The Tea Rose : Tea Rose

The book was well written and well read. I knew nothing about it and took a risk getting it. I'm always a little scared when spending my credits, though with the guarantee its now a much more comfortable feeling and less risk. I hated taking a chance of getting stuck with a book I didnt like!! This book far exceeded my expectations,

This is my first Jill Tanner book, and I have to admit that at first I was instantly in dislike. Her voice is a bit rough, kind of like a smoker maybe, and thus far I've listened to very smooth voices. As story went in, however, I became accustomed to, and appreciative of her. She did great voice changes and it was easy to follow who was who. Her voice is in just the right range where the inflections genuinely vary between a natural sounding mans voice or a natural sounding womans voice.

I was surprised at how much I was able to "feel" in this book. I actually cried a few times, both happy and sad cries. It was easy to be excited, happy, scared, anger, as well as a myriad of other emotions. I was really surprised by that. Every time I cried I was like "Seriously!?". The storyline with Nicholas was really touching in so many ways. I loved his character, I loved his and Fionas relationship, and I loved... Well I cant say anything else without it being a spoiler.

This book is different than those that I frequent in that instead of the characters being rich London Ton, they were the very poor in the bowels of the city. Getting used to a new narrator and a new kind of story was challenging at first, but only for a few chapters. Loved this book SO much and am now currently listening to the second one in the series, The Winter Rose. (Alternating between Into The Wilderness series and this one so as to make them both last)
In some of the reviews I read, people complained about the Jack the Ripper storyline. I had no issue with it and thought it added to the character.

Lovely mental vacation.

Jill Tanner's did an outstanding job with the narration. Her range in characters was done nicely.

At 28 hours one sitting would be difficult, but yes the ear buds were in my ears more often than not.

I have read this trilogy 3 times and listened to The Tea Rose and The Wild Rose twice. Jennifer Donnelly draws you into 1890 London and it's hard to come back to reality. Beautiful story, the characters are alive, the details are vivid without being boring. I even went so far as to print out a 1900 London & New York maps to move around with the story.

The Winter Rose is book 2, it is not out in audio yet, why they started with book 3 then moved to book one is a mystery to me. These books need to be read in order, character developement is created in each book that brings you to the next.

PLEASE HURRY with the release of book 2. How can a new reader understand the story without the middle!