Ulysses
(Libby/OverDrive eBook, Kindle)

This duo bring June 16, 1904, to joyous life. At nine hours, AudioGO's full-cast production covers roughly half of the Dublin wanderings of Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom from "Stately, plump Buck Mulligan" to the final "Yes." The emphasis is on the book's opening chapters, which set up the action and establish the characters' personalities and motivations. The narrators and assorted readers adroitly apply the proper voices and levels of brogue to match the characters; Bloom and Dedalus are clear-voiced and educated, while the trio of pub-goers accompanying "the Citizen" in a particularly effective act are pure shanty Irish. Molly Bloom's monolog is delivered in the appropriately leisurely pace of a woman accustomed to long hours in bed-usually with the company of men other than her husband. Naxos offers Molly's soliloquy unabridged, giving listeners a luscious earful of the full breadth of Joyce's stream-of-consciousness writing. While her husband is more the intellectual, Molly is the embodiment of the physical, casually discussing her bodily functions-usually conducted in private-while even indulging in a few (one clearly can understand why this shocked in 1922). Molly is pure sensuality; her thoughts focus on the sex she's had, is having now, and hopes to have in the future. Narrator Marcella Riordan quickens the pace a tad and adds singing to her presentation of Molly's inner thoughts. VERDICT Hearing Ulysses read aloud reinforces its literary merit while proving how much fun it is rather than a high-brow slog, as Joyce's bawdy sense of humor shines through. Though a joy, AudioGO's abridgment makes the story's flow jumpy, so the program serves best as a refresher for those familiar with the text. Naxos's Molly is solid for students, Joyce heads, and anyone who enjoys fine literature. Whether your taste runs to walking the streets with Bloom and Dedalus or slipping between the sheets with Molly, this duo has it all.-Mike Rogers, Library Journal (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.