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  • A Free Man of Color

  • The Benjamin January Mysteries, Book 1
  • By: Barbara Hambly
  • Narrated by: Ron Butler
  • Length: 11 hrs and 42 mins
  • 4.8 out of 5 stars (16 ratings)

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A Free Man of Color

By: Barbara Hambly
Narrated by: Ron Butler
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Publisher's Summary

This lush and haunting novel tells of a city steeped in decadent pleasures and of a man, proud and defiant, caught in a web of murder and betrayal.

It is 1833. In the midst of Mardi Gras, Benjamin January, a Creole physician and music teacher, is playing piano at the Salle d'Orleans when the evening's festivities are interrupted - by murder.

The ravishing Angelique Crozat, a notorious octoroon who travels in the city's finest company, has been strangled to death. With the authorities reluctant to become involved, Ben begins his own inquiry, which will take him through the seamy haunts of riverboatmen and into the huts of voodoo-worshipping slaves.

But soon the eyes of suspicion turn toward Ben - for, black as the slave who fathered him, this free man of color is still seen as the perfect scapegoat.

©1997 Barbara Hambly (P)2020 Blackstone Publishing

What listeners say about A Free Man of Color

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Wonderful to revisit

I’ve been reading the January books for decades and this reading is a way to delightfully revisit a favourite

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Great stories

These are terrific, and kudos to the author for giving them free on audible. Thoroughly enjoying the series.

The narrator is very good. Don’t be put off by others complaining about him. He is excellent.

And to those complaining about the Hannibal Sefton accent, he has an upper crust British accent which is accurate for an English Ulsterman in Ireland. Contrary to other complaints, he is not Irish. He is from an English Protestant “Orangemen” family, which was essentially the occupying British (ie, the people the IRA objected to … the ruling class people opposed to the reunification of Ireland). He was at Oxford and other elite English schools in England. He would certainly have a posh English accent.

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oh what a tangled web!

if you can get your head around the many, many characters, this is a good book. exclamation also well narrated exclamation

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