Shardlake: Heartstone

BBC Radio 4 Full-Cast Dramatisation

By: C. J. Sansom

Narrated by: Justin Salinger, Bryan Dick, full cast

An enthralling BBC Radio 4 full-cast adaptation of the fifth novel in C. J. Sansom’s best-selling Tudor crime series, featuring lawyer-detective Matthew Shardlake.

Summer, 1545, and England is preparing for war. Facing imminent invasion by the French fleet, King Henry VIII has mustered a huge army at Portsmouth.

Though no soldier, Matthew Shardlake also finds himself dispatched there. Queen Catherine Parr has asked him to take on a case involving the 'monstrous wrongs' allegedly committed by cloth merchant Sir Nicholas Hobbey against his young ward, Hugh Curteys.

Shardlake also has another, more personal mission – to discover the truth about Ellen Fettiplace, a young woman he has befriended in Bedlam. She refuses to speak about the traumatic events that led to her incarceration almost twenty years ago, and Shardlake believes her family may hold the answers.

As he and his assistant Jack Barak pursue their investigations, they uncover secrets, lies and sinister crimes, and are reunited with both an old friend and an old enemy. Events come to their dramatic climax on board the King's most famous warship: the Mary Rose...

Justin Salinger stars as Shardlake, with Bryan Dick as Barak, in this heart-stopping penultimate instalment of the 'Shardlake' series.

Cast
Shardlake……………………Justin Salinger
Barak……………………Bryan Dick
Queen Catherine……………………Emily Wachter
Ellen Fettiplace……………………Kath Weare
Dyrick/Officer/Sailor 2……………………Philip Bretherton
Goodryke/Landlord/Avery/Priddis/Villager……………………Clive Hayward
Sir Richard Rich……………………Nicholas Murchie
George Leacon……………………Finn den Hertog
Sir Nicholas Hobbey……………………David Seddon
Hugh Curteys……………………Will Howard
Abigail Hobbey/Sally……………………Isabella Inchbald
David Hobbey/Keeper Shawms/Sailor 1……………………Tayla Kovacevic-Ebong
Paulet/Reverend Seckford/Warner……………………Neil McCaul
Phillip West……………………Chris Pavlo
Feaveryear/Sailor/Pelham……………………Gary Duncan
Bess Calfhill……………………Kath Weare
Sir Richard Rich……………………Nicholas Murchie

Dramatised by Colin MacDonald
Produced by Kirsteen Cameron
Directed by David Jackson Young

©2017 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd (P)2017 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd

Well-done abridgement of this intriguing mystery

I adore the "Shardlake" series, and prefer unabridged audio versions, but I did enjoy this abbreviated-but-with-care presentation; it managed to convey the gist of the novel with some deft editing and very nice voice-performances.