The Spy Lover

By: Kiana Davenport

Narrated by: Todd Haberkorn

Thrust into the savagery of the U.S. Civil War, a Chinese immigrant fighting for the Union Army, a nurse turned spy, and a one-armed Confederate cavalryman find their lives inextricably entwined.

Johnny Tom, a Chinese immigrant, is promised American citizenship if he serves with the Union Army. But first he must survive the carnage of battles and rampant racism among the ranks. Desperate to find him, his daughter, Era, becomes a Union spy while nursing soldiers in Confederate camps. She falls in love with Warren, a one-armed cavalryman, and her loyalties become divided between her beloved father in the North and the man who sustains her in the South.

An extraordinary novel that will stand as a defining work on the Chinese immigrant experience, The Spy Lover is a paean to the transcendence of love and the resilience of the human spirit.

©2012 Kiana Davenport (P)2012 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Todd Haberkorn's affecting performance of the story of Union solider Johnny Tom, Confederate cavalryman Warren Petticomb, and nurse/spy Era Tom, the girl they both love, is packed with emotion. Listeners' understanding of how the characters are indelibly changed by war is enhanced by Haberkorn’s delivery; for example, he makes a fluid transition from Warren's initial enthusiasm to a haunted emptiness, which is demonstrated by slowly morphing a confident boyish tone into the gritty, weary voice of a veteran." (AudioFile)

Excellent narrator!

What an excellent narrator! He has a voice quality that is easy to listen to for hours, which is good since this is a long book. The story was very interesting to me even though the story line seemed preposterous the last couple of chapters. Overall, it was a very good story.

Interesting story, fantastic narration

What made the experience of listening to The Spy Lover the most enjoyable?

Todd Haberkorn has a really nice, soothing voice. It was a good contrast to the violent imagery that comes with a Civil War novel.

What other book might you compare The Spy Lover to and why?

This is really the first novel of this genre that I've read/listened to.

Have you listened to any of Todd Haberkorn’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

I've seen a few anime series that he's been in. This was very different from what I'm used to hearing from him, but I was pleasantly surprised.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

It was one I looked forward to coming back to. Definitely worth listening to.

A thrilling study in human misery

Kiana once again used her amazing abilities to create an in-depth story of human strengths and frailties. Luring and intriguing from beginning to end, its detailed descriptions of situations and emotions provide steady anxiety toward an unpredictable conclusion. Well done!

Engrossing!

This book is PERFECT for a long car trip! i sure hope that we'r will be able to find another that is as good.

Get this audiobook...you won't be disappointed!!

Fantastic civil war drama combined with exceptional narration made this audiobook a rare treat! Todd Haberkorn truly delivered an incredible narrative with Chinese, Irish, southern, northern, slave, indian....the list goes on......dialects with great success. It made listening to this terrific tale a real pleasure!

I couldn’t finish it

I tried, I really did try to finish it but I just couldn’t. The more I tried to make sense of it the more annoyed I got. It’s good when you first start listening to it but it quickly turns boring.
The narration was the only thing keeping me going but after 5 hours I just couldn’t listen to it anymore.

The multi-storylines thing seemed to trail off after a while and the perspectives swapped too often for my taste. As soon as you start to get into one character’s story, it changes to a different character. And once you go back to the character you liked, their story either changes or you forget what was happening completely.
After a while everything gets jumbled together and gets hard to tell who’s talking if you’re using it as background noise for work, errands or studies.

Big probs to the narrator Todd Haberkorn, despite me disliking the story he got me over halfway in before I gave up. His voice is like butter and you can tell he’s not one of those narrators that sound like they could care less about what they’re reading.
He never disappoints 💙