Money for Nothing
by P G Wodehouse (Herbert Jenkins, 1928); audiobook read by Jonathan Cecil (BBC, 2009)
More or less the quintessential Wodehouse novel, with a country manor, a romance frustrated by misunderstanding, comings, goings, comedy mishaps, and several greedy protagonists locked in a tangle of one-upmanship, all exquisitely facetious in the telling, the prose gilded in its loquacity.
The Silmarillion
by J. R. R. Tolkien (Allen & Unwin, 1977); audiobook read by Martin Shaw (HarperCollins, 2015)
A posthumously compiled addendum to Tolkien’s Middle-earth stories, demonstrating the epic imagination that underpinned these works but none of their narrative pull. In essence: a vast and proclamatory, untethered bore, which not even Martin Shaw’s sonorous narration can make worth persisting with.
Womble Stories
by Elisabeth Beresford; audiobook read by Bernard Cribbins (BBC, 1976)
Six bite-sized Womble stories much in the vein of the five-minute TV episodes, read by Bernard Cribbins for a 1976 LP recording. By staying true to their personalities, various of the loveable, childlike Wombles stray briefly (and safely) into happily ended difficulties.
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
by Ian Fleming (Jonathan Cape, 1963); audiobook read by David Tennant (AudioGO, 2012)
Bond’s attitude to women remains unconscionable, but in other respects Fleming gives him a greater depth and vulnerability here than in other books (and certainly the films). The writing has refinement above its genre, and gains added respectability through David Tennant’s reading.
Son of Holmes
by John Lescroart (Dutton Books, 1986); audiobook read by Tim Baltz (Brilliance Audio, 2011)
The titular Son of Holmes lurks mostly in the background, while the French protagonist is narrated by an American too well versed in ‘Allo ‘Allo cod accents. Nonetheless, the mystery is quietly engaging and the denouement at least smacks of the Sherlockian.
Sapphire & Steel, Assignment 1
by P. J. Hammond (ITV, 1979)
A darkly lit, suitably disconcerting introduction to time agents Sapphire (Joanna Lumley) and Steel (David McCallum), spoiled somewhat by the performances of two child actors in support and a haunted house plot that furthers its otherworldly atmosphere at the expense of coherence.
The Trials of Rumpole
by John Mortimer (Penguin, 1981); audiobook read by Bill Wallis (Bolinda, 2014)
Rumpole continues in his oratorically pugilistic, poetic way to champion the virtues of impartial legal defence, winning when his clients are guilty and losing when they are innocent. The book has dated rather better than the show on which it was based.
Mansfield Park
by Jane Austen; dramatised by Lin Coghlan (BBC Radio 4, 2003)
This full-cast dramatisation offers the narrative equivalent of time-lapse photography: too sketchy for the purists but sufficient to convey some of Austen’s epic to-ing and fro-ing. Its commercial release retro-boasts the involvement of Felicity Jones, Benedict Cumberbatch and bit player David Tennant.
Professor Branestawm’s Perilous Pudding
by Norman Hunter (The Bodley Head, 1979)
More misadventures from Professor Branestawm, narrated in a throwaway, madcap style for middle grade readers but with breezily sardonic social commentary and plenty of wordplay (especially oxymorons) for the adults. The characters entertain but Branestawm’s mid-speech ‘um-ing’ and ‘ah-ing’ becomes instantly tiresome.
The Enormous Crocodile
by Roald Dahl (Jonathan Cape, 1978); audiobook read by Stephen Fry (Puffin, 2013)
A classic safe scare for young middle grade readers, the audiobook stripped of Quentin Blake’s illustrations but enhanced in compensation by Stephen Fry’s delivery (albeit that the background soundscape becomes tiresome, especially when signifying the crocodile’s trademark ‘secret plans and clever tricks’).