Wonderful

A pretty much perfect novel. Beautifully written with not a word out of place, incredibly vivid characterisation and enough of a plot to race along with. The reader's voice is dreamy and I wanted it to go on forever. Gorgeous, grim, terrifying and sad. Loved this.

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Great to listen to

standard whodunnit but with lots of twists and turns. Interesting characters highlighted by excellent narration. What a great voice!

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great story and narration

I enjoyed this story a lot. Very engaging content. the narrator did an excellent job.

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Snowball shurely??

I would expect a book by John Banville to be well-written, which this is but he’s no Agatha Christie. There is a plot twist at the end, but much of it is predictable and the characters verge on charicatures of rural Ireland, Garda stock-types (drunken sergeant, lippy basic rank) and the Anglo-Irish family, from retired officer father down are straight out of central casting. It is read in a way that exaggerates the accents in a slightly distracting fashion.
However, I did enjoy it and finished it, which I can’t say of all fiction I consume these days.

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Storytelling at its best

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. A rich narrative with well developed characters who each came to life through excellent writing and narration. Some gruesome happenings but somehow it was a comforting read thanks to the Irish magic. I wanted a little more help to grasp the fine details of whodunnit but maybe it was intentional to leave it unsaid.

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A gripping tale well-told

Perhaps typically of Banville this is almost two books in one. A country house who-dunnit is streaked through with a visceral examination of paedophilia and the Catholic Church; delivered with 5-star narration.

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Delightful light but tasty concoction.

How effervescent and entertaining this novel is making the rather splendid writing seem to be effortless. Yes, we’ve heard the story many times before but the combination of such lyrical, engaging storytelling and the addition of such a whimsical and talented voice actor was so welcome during unique times.
And it felt really cold and full of Snow.

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2 people found this helpful

Beautiful evocative listen

Stanley Townsend narrates this murder mystery with his beautiful mellifluous voice. Could listen to him reading anything but this is a good story sparingly written, lovely descriptions of a time and a generation gone by. All the social Anglo Irish and rural Ireland mores neatly noted, fully deserves five stars

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1 person found this helpful

Thoroughly enjoyable, but…

Having never sampled the author before I throughly enjoyed this detective thriller. I don’t think I’ve ever been more impressed with a narrator either, from his portrayal of the bucolic, rough Foncy to the oleaginous bishop, he got right into the heart and voice of every character. My 'but' in the title is because there is a child abuse scene so maybe this title is not for everyone.

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Gripping and shocking

This is so good, I was lost in it.
By turns grim and claustrophobic- and funny, ultimately tragic.

More please.

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