The Call of the Wild

In this short and thrilling classic, Patrick Lawlor is called upon to render a dog's point of view in a natural and convincing way. Buck is a 4-year-old shepherd-husky mix who is stolen from his California home and shipped to Alaska during the Gold Rush to join a team of half-frozen sled dogs. Lawlor's matter-of-fact interpretation of Buck's perceptions, experiences, and above all, his helplessness to control his fate successfully stir up as much intimacy and compassion as any human character might. From the first moment, the reader willingly casts disbelief aside and joins hearts with this noble animal. N.G. (c) AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine


Great short stories are tailor-made for audiobooks. They transport you to another time and place, and bring you back in a reasonable amount of time. Such is the case with this classic tale of Buck, the indomitable dog, during the Yukon Gold Rush of 1897-98. Narrator Michael Kramer is a perfect match for London's words in both style and intonation His voice is compact, intense, cool, and utterly absorbing, and he sets a comfortable pace. Sometimes his delivery is choppy, almost abrupt, but that's an advantage in a story that takes place in the wilderness because it keeps us slightly off balance and involved. Kramer is also adept at character accents, from a West Indies dialect to a Western snarl. R.I.G. (c) AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine