Disappointing - use with caution.

To be completely fair, my knowledge of Hungarian history is above average. Likely a little better even than the average Hungarian. Having said that, this history, while it hits all of the high notes in the story, lacks depth. The writing is high school level at best, and it reads as though research consisted of reading Wikipedia entries. If you know nothing about Hungary and are thinking of visiting - perhaps during, or at the conclusion of a Danube river cruise - this will give you more than enough information to understand a little about the place. Unfortunately, there is very little here about the people, or what life has been like at various points in history.
It is always disappointing when reading (or listening to) a book, to have the author say something like 'this important thing that would make sense to talk about here is outside the scope of this book'. Amateurish.
As to the performance, I'm at a loss. I'm certain that the reader would be great for something - he has a gorgeous voice - but he sounds like he belongs on an oldies radio station, or selling synthetic chamois at a home show. And then there is the pronunciation problem. Our reader struggles to pronounce ENGLISH words properly. He absolutely savages the Hungarian words in this text. In fact, he pronounces several individual words in multiple wrong ways as he progresses through the text, but rarely even approaches correct.
I used a credit for this, and I almost wish I hadn't. I say almost, because as I mentioned, it does cover the obvious points of Hungarian history, and serves as a sufficient refresher course. Please, please do NOT use this audiobook as a guide to Hungarian pronunciation though. It is horrid. (I am aware that there are 'conventional' English pronunciations for certain Hungarian words, such as 'Magyar' and 'Szekler' - but for those other words and names appearing in the book, there are no excuses for not looking them up or consulting a Hungarian.)
If nothing else, it has inspired me to ask ChatGPT for a synopsis of Hungarian history, to see if it can do better.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!