Good

Really enjoyed story until last 3 chapters. Must say I preferred to film ending. Almost the whole story and film were the same, but the filming was so much better than the book , just saying.

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Better than the film and the film is 5 star.

A thoughtful and thrilling exploration of an early 20th century wartime relationship between a spinster missionary and a Cockney engineer as they embark on a seemingly impossible enterprise to strike a blow for England against German Central Africa.

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Enjoyable

I enjoyed this story with it’s highs and lows as the main characters battle the challenges of Africa’s rivers.

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Loved it

This was excellent. Full of drama and danger I could almost feel the oppressive heat of the African jungle. Two characters who make a perilous journey down river on a mission against the Germans in WWI. An ending that was a surprise and quite sad in many way to me.

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Great book

spoiled by the better ending in the movie, I guess we will never know what happened to them lol.

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Great little story

Like most people I have seen the movie many times so it was nice to hear the book.
Obviously slightly different to the movie but still very enjoyable.
As for the narration, Michael Kitchen is sublime, in fact it should be mandatory for this kind of reading
Thoroughly enjoyed it

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1 person found this helpful

Great Story

A great story, well written but for the ending which is very poor. The ending in the flim was better.

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4 people found this helpful

Great narration of a poignant story

I bought this audio book because Michael Kitchen was the narrator, as I think he is one of the best actors around, I was quietly confident that his narrating skills would be just as wonderful, and indeed they are. He is very much an actor who understands the importance of the voice and dialect when creating a character and because of this he really brings the characters and the sense of time and place to life. From listening to the book it seems that C.S Forester is a details author, taking great care in describing the difficult journey Rose and Allnut take, so it was probably best that I listened to the audio book rather than reading it.



The story itself is actually a rather tragic. Rose and Allnut are two characters who seem to have always been somewhat - inconsequential in world and with the outbreak of the First World War nothing has changed. Their attempt to strike a blow for England comes across as a desperate need for purpose than an heroic grand scheme and needless to say the tone of the book suggests early on that things may not go quite to plan.

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14 people found this helpful

end

terrible ending, no wonder film studio changed it, I wonder if forester intended a 2nd book, poor character portrayal by narrator doesn't help. the start and middle are very good but it just peters out leaving me searching for the film on digital TV.

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Brilliant 👏

Micheal Kitchen's narration brings the characters and the background of C. S. Forester's book alive.
I think it will be a while, before I listen to something this good.

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