It’s interesting when you hear different readers read the same story. It actually changes the characters and even the tone of the story. The better reads actually make the story better. Here’s an example. Robert B. Parker
is considered the dean of American crime writers. He has written scores of books around three different characters. Spenser, Jesse Stone and Sunny Randall. It’s interesting that Sunny Randall seems to be a female Jesse Stone and in the book Blue Screen they hook up.
Anyway since he’s written so many books over the years, they get read by different people. There are maybe five people who have read Spenser books from Burt Reynolds to Richard Massur and Joe Montagne. They’re all good but Joe Montagne really gets identified with the characters and adds a tone of sarcasm that makes the character unique.
Jesse Stone novels are read by Robert Forster and Scott Sowers. Both excellent readers but very different. Robert Forster has a flatter even style that adds a level of depression for Jesse.
The best way to listen to series like this is to start early in the series and work forward. As you learn the characters, you easily pick up all the references in later books. It gets you into the story quickly. The other thing that makes Parker’s style easy to listen to is that he doesn’t repeat information. For example, a character goes through an event and then has to tell it to the cops. He simply writes and then I told them the story. Here are just a couple of the Parker books:
The other thing that’s interesting about his writing is that you end up knowing more about what each character is wearing than any other books you’ll read. It’s very fashionable crime.
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