The Innovators

On the heels of the author's gravelly voiced narration of the introduction, narrator Dennis Boutsikaris at first sounds tame or buttoned-down. But as the audio unfolds, his reading reveals a rich palette of emotional accents that he applies to great effect in all the right places. His skill with the subtleties of narrative energy also work well with this textured history lesson--one that focuses less on the technological than on the visionary characters profiled by the author. With one fascinating story after the other (did you know the daughter of a famous poet pioneered computer programming in the 1840s?), this highly entertaining audio chronicles the importance of collaboration as much as individual creativity among the colorful pioneers who brought us today's digital world. T.W. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine