donât remember if I finished it before the library copy expired. My reaction was similar to yours. The most interesting part was the characters and their life in the town. I think Iâll try the audio since I love listening to a Welsh accent.
Charlotte MacLeod, one of my favorite mystery writers, wrote a great series about a Welsh-Canadian Mountie. The audio narrator does a great job with the male characters and Iâve listened to all the books in spite of his abysmal female voices. [If you decide to listen to it, you should probably start with the second book. Madoc doesnât show up until halfway through the first one and there are a lot of screechy female voices. I wouldnât have made it through the first audio if I hadnât already read and liked the book.]
If you like linguistic rhythms, you might try Howlâs Moving Castle read by Jenny Sterlin. I find her performance very . . . lyrical, I guess. It sounds like a story meant to be read aloud. I sometimes listen to it while falling asleep because it calms my brain. Thereâs also a bonus Welsh accented character.
I would HIGHLY recommend listening to The Rook and Stiletto by Daniel O’Malley. The Rook is narrated by Susan Duerden, who I desperately love, and Stiletto is narrated by Moira Quirk, who is also AMAZING. Part of what I loved about these books is that the characters are from all over the UK, and both narrators do a brilliant job shifting between regional accents. Plus, the story is kickass, and O’Malley actually does a brilliant job writing fantastic, realistic female characters (I mention this because generally, I think dudes don’t know how to write women).
Another amazing audiobook is The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, which I actually picked up because I was looking through my BFF Susan Duerden’s work, and she’s the main narrator in this. There are multiple narrators, and they all do a glorious job (plus, it’s a beautiful, poignant, sweet romance story with tons of amazing characters).
Definitely look into Susan Duerden, as she is AMAZING.
Iâm really enjoying the Daisy Dalrymple series by Carola Dunn. I like the stories and the performance is good enough that I forget about the narrator.
“Supremely enjoyable and very frustrating” pretty much sums up my feelings about all of Rhys Bowen’s series. I’ve mostly given up on her.
I listen to a lot of mystery books on audio, but I think most of them (including the wonderful Kate Shugak series narrated by Marguerite Gavin) would exceed your tolerance for violence. I’ve picked up a lot of first books in cozy series thru various Audible sales and have enjoyed a number of them, but never enough to continue with book two.
I am slowly making my way through MC Beaton’s Poor Relation series narrated by Davina Porter. They are Regencies with some romance and some criminal hijinks. I think the stories are good enough, but Porter’s narration is what I return for. A lot of the Beaton/Chesney books (and audio) seem to be on Kindle Unlimited, so that’s a plus for subscribers.
I’m also a Steve West fan–just finished listening to The Thief–but I don’t think he’s narrated any cozies. Sorry!
There are such great recommendations. As usual, y’all know everything. Thank you!
Loving this comment thread!
I adore Robert Glenister’s narration of the Cormoran Strike series, a.k.a. the ones JK Rowling writes as Robert Galbraith. (And I’m not even a Harry Potter fan!) Books 2 and 4 have some gruesome murder details and book 3 is pretty disturbing as we get serial killer POV, these are definitely not cozy. But there are all kinds of different regional British accents and I find it really fascinating (boring American here), to the extent that I can’t bring myself to read it in prose only through audio (even though the latest book, number 4, is almost 23 hours long!!).
Second the Daisy Dalyrymple series although I read them rather than listen. The romance is reasonably satisfying if resolved đ
They are formulaic etc after several like most series like this but hey are just the thing to sort of have a nice expected read or on your case a listen!
@Shem – It is resolved. I peeked at the blurb of one of the later books. đ I have to know before I can commit to a series.
I just thought of another cozy series to recommend. The Miss Seaton series. Itâs a little strange in that itâs had three authors.
https://www.amazon.com/Picture-Miss-Seeton-Mystery-Book-ebook/dp/B075738JZ3/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1546133241&sr=8-1&keywords=picture+miss+seeton
I stumbled across it by accident and have really enjoyed the first couple of books by the original author. I havenât made it to the second author yet so I donât know how they hold up. I listened to the audio version but canât remember any details except that I liked it.
Love this thread. And need MORE recommendations of audible series with great narrators. I loved the Phryne Fisher books by Kerry Greenwood and their narration was wonderful. The TV Series is fun, but the actual books are better! Narrated by Stephanie Daniel. Thanks SBTB for all you do! Looking forward to 2019!
I really enjoy Rhys Bowenâs âHer Royal Spynessâ series, but havenât been able to get into any of the others. That one I have had 0 issues with sexism from MCs and found he ongoing romance satisfying. I also like that the MC grows as a person throughout the series and you can see her become moreconfidant and her relationships with friends and family evolve. I also liked that at one point in the series she admits sheâs grown used to finding dead bodies and is a little disturbed by it.
I really enjoyed the Evan Evans series for the Welsh setting (due to personal and familial connections with the place and language) but I think I’m so used to not getting anything out of the interpersonal relationships in most romance and mystery novels that the defects didn’t register as anything more than stereotypical “local color”. I think I must have finished the series (because I remember spending years keeping my eyes peeled for a next installment). I’ve always been curious what an actual resident of small-town Wales would think of them–whether it’s a reasonable “loving and accurate depiction” or whether it comes across as a tourist-oriented caricature.
The narrator for the Daisy Dalrymple series changes with book 4 and the new one isnât as good though still worth listening to.
@MaryK
I thought the new narrator of the Daisy Dalrymple series sounded more British than the original. And this made her better. But I did enjoy the original narrator who also does the Donna Andrews series about Meg the blacksmith and one of Lois McMaster Bujold’s 4 book series.
@RebeccaA – They sound a lot alike to me, but I have more trouble distinguishing between the characters with the new one, particularly the policemen. It seems like her voices arenât as distinct or maybe not as consistent.
Iâve been waiting for the earlier Donna Andrews books to be recorded so I can listen in order. Your comment prompted me to check again and the first one just came out!