Portuguese Irregular Verbs

Expertly narrated by Hugh Laurie
Funny and amusingly comical novel in the series by Alexander McCall Smith

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Just delightful

Hugh Laurie’s narration is superb. You expect it to be good, then you listen and hear him navigate the different languages and realise his skill. Coupled with the comic irony and percent of McCall Smith, this audiobook is one of the best. It tracks the adventures of an academic who finds himself in different countries and one should not be put off by the title. Shame it is so short - when it ended I immediately bought the next in the series.

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such fun

Hugh Laurie is the perfect narrator of this highly amusing, foppish story. His accents are really good and his delivery of the lines are perfectly timed.
I adore Alexander McCall Smith's writing. He obviously knows the wonderful people that this story is based on.
I loved it.

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I loved it!

I thought it was a delightful story, engagingly read by Hugh Laurie. The humour was gentle but pointed at the rarefied world of the academy. Very reminiscent of PG Wodehouse.

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3 people found this helpful

Beautiful narration, mediocre text

My initial reaction to this book is “meh” and then “why did he bother”. Literally a lot of nothing happens for quite a long time. Nowhere near as entertaining or charming as the author’s no. 1Ladies Detective Agency books. The characters aren’t as engaging as those in his Sunday Philosophy club series either. The main character is Boeing and pompous and the text is a series of episodes that are not really link so this is not really a novel with an over arching story. It is a huge disappointment. That being said Hugh Laurie does an amazing job of the narration.

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Hugh Laurie is a joy to listen to

An eccentric comic novel which gently parodies the academic life. Hugh Laurie's reading is a joy, he manages 6 or 7 different German character's voices, a number of Italians, and Irish, among others, both male and female, and gives each character their distinctive voice, accent and mannerisms, preserving this during dialogue. He knows exactly the right tone of voice to adopt to bring out the humour in the book. I'm looking forward to listening to him read the other books in this trilogy.

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7 people found this helpful

Hugh Laurie is a hilarious story-teller

Mr. Laurie's ability in adopting a varety of voices, characters and their respective accents, is immersive and superb. Rather looking forward to the next book. Perhaps Mr Laurie can produce more audiobooks to generate more characters than the grouchy, yet brilliant, Dr House. Thoroughly enjoyed this short audiobook.

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Exceptionally funny and thoughtful comedy

A brilliant piece of erudite comedy. The first in what was a trilogy and became in the end a four part series of novels about Von Igelfeld. The performance was first-class, as you'd expect from the famous name - and clearly Hugh Laurie must have really enjoyed reading this out as well.

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Quirky and laugh out loud

McCall Smith's characters spring to life. I dragged myself reluctantly back to the 21st Century.

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Hugh Laurie makes this collection worthwhile

The book is a collection of short stories regarding a German philology professor and his fortunes/misfortunes after writing his masterpiece "Portuguese irregular verbs". Some stories and funny and witty, some I felt missed the mark, but the narration by Hugh Laurie is a joy!

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