News, Reviews, and Commentary on all forms of science fiction, fantasy, and horror audio. Audiobooks, audio drama, podcasts; we discuss all of it here. Mystery, crime, and noir audio are also fair game.
Radio Drama Revival has a new Sherlock Holmes podcast audio drama in it’s feed!
Sez host Fred Greenhalgh:
This week we bring back the Quicksilver Radio Theater in a most peculiar of Sherlock Holmes tales set during the Christmas season.
A fat goose, a random mugging, and a precious gem. How do all three relate, and who committed this most unusual crime?
One caveat folks: This is an all-American production (Quicksilver is based out of New York). Don’t expect too much in the way of spot-on English accents. Part 2, presumably the concluding portion of the adventure, will likely be in the feed next weekend… PART 2 is HERE!
Radio Drama Revival – Episode #152 In Search Of The Blue Carbuncle
Part 1 |MP3| Part 2 |MP3|
And…
RDR had another Sherlock Holmes AD back in 2008, created by the same Quicksilver team: The Speckled Band Part 1 |MP3| Part 2 |MP3|
Naxos Audiobooks, in partnership with AudioFile Magazine, is offering three unabridged Sherlock Holmes short stories FREE for download until December 29th, 2009! The first of these had already been made available, but the other two are definitely new to my collection (and SFFaudio). Narrator David Timson has a really terrific voice for Sherlock Holmes narration. Have a listen to Timson talk about Doyle and Holmes |MP3|. He’ll make you want to get the rest of the Sherlock Holmes short stories and the four Sherlock Holmes novels he narrated for Naxos.
The Adventure of Silver Blaze
By Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; Read by David Timson
1 |MP3| – Approx. 60 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Naxos Audiobooks
Published: 2009 One of the most famous images of Sherlock Holmes, Sidney Paget’s drawing of Holmes, complete with Deerstalker and Inverness cape, leaning eagerly forward to a an attentive Watson in a railway carriage as they hurtle towards their next adventure comes from ‘The Silver Blaze.’
The Adventure of the Stock-Broker’s Clerk
By Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; Read by David Timson
1 |MP3| – Approx. 41 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Naxos Audiobooks
Published: 2009 In Stock-Broker’s Clerk, the intrepid pair travel by train to Birmingham, and it is nostalgic to think that despite it being 1889, when Holmes and Watson alighted at New Street station they would have been greeted by cobbled streets, eighteenth-century houses and a town still largely undeveloped.
The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans
By Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; Read by David Timson
1 |MP3| – Approx. 71 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Naxos Audiobooks
Published: 2009 Trains feature consistently throughout the canon, incidentally and as a main component of the story as in ‘The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans’. It is popular amongst railway enthusiasts, as a significant part of the investigation takes place among the subterranean tunnels of the London Underground system.
The SFFaudio Podcast #043 – Jesse and Scott talk about all the Recent Arrivals and New Releases that have been piling up while Scott’s been away fiddling on a roof.
No doubt recalling my fondness for August Derleth’s Solar Pons, my friend Julie D. dropped me a line saying:
“the Sebastian Thorn stories paint a nice ‘modern’ Holmesian figure.”
Who? Thorn? Never heard of the fellow.
So, curious, I followed the link that Julie provided and saw that a young gentleman named Andrew Evelyn has been self-publishing his own present day Sherlock Holmes pastiche stories (starring a character named Sebastian Thorn).
Here is the series description:
Consulting detective Sebastian Thorn follows in the footsteps of Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot in solving baffling crimes and mysteries accompanied by his friend and partner James Ashton.
And most importantly there are audio versions! Andrew Evelyn has posted his stories into an iTunes podcast feed…
The Adventures of Sexton Blake
Based on the character created by Harry Blyth; Performed by a full cast
2 CDs or MP3 Download – Approx. 2 Hours [RADIO DRAMA]
Publisher: BBC Audiobooks / Perfectly Normal Productions
Published: September 2009
ISBN: 1408410540
Themes: / Mystery / Adventure / Crime / Steampunk / Airships / London / Exmouth / Willesden /
Britain’s iconic and most prolifically chronicled sleuth explodes back into action in a brand new series of thrilling Adventures packed with incident and hilarity!
Back in 2006 we had a story about the new co-venture between Perfectly Normal productions and BBC Audiobooks. Audio drama legend Dirk Maggs was set to revive several “cult British comic characters.” This is the first of these. I hope there will be MANY MORE!
Sexton Blake, a renowned Baker Street detective, and his youthful assistant Tinker regularly face peril with deceptive disguises and flying fists. In between investigations they return to their Baker Street rooming house for endless lashings of tea and heaping plates of kippers. Their landlady, Mrs. Bardell, makes the food, debriefs the great detective, and commiserates with her neighbor, Mrs. H. (she’s also a landlady to another famous Baker street detective). The story begins aboard a runaway locomotive at the tail end of a kind of locked room mystery – after a few shootings by the various suspicious characters and a brief detour into the dining car’s wine cellar, the villain is revealed -only to escape by auto-gyro. When Blake returns to his Baker street residence he’s soon embroiled in a new investigation brought on by the arrival of a beautiful American actress. The investigation is both serpentine and ingenious, and it leads directly into the next – one in which an incredibly capable and amnesic woman saves Blake and Tinker from a false charge of burglary. Their investigation into her curious abilities and former profession lead Blake and Tinker into a house of deathtraps (or is that a deathtrap house). The action finally culminates in a thrilling saber duel atop a Zeppelin! At the beginning of each new episode there’s a mini-scene from an unrelated Sexton Blake adventure – each depicting Blake defeating either a rapscallious villain or a villainous rapscallion.
The Adventures Of Sexton Blake is jam packed with as much rib-tickling raillery as The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide To The Galaxy. The script is unbelievably clever and funny. It features a kind of endless stream-of-consciousness wordplay that clearly follows in the tradition of Douglas Adams, Monty Python, and The Goon Show. What sets it apart from it’s forebearers is a strict adherence to the medium. The only possible way to tell this tale is as an audio drama. Perhaps the most amazing aspect is vaguely amazing feeling I got while listening to it. There’s this kind of general consensus by all the characters to LARP their way through the adventure. No one character has the final word on anything, and every character in the scene is constantly throwing new nuance on the mental pictures being created in the listener. It’s not so much a mystery you can solve by following the clues, it’s more of an adventure you can ride with a flashing smirk.
These adventures are brilliantly envisioned by a terrific combination of skilled comedic acting, an engaging theme song and thousands of layered sound effects. I’m betting the script was at least twice as thick, per minute, as a typical (or ordinary, or normal) one. The outstanding cast and crew has made The Adventures Of Sexton Blake a play that can stand shoulder to shoulder, chin to chin, and eye to eye, with the finest audio dramatizations ever produced – and not feel even the slightest weak in the knees. This is very highly recommended listening!
Crew:
Written by Mil Millington and Jonathan Nash; Directed by Dirk Maggs
Sound Design and Music by Paul Weir
Produced by David Morley
Cast:
Simon Jones ….. Sexton Blake, Adventuring Detective
Wayne Forester …. Tinker, his Plucky Assistant
June Whitfield …. Mrs Bardell, their Doughty Housekeeper
Graham Hoadly …. Professor Kew, a Spindly Cackler
Lorelei King …. Miss Elizabeth Mary-Louise Tarabelle Beauchamp
Simon Treves …. Inspector Coutts Of Scotland Yard
Felicity Duncan …. Miss Terry, Window-Leaping Adventuress
Susan Sheridan …. Mrs Hudson, Housekeeper To A Neighbouring Detective
Malcolm Brown …. Count Ivor Carlac, a Villainous Juggernaut
Philip Glassborow …. Cyril, A Grim Assassin
Oscar Sharp …. The Frantic Caller
William Franklyn …. The Mysterious Waiter
Looking for more Sherlock Holmes pastiche? Indeed, so are we! In that vein, look what a set of beautiful gems I found over on RadioArchive.cc…
Poking around the internet I also turned up one viable “RealAudio” link from 1995 – using this, and some elementary HTML skill, I managed to reconstruct the links to the remainder of the files. I shall, perhaps, write a brief monograph on this process one day. If you’re looking for MP3 versions I suggest you visit RadioArchive.cc and do a search.
2. The Lady Downstairs
By Christopher Fowler; Read by Hannah Gordon
1 Broadcast – Approx. 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED?]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 7
Broadcast: 2005 Holmes’ landlady has picked up a few tricks over the years.
|REALAUDIO|
3. The Deer Stalker
By Paul Cornell; Read by Andrew Sachs
1 Broadcast – Approx. 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED?]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 7
Broadcast: 2005 Holmes finds a most unusual weapon.
|REALAUDIO|
4. A Shambles In Belgravia
By Kim Newman; Read by Andrew Sachs
1 Broadcast – Approx. 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED?]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 7
Broadcast: 2005 Professor Moriarty helps out a lady.
|REALAUDIO|
5. The Adventure of the Lost World
By Dominic Green; Read by Andrew Sachs
1 Broadcast – Approx. 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED?]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 7
Broadcast: 2005 Holmes investigates a series of gruesome trombonist murders.
|REALAUDIO|
Radio Drama Revival has a new Sherlock Holmes podcast audio drama in it’s feed! 
One caveat folks: This is an all-American production (Quicksilver is based out of New York). Don’t expect too much in the way of spot-on English accents. 
RDR had another Sherlock Holmes AD back in 2008, created by the same Quicksilver team: The Speckled Band Part 1 |MP3| Part 2 |MP3|
The Adventures of Sexton Blake
