Gretchen and the Bear
By: Carrie Anne Noble / Narrated By: Amanda S. Brown
Length: 7 hrs and 38 mins
A mashup of old and new and all in between—just deLIGHTful!!!
I dunno what-all kinda bug got up my dear rear, but I just started searching Audible for narrations by Amanda S. Brown. It’s not like I’d listened to an entire work of hers, but looking at what she’d done, and going by the narration samples—Gosh, I was smitten!
Soooo—Avoiding Publisher’s Summary like the PLAGUE—I saw the cover for Gretchen and the Bear and was instantly taken with it. No, I’d not listened to any other Carrie Anne Noble works, so basically this was a TOTal crapshoot for me.
And oh how WONderful the whole experience was!!!
16-year old Gretchen, chafing under the bonds of a wicked stepmother, is sent by said wretched woman down to a regenerated Earth to find her stepsister, Ruby, who’s madcapped it down there to wed a Fae prince. Gretchen WILL retrieve her… or beware the consequences. At first, it’s just woe unto Gretchen, but soon the threats are more ominous: If Gretchen ever wishes to see her father again? Alive? She WILL get Ruby!
Down to the faerie-infested Britannia she goes, where she discovers that aaaalll her technology does NOT work. She’s at the mercy of… whazzaaa? Dunno. This is a completely alien world, and Gretchen, all crotchety and hungry and sooooo tired and miserable, pulls a “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” and hunkers down in a house. She’s discovered by young Arthur, who she’ll learn is Bearfolk, and he saves her from death (Arthur’s mum is also a bit of a wretched woman…). But soon Arthur’s family is onboard with helping her to find Ruby and to get the heck off the planet posthaste. It’s not safe, there’s this weird prophecy concerning a girl with a silver streak in her hair riding into battle to lead the Bearfolk to wartime success, and blah blah Fae, magic, giants, blah.
After a tragedy, Arthur hurries Gretchen back to her spaceship and sacrifices something oh so precious so that Gretchen might survive her life back home. Soon we are treated to parallel stories of Gretchen navigating the wiles and trickeries of her stepmother whilst trying to save her father, and of Arthur navigating through being cast out, living on the fringes, and finding the courage to make the hard choices, the right choices.
It’s all lovely, I tell you. It’s written in such a clever style so that the environment, the landscapes around the two—be they sterile orbiting station or lush Fae-lands—seem like characters in their own right. It’s an emotional journey too, which I dearly appreciate, and it had me chuckling at Gretchen’s shenanigans and weeping as Arthur muddles through devastation and loneliness (And his dad had me feeling somewhat mournful also, I must admit—AWEsome! I was a weepy wreck!!!). There are some wonderful characters who are written to go beyond their quirkiness and come to have depth and feeling. What more can I say? A mashup that worked beyond it’s Sci-Fi and Fantasy canoodling and threw in folklore and fairy tales also.
And now to the truly amazing narration by Amanda S. Brown (Do NOT forget the “S.”!!!). Oh my, what to say, how to convey how marvelous it was to have truly distinct characterizations that just flowed, no juggling necessary, as tho’ the magical woman just inhabited each being. Whether it was Gretchen so excited to be scarfing more and more and even more grub after tottering around on an empty stomach, or it was Arthur’s father being soulful and upright, or it was a creep of a guy back on the orbiting station, veritably holding Gretchen hostage, all whilst having The BEST fashion sense. Truly, I am soooo looking forward to two other books I have in my Library that she’s narrated: One a P&P Variation, and one a Jane Austen mashup with the supernatural sucking some blood outta heroines.
See? I’m so very excited, and I canNOT pat m’self on the back toooo much for choosing this all-around joy of an audiobook. Do yourself a favor during these continuing fraught times, and treat yourself to Gretchen and the Bear—Kindle Unlimited member? Check it out for free and get the paired audiobook for a few dollars.
Delight, delight, delight! Wait! One more!
DELIGHT!!!
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