Okay, I need to rant about something first: why do publishers keep assigning male narrators to books with female protagonists? Like, I get it, Graeme Malcolm has a nice voice. Clear, professional, good pacing. But Merrick is literally named after the main character—a powerful, complex witch—and every time she speaks, I'm pulled out of the story because she sounds like a British dude doing a voice. It's 2024. We have options.
That said, I finished this in about five commutes, so clearly something kept me plugging in my earbuds at 6:17 AM on that packed Caltrain car.
The Anne Rice Problem (And Why I Keep Coming Back)
Here's the thing about Anne Rice. She writes like she's being paid by the atmospheric description. Every room needs its candlelight catalogued. Every character needs their lineage traced back three generations. Some days this is exactly what I want—a slow, gothic bath of words while I'm sardined between a guy with a massive backpack and someone eating an egg sandwich. When I need that same kind of lush, immersive escape, Court of Thorns and Roses delivers with its own brand of atmospheric fantasy.
Merrick sits at the intersection of Rice's two big universes—the Vampire Chronicles and the Mayfair Witches. David Talbot (vampire, former Talamasca scholar, general brooding intellectual type) tells us about Merrick, this incredibly powerful witch descended from New Orleans' gens de couleur libres. The worldbuilding around Creole voodoo traditions is genuinely fascinating. Rice clearly did her homework, and the New Orleans atmosphere is thick enough to taste.
But—and this is a big but—the pacing is uneven. We get these gorgeous sections about Merrick's childhood, her training, a wild expedition to Guatemala for Mayan artifacts. Then the actual plot kicks in (something about summoning ghosts and vampire drama with Louis de Pointe du Lac), and suddenly we're rushing through what should be the emotional climax. I was following along on the train, half-asleep as usual, and suddenly realized we were at the ending and I'd somehow missed the buildup.
Not Rice's tightest work. But still enjoyable? Yes. It's basically comfort food gothic—you know what you're getting.
Competent Voice, Wrong Character
Look, Malcolm is fine. His pacing is solid—I never had to rewind because he was mumbling or racing through sentences. The production is clean. No weird audio glitches or volume drops.
But "fine" doesn't cut it when you're voicing a book about a woman whose power comes from her femininity, her heritage, her specific embodied experience. Every time Merrick speaks, there's this disconnect. Malcolm does this slightly higher, softer thing for her voice that just... doesn't land. It's not terrible. It's just not right.
I kept thinking about how different this would've been with someone like Robin Miles or Bahni Turpin—narrators who could've captured Merrick's Creole heritage and fierce independence. The narrator mismatch here is as frustrating as some of the casting choices I've heard in other genre fiction—though at least Beneath This Mask got the voice casting right for its strong female lead. Instead, we get competent British man doing his best.
The David Talbot sections work better, obviously. Malcolm's natural register fits the scholarly vampire narrator vibe. But that's maybe 60% of the book.
Who's This Actually For?
If you've already done the Vampire Chronicles and the Mayfair Witches series, this is a fun crossover episode. You'll get the references. You'll enjoy seeing familiar characters.
If this is your first Anne Rice? Don't start here. The book assumes you already know who David Talbot is, who Louis is, what the Talamasca does. You could figure it out from context, but you'd be missing layers.
The ROI on this audiobook is decent for commutes—engaging enough to follow at 6 AM, atmospheric enough to zone into when the train gets crowded. I bumped it to 1.5x during some of the longer exposition sections and didn't miss anything crucial.
Skip if: you're picky about narrator-character matching (and honestly, you should be). This might frustrate you. The story deserved better casting.
The Bottom Line on This One
Qualified yes.
If you're an Anne Rice completionist, you'll listen regardless of what I say. If you're curious about the Mayfair-Vampire crossover, it's worth a library borrow through Libby rather than a credit. The story is solid B-tier Rice—not her best, not her worst, plenty of atmosphere, slightly rushed ending.
The narration is the weak link. Not bad enough to skip, not good enough to elevate. Just... there.
I'd wait for a sale or use your streaming subscription. Save your credits for something with Ray Porter.
