These Old Shades: Gossip, scandal and an unforgettable Regency romance

This is one of my favorite Heyer novels, and I was happy to find it in an audiobook. The narrator’s overall voice is fine; however, I find it difficult to believe that he did any preparation before this reading. A character that is supposed to have an upper class French accent, speaks with a lower class English accent. This is a critical flaw because it directly connects to the plot. An upper class English character is inexplicably given a Scottish accent. Most of Heyer’s fans have read her novels countless times, and are going to pick up on a poorly prepared production. I could not finish listening to this version.

This is a wonderful book, and the narration is not as bad as one of the other options out there, but it is still not great. Some name pronounciations are inconsistent, the tone of different people’s voice often doesnt match their personality, and there is often an “overacted” vibe. The french servants all have strange scottish and welsh accents. It is listenable and i still enjoyed it but would avoid this narrator in future.

I’ve read this book twice over the last forty years and decided this time to listen to it on audio whilst crafting. I think it’s always difficult for men to read women’s voices and vice versus, and for the most part the narrator did well. But oh! Very sadly he ruined Leon/Leonie’s voice, sounding first like a 12-year old boy, then a 12 year old girl. The voice was so high, jerky and childish it was difficult to know why Avon didn’t just throttle her. She was supposed to be 19! I never felt like this reading the book - she came over as naive but charming. So unfortunately this did rather spoil the book for me. There were many more male characters in this book than female so it made sense to have a male narrator - such a shame it was the second lead character that didn’t ring true for me. Georgette Heyer’s books do sound just a little dated (even politically incorrect!) these days, but the stories are full of charm and wit! I shall work my way through them again - on audio!