Walking to Hell – The Story of a Confederate Soldier by Knud Hermansen, available now as audiobook narrated by Jim Patton
Hello again, dear audiobooks friends! In today’s spotlight article I will bring to your attention a new audiobook featuring the Civil War.
Walking to Hell is written by Knud Hermansen and it has been released in 2014 in print, but just recently has been made available in audiobook format narrated and published by Jim Patton. This is the first book in The Story of a Confederate Soldier and Western Frontiersman series of historical fiction novels set during the Civil War.
The audio production is a few minutes over four hours in duration and after listening to a few chapters, I can say that I enjoy both the story and the narration.
Now, let’s take a look at the Publisher’s Summary in order to find out more about the story, and after that I will help you make the acquaintance of our author and narrator.
Walking to Hell is the story of Ezekial McNair, a description of his Tom Sawyer-like upbringing and his life in the Confederate infantry, fighting in a war he didn’t understand, for a cause he didn’t know, but confident it was his path to heroism and glory. He did become a hero, but only by accident, in a battle that would haunt him his entire life.
Zeke’s story is one of humor, poignancy, and tragedy. It describes the every-day life of a Confederate infantryman and provokes contemplation on how attitudes have changed and not changed since the 1860s.
The author, Knud E. Hermansen, grew up on a dairy farm outside of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania often visiting the battlefield. After high school, he served in the United States Marine Corp and later, while enrolled in college and after graduation; he served in the United States Army Reserve where he eventually retired as a major in the engineers.
He has a B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in civil engineering and a law degree. He is a licensed surveyor, engineer, and attorney at law. He teaches in the college of engineering at the University of Maine. As an aside, his great, great, grandfather, Charles Hughes, served in the 62nd New York Volunteer Infantry (Anderson Zouaves).
Jim Patton is an audiobook narrator recording from his professional home studio near Las Vegas. He has been interested in theater his whole life, but the occupation that fed his family precluded a full time acting effort. As a result, Jim became an audio drama actor, allowing him to exercise his acting creativity from the confines of his home studio at a time of his choosing. Having spent hours auditioning, acting, editing, and performing in this manner convinced Jim that audiobook narration is a reasonable and desired goal.
Jim acted in high school, but he became hooked when he played Hamlet in a college production. He has since acted in community theater when he had the opportunity, but eventually, he found that remote audio acting was the most convenient.
Jim Patton has a doctoral degree in electrical engineering. He worked as an international power system field engineer, located in the Middle East, South America, and Africa where he spoke French and Spanish. Jim then became a tenured university EE professor and a university administrator before retiring a few years ago.
His strengths as a voice actor are characterization and story telling. When he says “story telling”, he is very conscious of and sensitive to vocalization that sounds like someone reading from a script. He has been told the extended narration he vocalizs consistently represents the emotion and texture of someone relating a personal experience – a “story”.
I will return soon with a full review for Walking to Hell but until then, take care, stay safe, and don’t forget, always listen with your heart!
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Victor Dima
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