Sunday, June 06, 2010

Book 6: Audiobooking Hurricane Gold

Hurricane Gold (A Young James Bond Adventure) (Young Bond Series, Book 4)(Library Edition)I may have mentioned before how much I esteem the narration powers of British actor Nathaniel Parker.  His performance of the Artemis Fowl books is up there with Jim Dale's Harry Potter tour de force. 

Similarly, his Young James Bond readings are so well done that I only listen to the books.   His patrician tones are a perfect match for the Eton College educated Bond and his facility with voice characterizations works with the different characters brilliantly.

Needless to say, I have been awaiting the USA release of the Hurricane Gold audiobook rather anxiously.  As happens sometimes, there is a weird time lag between the time the book was released in the UK and over here but all is forgiven, I've downloaded the audiobook and WHAT????

These are not the dulcet tones of Nathaniel Parker!! This is Gerard Doyle who I enjoyed very VERY much reading Gideon the Cutpurse: Being the First Part of the Gideon Trilogy but this is James Bond!! 

C'MON!  

Parker did record Hurricane Gold and the next book, By Royal Command and according to their website, I can still buy his version for a packet of $$ from BBC Audiobooks.  Apparently, Blackstone is now the distributer for the audiobooks here in the USA.  The first three were available through Random House Listening Library. The change must have been because of the money. I always tell my entlings, "follow the money."

My attempts at ILL the Nathaniel Parker version, through World Cat, from Australia were unsuccessful.   Drat and Blast. 

OK, so, for the challenge, I've been trying to give this new version a chance.   
No. Sorry.  

Doyle's attempt at an American  Southern accent sounds demented--as bad as, say, Dick Van Dyke attempting a Cockney accent.  

This is very sad for me.  Young James Bond Fail.


Audiobook listening time: 1 hr. 06  min.
Blogging time:  45 min.

2 comments:

tanita✿davis said...

Oh, WOW. I have to say that was DUMB of them!!! Not everyone can sound Southern - and I cannot imagine why they wanted to drag a Brit back into doing that.

It's payback for the Van Dyke thing.

Camille said...

BBC Audiobooks probaby wanted to much money to renew the rights to Parker's reading. Honestly he is just divine. I hope he is going to continue to read Artemis Fowl.