Balthazar cover art

Balthazar

The Alexandria Quartet, Book 2

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Balthazar

By: Lawrence Durrell
Narrated by: Nicholas Boulton
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About this listen

"The politics of love, the intrigues of desire, good and evil, virtue and caprice, love and murder, moved obscurely in the dark corners of Alexandria’s streets and squares, brothels and drawing-rooms - moved like a great congress of eels in the slime of plot and counter-plot."

In Balthazar, the second volume in Durrell’s Alexandria Quartet, the story and the characters come more clearly into focus. Darley, the reflective Englishman, receives from Balthazar, the pathologist, a mass of notes that attempt to explain what really happened between the tempestuous Justine, her husband, Nessim, Clea the artist, and Pursewarden the writer; new figures emerge and play key roles. Balthazar, in his "Interlinear", explains and warns.

©1958 Lawrence Durrell (P)2021 Naxos AudioBooks UK Ltd. Classics Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction
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Again, fantastic to have the unabridged Quartet on here, and Boulton's soulful, intelligent reading. Perhaps there were moments in the dialogue that felt too pacy, but I suspect this was primarily Naxos' desire not to have extraneous amounts of tape/playing time with natural silences. Otherwise, this was an engaging and satisfying listen to a genius novel.

Elegant and engaging

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I found the narration really contributed greatly to the story. Different character voices and accents were well done and quite subtle. The narration complimented the story creating a great image for the setting of Alexandria

great narration

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