Reserved for the Cat

Elemental Masters

By: Mercedes Lackey

Narrated by: Mirabai Galashan

Based loosely on the tale of Puss in Boots, Reserved for the Cat takes place in 1910 in an alternate London. A young dancer, penniless and desperate, is sure she is going mad when a cat begins talking to her mind-to-mind. But her feline guide, actually an Elemental Earth Spirit, helps her to impersonate a famous Russian ballerina and achieve the success she's been dreaming of. Unfortunately she also attracts the attention of another Elemental Spirit - a far more threatening one - and the young dancer must once again turn to her mysteriously powerful four-legged furry friend.©2006 Mercedes Lackey (P)2009 Audible, Inc.

A Great Book, But Unimpressive Narration

Would you try another book from Mercedes Lackey and/or Mirabai Galashan?

I love this author, and this series in particular. You can tell she does a lot of research to create a historically accurate setting for her tales to juxtapose the magic, which she also seeks to ground in lore and fact. The narrator, however, is not my favorite. Her accents are terrible, and there is always a sense that she has not read the story in advance. She stumbles over foreign words and those she does not know (it's always easy to tell when she doesn't) and often puts the wrong emphasis on syllables in a word or words in a sentence, as if she is reading without full comprehension. She's tolerable and not the worst I've ever heard by any means, but it's hard to lose oneself in the story if the narrator isn't guiding properly.

Would you listen to another book narrated by Mirabai Galashan?

Only if she does another in this series, because the books are good enough to put up with her slightly clumsy style of narrating.

Was Reserved for the Cat worth the listening time?

Yes, despite the narrator. I love this book enough to own both a physical copy and the audiobook, and always enjoy re-reading or listening to it again.

Great story, poor narration

The narrator almost ruined the title for me, loved the story but will avoid books read by this woman again

A great tale! I thoroughly enjoyed it !

The storyline with humor, mystery and many surprising twists and turns. Very enjoyable colorful characters

Awful narrator! Great story

I love this series! This book is not my favorite but still very enjoyable. Listening to it with this narrator was pretty rough. She gave the men higher pitched voices than the women! Whiny and too feminine!

awesome enterrtainment

the only thing this audiobook has in common with the puss in boots, is that in this story too, there are a cat and a mystical/magical creature.
don't believe the synopsis, listen to the story: is one of "the elementals" series best, just as the elementals are one of mercedes lackey's best.
the story line is clear and probably, one of the most logical she has ever written.
the writing is quite good and occasionally even funny or revealing of a social injustice.
the narration is professional and the narrator very rarely messes up the intonation or the different characters' voices.
and since I am a cat lady that cannot keep real cats, I will keep this one in my favorites.