From Publishers Weekly
A Twist of Beauty An inviting design may inspire readers of a newly abridged edition of Charles Dickens's classic Oliver Twist to join the hero in asking, please sir, for more. Christian Birmingham spots nearly every page of text with a small, charcoal-gray image, and complements important scenes with full-page color illustrations. Birmingham's hues are predominantly deep, somber and gritty, but not without occasional flashes of royal blues and golds. Text is shaded in the faintest yellow, soft on the eye.Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From School Library Journal
Grade 7 Up-A BBC radio dramatization of Dickens' classic. Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Oliver Twist was Dickens's second novel and one of his darkest, dealing with burglary, kidnapping, child abuse, prostitution, and murder. Alongside this gallery of horrors are the corrupt and incompetent institutions of 19th-century England set up to address social problems and instead making them worse. The author's moral indignation drives the creation of some of his most memorably grotesque characters: squirming, vile Fagin; brutal Bill Sykes; the brooding, sickly Monks; and Bumble, the pompous and incorrigibly dense beadle. Clearly, a reading of this work must carry the author's passionate narrative voice while being flexible and broad enough to define the wide range of character voices suggested by the text. John Wells's capable but bland reading only suggests the rich possibilities of the material. Restraint and Dickens simply don't go together. The abridgment deftly and seamlessly manages to deliver all major characters and plot lines, but there are many superior audiobook versions of this material, both abridged and unabridged. Not recommended.-John Owen, Advanced Micro Devices, Sunnyvale, CA Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From AudioFile
This abridged version of the trials of Oliver Twist makes the tale quite accessible to young listeners. Dick Cavett does an excellent job of moving from his familiar, level voice in the narrative passages to the true vibrancy of the dialogue. He handles British accents of the more lowly characters quite well, his characterization of Fagin being especially insidious and distinct. Mr. Brownlow and Monks are less developed, and their characterizations rely more on the text. The abridgment is quite a feat, having reduced a tumultuous tale into a tight storyline. However, some of the final sequences require more careful listening to absorb plot developments. E.S.B. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine


From Booklist
Gr. 5^-7. Let's face it, there are dreary passages in Dickens and convoluted sentences that are impenetrable for young readers and that put them off a great story. This retelling works well: it gets rid of a lot of the padding while keeping the narrative tension of the original. Oliver's stark request, "Please, sir, I want some more," will thrill kids today as it always has, and the story of the street boy on the run, who lives with outlaws and then finds a safe home, is an archetypal adventure. The problem here is the illustrations. Dickens' novel is scary. Cruickshank's original pictures were true to the terror as well as the comic absurdity of the story, but Birmingham's large, soft pastel pictures are sunny and sweet and angelic, with no hint of darkness and grime. Yes, Dickens' story does end in sentimental togetherness, but the terror is always there. Fagin's crowd was never this cute. Hazel Rochman

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Orphaned at birth, Oliver Twist is brought up in the workhouse and sold into apprenticeship to an undertaker. Rebelling against starvation and ill-treatment he flees to London, only to be taken up by a gang of child-pickpockets led by the rascally Fagan, assisted by the Artful Dodger. Oliver is rescued temporarily but then snatched again by thieves, and it becomes plain that the secret of Oliver's birth and background is of deep interest to a large number of people.

In its raking condemnation of contemporary attitudes towards the poor, the claustrophobic horror and comic invention of its portrait of the Victorian underworld, and its sharp, sympathetic insight into the condition of the innocent and the outsider, Oliver Twist remains one of the most powerful and relevant of all nineteenth-century novels.

SYNOPSIS

This fiercely comic tale stands in marked contrast to its genial predecessor, The Pickwick Papers. Set against London's seedy back street slums, Oliver Twist is the saga of a workhouse orphan captured and thrust into a thieves' den, where some of Dickens's most depraved villains preside: the incorrigible Artful Dodger, the murderous bully Sikes, and the terrible Fagin, that treacherous ringleader whose grinning knavery threatens to send them all to the "ghostly gallows." Yet at the heart of this drama is the orphan Oliver, whose unsullied goodness leads him at last to salvation.

In 1838 the publication of Oliver Twist firmly established the literary eminence of young Dickens. It was, according to Edgar Johnson, "a clarion peal announcing to the world that in Charles Dickens the rejected and forgotten and misused of the world had a champion."

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