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I had the pleasure of listening to Lee Horsley narrating Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry. I had a little trepidation going in because some of the top narrator reviews on Audible mentioned heavy breathing that was too distracting. However I had no problem with his breathing and in fact it didn't sound very heavy to me, so to each their own. What's more, this is one of the longest audiobooks I've listened to at almost 37 hours so there was plenty of time to notice anything amiss. It makes me wonder if many who listen to Lonesome Dove haven't listened to many other audiobooks or narrators before because I've definitely heard other narrators who have more distracting breathing and whose breathing wasn't prominently mentioned in their ratings.
Horsley has a great narrating voice and pace, and does a huge variety of character voices really well (well, except for a seldom used questionable Irish accent). I was tempted to give him five stars but for the fact that he gives one of the main characters, Gus, who talks in the book all the time, such an inflection that's on the way towards cartoonish. The character is vivid, loud and outspoken but still he's also powerful, shrewd and intelligent. Who knows, maybe the voice was realistic and it was distinctive, and I did get used to it, but I felt the character would've been suited to a voice slightly more subtle. Overall 4/5.
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