Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Short Takes

One of the benefits of an Audible subscription is that Audible from time to time offers freebies--less than book-length downloads at no charge. Recently, I listened to two of these freebies. One was an Arthur Conan Doyle "holiday" story, "The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle," read by Alan Cummings. To all the Sherlock Holmes aficionados out there: sorry, but this story is just tedious. I was listening to it while walking and--despite the fact that the story is less than an hour long and beautifully read--I kept realizing that I had completely tuned out and missed numerous brilliant deductions and plot twists.

On the other hand, I thoroughly enjoyed the excerpts from Listening Is an Act of Love, a selection of excerpts from StoryCorps oral history interviews. If you, like me, blink back tears as you listen to the StoryCorps pieces on NPR's Morning Edition, you will love this collection--undoubtedly selected to pull at the heartstrings. Or, if you need to be reminded that people can be loving and giving, this collection might be an appropriate and uplifting holiday gift to yourself.

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