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Montalbano's First Case and Other Stories cover art

Montalbano's First Case and Other Stories

By: Andrea Camilleri, Stephen Sartarelli
Narrated by: Mark Meadows
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Summary

Montalbano's First Case and Other Stories is a brilliant collection of short stories, personally chosen by Andrea Camilleri.

It follows Inspector Montalbano from his very first case in Vigàta, in which he stumbles upon a young girl lurking outside a courthouse with a pistol in her handbag. When she is taken in for questioning and won't utter a single word, Montalbano must find another way to learn who she is trying to kill, and why . . .

Other cases include a missing woman who has run away from the love of her life; an old married couple who appear to be rehearsing their suicides; and a crime so dark there's only one person the inspector can call for help.

With twists and turns aplenty, these short stories have all the wit, mystery and culinary gusto that Camilleri's fans have come to love him for.

©2018 Andrea Camilleri (P)2018 Macmillan Digital Audio

What listeners say about Montalbano's First Case and Other Stories

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

poorly read in cockney accent.

awful to listen to. Never finished it. The narration was tedious, and the cockney accent for the villans and some characters was ridiculous in the context of a Sicilian drama.

I had been really looking forward to this but was utterly disappointed.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars
  • EK
  • 24-04-19

Awful Narration

Camilleri writes very easy to listen to stories which is all that saved this book being returned for a refund. The narrator covered up for his apparent inability to produce good Italian accents by using a variety of weird voices, by far the worst of which was the one he chose for Fazio, who did not deserve to sound like a nasal half wit. All the women under 50 got to sound like a man doing a bad impression of a man in drag (breathy come to bed tones alternating with petulant indignation). When he was talking normally it wasn't too bad.

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Great art

Mark Meadows’ narration is very good. I completely disagree with the previous comment about the use of English voices to portray Sicilian characters: for me, this worked superbly well. The stories are marvellous. Camilieri writes about life.

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Narration is really poor

I loved series shown on BBC 4 but as they no longer show them I thought I could get my fix via the audio books. The narrator keeps going into and bad East London and West County accent, the story is set in Sicily It would have been much better to have a Sicilian or Italian reading in English. The narration really made this a hard listen and I had to skip bits because it was so bad.

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4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Loved the TV series and love the audible book more

Amazing book great stories and great performance by the reader...ok some of the character accents might be a bit of a concern to some but to me fine.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Oh dear, oh dear.......................

This is a good fun book, I read it a while back, but wanted an audiobook copy too, so was pleased to see it offered.

So why the one star?

Well the narrator might be good for all I know, and he does have a fair range of accents. Sadly none of these get within a couple of thousand miles of Sicily or Italy, or for that matter anywhere south of Basingstoke. If you fancy hearing pheasants talking in Norfolk yokel, while discussing their goats getting lost on the mountains. It is all too terrible, really terrible. No I mean this, I really do, it is unremittingly awful.

You might think it might be funny - well have a go, it was for a few minutes. I tried to get through it but no, it is too too terrible.

Thanks for nothing audible, it's going back for return.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Really enjoyed this audiobook.

I was a little unsure when I ordered this book but it was as interesting, if not more, than the TV series.
The use of the different English dialects brought out the humour into a serious plot.
Well done and I would like to hear more.

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Very good apart from the cockney accents

Mark Meadows is an excellent narrator but who told him to use cockney accents for all the characters?

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Just perfect...

This is my first Montelbano on audible, why I waited so long I don't know. I got a bit confused with the names but I think that is to be expected with my limited Italian. Some stories are longer than others which makes for contrast. I have the first book The Shape of Water as a physical book lent to me by my nephew who is also a Camilleri fan so I will pass on that for audible. The Inspector is a little shall we say 'rougher' than he is portrayed on the TV series but you soon get used to that-makes him a little more real.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Bits & Bobs

Sometimes you come across books like this, a small intro to the character plus other little stories.

Performance held it together, the stories were just held together by the narrator. I think the full novels will be better, I certainly hope so!

I nearly fell asleep on several occasions, having to rewind the book.

I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would..... I hope you better luck.

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