Pandora - Susan Stokes-Chapman Audiobook

Written by Susan Stokes-Chapman
Read by Olivia Vinall
Format: MP3
Bitrate: 64 Kbps
Unabridged

Publisher: HarperAudio
Release date: January 17, 2023
Duration: 11:36:08

Steeped in mystery and rich in imagination, an exhilarating historical novel set in Georgian London where the discovery of a mysterious ancient Greek vase sets in motion conspiracies, revelations, and romance.

London, 1799.

Dora Blake, an aspiring jewelry artist, lives with her odious uncle atop her late parents’ once-famed shop of antiquities. After a mysterious Greek vase is delivered, her uncle begins to act suspiciously, keeping the vase locked in the store’s basement, away from prying eyes—including Dora’s. Intrigued by her uncle’s peculiar behavior, Dora turns to young, ambitious antiquarian scholar Edward Lawrence who eagerly agrees to help. Edward believes the ancient vase is the key that will unlock his academic future; Dora sees it as a chance to establish her own name.

But what Edward discovers about the vase has Dora questioning everything she has believed about her life, her family, and the world, as she knows it. As Dora uncovers the truth, she comes to understand that some doors are locked and some mysteries are buried for a reason, while others are closer to the surface than they appear.

“After a slow start, narrator Olivia Vinall’s pleasing voice makes PANDORA an engaging listening experience. When a sealed box is retrieved from deep below the sea, Dora, an aspiring jewelry designer, opens it and becomes fascinated with the ancient Greek vase within, covered with images from the Pandora myth. Her unscrupulous Uncle Hezekiah’s antiquities shop is filled with fakes, so Dora turns to Edward, an antiquities scholar, to verify the authenticity of the vase. What they discover comes at a great cost. Susan Stokes-Chapman’s writing works too hard to transform a classic myth into an eighteenth-century mystery, but Vinall stretches her range to encompass the numerous characters and abundance of subplots. She provides a serviceable narration for a novel that never quite lives up to its promise.”— AudioFile