Which Treasure Island recording should you buy?
A children-and-adults classic with ten editions on Audible UK, ranging from a one-hour cut to a full-cast Audible Original. The unabridged readings all land within about an hour of each other, which makes the two that do not stand out.
Short answer
Timothy West for a straight reading: unabridged, one narrator, and the same voice that carries both Trollope cycles if you end up wanting more Victorian fiction. The Luke Evans edition is one hour two minutes and abridged -- a fine listen, but a twentieth-century trailer for the book rather than the book. The Audible Original with Philip Glenister and Catherine Tate is a dramatisation: a cast, not a narrator, and worth having as well as rather than instead of.
Every recording, compared
| Narrator | Length | Type | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Timothy West Our pick | 6 hrs 57 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. West also reads all twelve Trollope novels on this site. |
| David Buck | 6 hrs 50 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. |
| Grover Gardner | 5 hrs 53 mins | Unabridged | The briskest of the complete readings; still the whole text. |
| Frederick Davidson | 6 hrs 50 mins | Unabridged | Complete and solo. |
| Luke Evans | 1 hr 2 mins | Abridged | ABRIDGED, to under a sixth of the book. The shortest thing on the page by a wide margin. |
| AI Voice Bob | 7 hrs 56 mins | AI narration (Virtual Voice) | Complete text, synthetic voice. |
| Philip Glenister, Daniel Mays, Catherine Tate and a full cast | 6 hrs 23 mins | Full-cast dramatisation | An Audible Original adapted by Marty Ross. Nearly as long as the unabridged readings, but it is an adaptation with a cast, not a narration. |