Review: Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens, read by Cassandra Campbell
Hello dear friends! Last week I picked up the best-selling and award-winning fiction audiobook Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens.
This audio production has stayed in my wishlist for the last four years, patiently waiting for me to purchase it and to give it a listen. I bought it on Friday and during this last weekend I was completely immersed into this achingly beautiful story that is part nature exposé, coming of age story and murder mystery.
For those of you who don’t know yet, Where the Crawdads Sing is a #1 Bestseller in New York Times, USA Today, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and others. With 15.5 million copies sold and high praise from everyone who has taken the time to read it, there’s not too much that I can say about this novel that someone else didn’t say already, but I feel the need to make you read, so here we go.
Where the Crawdads Sing has instantly become one of my favorite audiobooks of all times. As you probably already know, I have listened to more than 1400 audiobooks and this one is definitely a literary masterpiece, flawlessly written, emotional, gripping, thrilling, magical, and at the same time poetic.
The story follows Kya, a wonderful, smart, timid, extraordinary, and fragile young girl who has been sadly abandoned by her entire family. The action is set in the marshlands surrounding Barkley Cove, a quiet town on the North Carolina coast and follows young Kya as she struggles with being an outcast, with growing up poor, and with navigating the unknown waters of interpersonal relationships.
I really don’t want to spoil anything about this dramatically moving tail of survival and resilience, so I will stop talking about the plot here. What I want you to know is that this is one story that will stay with you forever, Kya feels more real and alive than any other character in a novel. Delia Owens paints the characters, the secluded Cove, the marshes, the small village, and other locations in vivid, lively colors, painstakingly detailed and achingly realistic.
Each of the characters that we meet has their own story, their own personality, unique with faults, flaws, and secrets. I loved most of them and hated a few, but regardless of my positive or negative feelings, I know that all of them will remain unforgettable.
The audiobook version of Where the Crawdads Sing is heavenly performed by audiobooks industry living legend, narrator extraordinaire Cassandra Campbell. I can’t think of anyone else who could have done a better job with this fantastic story.
She reads quietly, she acts with emotion, passion, skill and respect, she brings Kya and all the other characters to life with love and care. Cassandra is one of the best at what she does and this reality becomes crystal clear as soon as you hit play on this sublime audio production. Her extended range of credible Carolina accents quickly transports the listener into the early 50s atmosphere and keeps us hostage for the entire duration of Where the Crawdads Sing.
Cassandra‘s performance enriches and elevates the narrative experience to the highest level of literary entertainment possible!
Where the Crawdads Sing is a one-of-a-kind tale! I cried, I discovered multiple times that I was holding my breath, I experienced emotions that usually I only associate with living human beings. And now, I would love for me to be able to do some kind of a magic trick and gift this unique novel to each and every one of you.
I’m sorry that it ended, I know that I will be thinking about it for days and weeks and months and years to come. Pick it up, in paperback, hardcover, Kindle, digital or as audiobook and start experiencing for yourself one of the best stories out there. Of course, I highly recommend the audiobook version because as I said, Cassandra manages to bring it to life in a spectacular way!
I know that Sony Pictures has recently brought into cinemas a movie adaptation of Where the Crawdads Sing, but to be honest with you, I don’t know if I want to discover what they did with it. The writing is so good that I don’t think it is possible to encompass everything that makes this novel so special.
I hope that you like the review and that you will give this story the chance it deserves.
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Victor Dima
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