Creepy

I'm listening to Heavenly Date and Other Flirtations by Alexander McCall Smith. It's a collection of short stories and is read by "various narrators".

The blurb for the book is quite misleading. It refers to "hilarious stories" and I would not have described any of the stories as even amusing.

And some of them are quite sick. The second story in particular is unsettling. I was unsettled from the get go because the various narrator, Simon Pebble had a creepy tone (sounded like he might be about to say, "He looked down at his hands and saw the blood. Blood. Blood. So much blood. He screamed but there was no sound.") At first I thought it was an appalling choice of reader for a light-hearted McCall Smith romp. Then I realised what was going on in the story and I gave the narrator's inflections a big tick of approval.

Most of the the stories are engaging enough, but some don't really go anywhere. What carries the story tape is the various narrators who a really good job of making something out of not much really.