Wind in the Stone

The Five Senses Set, Book 2

By: Andre Norton

Narrated by: Reina Mystique

An orphan girl battles an evil mage in this “stunningly vivid” fantasy from the New York Times–bestselling author of The Scent of Magic (Starlog).

A mage, seeking to enslave the Valley and destroy the Forest, has brutally sundered a family. A mother has fled into the woods with her infant girl-child, while the depraved sorcerer holds the babe’s twin—a boy—captive in a black tower. The mother dies but the girl survives. Adopted by the strange denizens of the Forest—safe from the mage’s malevolent influence—she grows to young womanhood, cultivating a cherished skill that has been denied the others of her kind: the ability to truly hear the sounds of her world. But her future will be fraught with trial and terror, for only she can smash the chains that shackle the Valley and its inhabitants. It is her destiny to confront sorcerer and demon minions, and to oppose the one she must conquer and free: the magician’s protégé and her most powerful adversary. Her bane and blood. Her brother.

©2014 Andre Norton (P)2025 Dreamscape Lore

Good book, bad reader

First off, I did enjoy the story, despite the poor reading. This one is a bit darker than the majority of Andre Norton's books, but the story helped me get through the way it was read.

As for the reading. I don't need a voice actor to make different voices for each character, while I find that a good bonus, it isn't necessary for me to be fine with the reading. What I do have an issue with is the reader pausing in the middle of a sentence and stumbling over words and generally sounding like they had never did a book reading professionally before. I could believe they handed her the book, told her go, and turned on the mic. Fortunately, by the time she got about halfway through the book she was only stumbling on sentences occasionally and wasn't as horrible as she was from the beginning. I was kind of shocked and annoyed at the end when a producer was named. What did they produce? I doubt they listened to any of it because if they had they would have had it redone.

If you really love Andre Norton's stories, and want to listen to the audio book, this can be suffered through, otherwise, I can't recommend this version because of the reader.