A beautiful, intelligent narration

With a remote snowbound location on the Czech-Polish border and a handful of awkward misfit characters Tokarczuk weaves a spellbinding tale, toying with crime fiction, magical realism, feminist literature and the poetry of William Blake. Pity the poor librarian who must figure out which shelf this belongs on.

In her protagonist Janina, she gives voice to an otherwise invisible person, a woman, late in life, ignored by authority, with no status, but who in return, guided by her own mysticism ignores the rules and ploughs her own furrow using her invisible footsteps in the snow to solve, or possibly commit a crime.

This crisp and luminous translation by Antonia Lloyd-Jones, who also narrates beautifully here, surely helped cement Togarchuk’s international literary reputation.

Narrating a character that is eccentric, unreliable, sometimes admirable and sometimes downright unlikeable, is a tough call, but as Blake avers “Without contraries is no progression”; this is such a well paced and intelligent reading. I had already read the book and had not planned to download the audio version, but was enticed to listen to this recording by the preview. What comes out in this wonderful reading is the warmth and humour of the novel. I liked all the characters a lot more after this as they seemed to acquire a life of their own, and live on after the words were done.

5 people found this helpful

excellent versatile story

I must contradict the previous reviews with regard to narration, I personally think it perfectly fits the character. The translator has done excellent job in both: translating and narrating.
As for the story itself, it's vividly written, with enjoyable humour. It's dark, at moments disgusting, sometimes slightly boring, but it's all there for a reason, you must listen it till the end!

3 people found this helpful

A strange and meditative, beautiful story

A cryptic, beautiful story that demands a second read. The writing, as always with Tokarczuk, is top notch. The narrator makes some pretty basic errors around phrasing (a few sentences don't actually make sense the way she has split them up) and a few mispronunciations which could be forgiven but her style is rather tedious to listen to with a fairly predictable range of character voices that begin to sound rather similar. Definitely a reader rather than a storyteller. Despite this, give the book a go (or even better find a different recording), it deserves your attention.

2 people found this helpful

A lovely surprise

As a Pole, I was reluctant to listen to Tokarczuk in English, but the translation turned to be very good and the performance of the narrator is very good. She ia a true Duszejko. This audiobook works on many levels!

1 person found this helpful

As poor a piece of narration as I have heard

it is impossible to enjoy Antonia`s translation because her reading is so bad on so many levels. I am horrified that a Nobel Laureate`s work can be released in an audio book that pays no attention whatsoever to rhythm or any other prerequisites of the spoken text. I abandoned this in sheer disgust that the publishers and producer allowed it to be released.

1 person found this helpful

Incredible

One of the best stories I’ve listened to in a long time. Sad, beautiful, funny, moving, divine. Thank you.

1 person found this helpful

Phenomenal story let down by the narrator.

I loved the story but the narrator was poor. It seems that the translator read her own work. While I think she deserves a lot of credit for the quality of the translation I feel that the recording quality leaves something to be desired.

1 person found this helpful

Good story, wrong voice

I did not like the narrator's voice. Part of me hunks that maybe it was this annoying because the character is supposed to be annoying but I think I would have liked the story and the character better if the narrator's voice was less shrill. The story is not mind blowing either but it is subtle as well as clear and with multiple unique angles which I totally respect and even admire.

1 person found this helpful

Intense and original

Brilliant story with perfect narration that brings out the humour and suspense of this clever tale

stick with the narration

The narration style did jar a little at the start, but once I was used to it I enjoyed the book.