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‘Wanderlust: An Eccentric Explorer, an Epic Journey, a Lost Age,’ by Reid Mitenbuler
Writing with panache and insight, Reid Mitenbuler serves up the many-faceted life of Peter Freuchen (1886-1957), Danish Arctic explorer, trading-post operator, writer, journalist, lecturer, actor, environmentalist, supporter of the Danish Resistance and winner of the immensely popular quiz show “the $64,000 Question.” (This last made him a celebrity where his death-defying feats and creative accomplishments had not.) Beginning in 1906, he spent almost 20 years living among the Inuit in Thule, Greenland. He married a Native woman and took part in several grueling arctic expeditions, one of which cost him a foot and part of a leg, frozen when he was trapped beneath packed snow. The book has found the ideal narrator in Peter Noble, who has a fine storytelling voice and conveys the drama of events in a measured fashion, without theatricality. It’s a fine achievement given the larger-than-life details — one or two of which strike the listener as being embellished by Freuchen’s penchant for a good yarn. (HarperAudio, Unabridged, 19¼ hours)
‘The East Indian,’ by Brinda Charry
Brinda Charry’s novel begins in her native India and draws on her study of English Renaissance literature, specifically Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” It’s an unlikely pairing that never quite works — but what does, and does so splendidly, is her fictional recreation of the predicament of Tony from India’s Coromandel Coast. He travels to England as a young servant to a master who dies; he is soon snatched from a London street and transported to the English colony of Jamestown in 1635. There he is indentured to a series of masters, all demanding, one brutal. Tony, the first East Indian to arrive in America, falls between racial categories which are hardening into social identities. Lonely and often despised, Tony perseveres with a plan to practice medicine. His adventures illuminate the precarious circumstances, superstitions and outlook of this ill-favored, tobacco-producing colony. Vikas Adam narrates the book in a clear, gentle voice. His delivery is a real pleasure, despite his repeated mispronunciation of “victuals.” (Simon & Schuster Audio, Unabridged, 10¾ hours)
Katherine A. Powers reviews audiobooks every month for The Washington Post.
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