B. J. Harrison Reads The Moonstone

Written by Wilkie Collins

Narrated by B. J. Harrison

“The Moonstone” by Wilkie Collins is one of the forefathers of detective fiction, cementing the foundations of the genre. At the centre of it lays the theft of a diamond, dating in origin from a religious Indian shrine, which prompts detective Sergeant Cuff to take up the case. It is an absolute page-turner of a story and goes through the accounts of the different characters, winding and meandering from fact to fiction and vice versa. A tale of romance, theft, murder, and mystery, “The Moonstone” is a central text for the genre, recommended to all readers of fiction.B. J. Harrison started his Classic Tales Podcast back in 2007, wanting to breathe new life into classic stories. He masterfully plays with a wide array of voices and accents and has since then produced over 500 audiobooks. Now in collaboration with SAGA Egmont, his engaging narration of these famous classics is available to readers everywhere.Wilkie Collins (1824-1889) was an English novelist, one of the most popular and well paid during of his generation. A close friend of Charles Dickens, Collins achieved his fame mostly through his novel “The Woman in White” which many consider the first piece of British detective fiction. His other popular works include “The Moonstone” and “Armadale”.

• Language: English
• Publisher: SAGA Egmont
• Release date: Aug 11, 2020
• ISBN: 9788726575828

Wilkie Collins

William Wilkie Collins was born in London in 1824, the son of a successful and popular painter. Collins himself demonstrated some artistic talent and had a painting hung in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition in 1849, but his real passion was for writing. On leaving school, he worked in the office of a tea merchant in the Strand but hated it. He left and read law as a student at Lincoln's Inn but already his writing career was flowering. His first novel, Antonina, was published in 1850. In 1851, the same year that he was called to the bar, he met and established a lifelong friendship with Charles Dickens. While Collins' fame rests on his best known works, The Woman in White and The Moonstone, he wrote over thirty books, as well as numerous short stories, articles and plays. He was a hugely popular writer in his lifetime. Collins was an unconventional individual: he never married but established long term liaisons with two separate households. He died in 1889.

Reviews for B. J. Harrison Reads The Moonstone

[Sonalee Majumdar · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Racist AF, which is to say par for the course for the British. It is fascinating psychologically, though almost too ironic to be true.

A (very long) investigation of a purported “crime,” bookended incidentally by the actual colossal CRIME (TM) of imperialism — the rape, pillage, genocide of an entire subcontinent. The whole book is a sad inconsequential romp among the thieves, with the embarrassing backdrop of the grotesqueries of the British *ahem* caste system.

FFS, YOU (all the characters and vast majority of readers) ARE THE BADDIES! You cannot make this stuff up.