England cover art

England

Seven Myths That Changed a Country – and How to Set Them Straight

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England

By: Tom Baldwin, Marc Stears
Narrated by: James Bartlett
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About this listen

 Bloomsbury presents England by Tom Baldwin and Marc Stears, read by James Bartlett.

A PROSPECT BOOK OF THE YEAR

‘Challenging, forensic, compelling' SATHNAM SANGHERA
‘Pure centrist erotica. A myth-busting chronicle of bad-tempered, Brexit-riven England' SUNDAY TIMES
‘Wonderfully evocative. Too honest, too nuanced and too deep for any party manifesto' MATTHEW PARRIS

After an election where people voted for a politics that our new Prime Minister describes as 'treading more lightly on people’s lives', this must-read book charts a gentler course for a country that has suffered the ructions of profound change in recent decades.

Some politicians will still talk of restoring an English birthright of liberty and the swashbuckling self-confidence to rule the waves. Others yearn for the old-fashioned morality which they claim once civilised a savage world or want to look inwards to a story of an enchanted island that can stand alone and isolated against the world.

But England, by Tom Baldwin, the bestselling biographer of Keir Starmer, and Marc Stears, an influential think tank head, unravels the myths that have distorted ideas of this country and provided ammunition for culture warriors from both left and right.

Instead of vainly promising to solve everything all at once, Baldwin and Stears provide clues for how a humbler, less grandiose, set of ideas rooted in real lives can help fix some of the things that have gone so badly wrong in recent years.

They travel from muddy fields in the Home Counties to the ports of Plymouth and Hull. They visit the old industrial heartland of Wolverhampton, spend weekends in the worn-down seaside resort of Blackpool, then gaze up the gleaming towers of modernity on the edge of London and the dreaming spires of Oxford. Along the way, they speak with many different people who tell stories of England, including politicians Nigel Farage and David Lammy, campaigner Chrisann Jarrett, playwright James Graham and scientist Sarah Gilbert.

What emerges is a startlingly fresh and vivid picture of an old country that belongs to everyone, or at least, to no one in particular.©2024 Tom Baldwin, Marc Stears (P)2024 Bloomsbury Publishing Plc Europe Great Britain Politics & Government World England Mythology

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All stars
Most relevant  
As pointed out by other reviewers the overall impact is spoiled by a narration which uses idiosyncratic pronunciation of even basic words. It’s like having the book read by your Sat Nav! Must be an AI voice? Never had this problem with other Audible books. Had I realised earlier I would have just read the book myself!

Distracting Narration

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This is an interesting book spoiled by the 'narrator'. By the time I was half way through I was entirely convinced that this has to have been read by A.I. There are just SO MANY mispronunciations.

Definitely A. I read

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Horrible enunciation and pronunciation of common English words made this torture to listen to. I lasted an hour and had to give up and return. Very poor quality control here.

Was the narration done by AI?

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The exploration of some of the founding myths of England is fascinating and i bought this after hearing some very interesting interviews with the authors. If only the authors had recorded the audio version! The performance here is awful - many words grievously mispronounced and the rhythm at times making it clear that the reader doesn't understand the text. I began to suspect that this was read by one of the new generation of computer voices, rather than by a person.

Interesting exploration of 'founding myths' spoiled by poor reading

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Really like the story but just can’t listen anymore to the audio. It sounds computer generated. It’s just Spoiling the story and my enjoyment. The word ‘however getting on my nerves now. Please get someone else to read this great story and I will be happy to listen again. It’s sounds like a politician or journalist is reading it. Bad 😢

Terrible Audio sounds like a computer

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The theme and story of this book was potentially of huge interest to me, but the narration is insanely bad so unfortunately I’ve had to abandon it (that’s the first time that’s happened in over 250 audio books)

There are so many words poorly pronounced and the intonation is all over the place. I’m pretty sure this is done by bad AI - should come with a warning.

Terrible narration

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Buy the book. There’s a good story here, but one wrecked by whatever software was used to create the narrative.

Comically bad narration

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The premise of the book is interesting, but unfortunately James Bartlett's narration is so bad it's difficult to keep listening.
It includes frequent simple mis-pronounciations, poor sentence cadence and intonations that is distracting for the listener.
For a book examining Englishness, it's important that the narrator understands the topic, pronounces correctly or at least dictates it well, but this one does not.

Bad narration

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This is a really fascinating book but I have had to stop listening to it because the terrible narration has finally got to me. I appreciate that narration is a difficult skill but so many even ordinary words are mispronounced. I can’t understand how this could have got through even the most basic editorial process. I have listened to many audiobooks and this is by far the poorest rendition. Such a shame.

Great book terrible narration

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The narrator obviously has no political vocabulary (chartist becomes "charitist") and frequently mispronounces common words. It feels like he pauses between pages (1066.............And all that) and often stresses the wrong part of a sentence to lose or distort its meaning. It's not all his fault, it seems like no one has bothered to listen to him, ask for him to try again or do basic edits.The book itself is ok and I bought it despite being warned about the quality of reading, but it is putting me off listening. A turd.

Awful reading - a shoddy "will this do?"

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