What a treat!
I read, and re-read, this series as a young adult, and Cameron Beierle brings it to life with a (mostly) exceptional reading.
His voice characterizations are amazing and truly bring them to life, exceptional for the female characters, with his naturally bass-ranged speaking voice hitting the needed upper ranges with aplomb. Each of the characters is uniquely voiced, and he knows when to put emotion into their voices and when to allow the text as written to do that for the listener.
My “mostly” above refers to a systemic issue where, infrequently, the voices drift a noticeable amount: Ce’Nedra might start to speak but Aunt Pol quickly reasserts to the correct voice, or Silk starts but Durnik finishes. Not enough to be a real issue (he’s that good!) but a fair thing to mention in an audiobook review.
I’ve listened to just the “Belgariad,” and the rating is 4, not 5, stars due to the audio compression of the MP3 files, as well as how the files are shipped to the buyer. There’s a noticeable “warble” to the audio from over-compression, and the tracks are numbered in odd ways. Both issues appear to stem from a CD to MP3 conversion done a long time ago, and never updated to more modern conversion algorithms or track numbering conventions.
This is worth mentioning specifically because Cameron Beierle has an eloquent, articulate, sonorous, and oh-so-expressive voice, it’s a shame compression artifacts prevent the listener from hearing the fullness of his work, except in those moments where everything aligns in the digital realm and you hear him at his best, with little to no compression artifacts.
Note: The track numbering is easily remedied with a few free metadata tools you can download and use to provide consistent naming and book groupings, plus cover art (absent here, presumably due to copyright and/or royalties).
Speaking of tracks: they’re all about 2–3 minutes long. I couldn’t figure out why when I first downloaded them, but after listening through several books I realized they’re “bite-sized” by design, very user-friendly when you need to backtrack to find your place or re-listen to a section after a distraction.
All in all, I’m very pleased with this purchase from Motion Audiobooks. If you’ve enjoyed reading any of the books in this collection, you will certainly enjoy hearing them read aloud by an amazing voice that masterfully breathes life into some of your favorite fantasy characters!
