2008-09-20 A great read - but not a great listen

I have now read Mr Gum books 1 to 4, twice, to my son and we have enjoyed every minute of it. It helps if you can put voices into the reading as there is sometimes a lot going on within the plot (I chose a sort of UK West Country accent for most of the characters!). There isn't a huge amount to read as the text starts quite low down on the page and there is a lot of line spacing....
My advice though is to NEVER by the audio books (CDs). The author has read the stories himself and the BBC have decided that a few, annoying and obvious, sound effects is suffice to call it a 'BBC production'. The reading is too quick, not stylised enough, and feels as though the author has something else he has to rush off to do. We were both disappointed....but hey, Mr Gum and the Dancing Bear is out now (Book 5) and I can't wait until he receives it for his birthday...