Unabridged audiobooks for the Chronicles of Amber?

I recently managed to get a hold of all 10 audiobooks for the
Chronicles of Amber series. However the fact that they are abridged is
driving me crazy. I have re-read the series so many times that each
time they skip something it makes me twitch. Don't ge me wrong, I am
very happy to have what I do, but a complete reading would be so much
nicer.

Was there ever a recording made of the series in unabridged format?

Thank you in advance.

On Jan 1, 12:36 pm, kurt_odin... DeleteThis @yahoo.com wrote:
> I recently managed to get a hold of all 10 audiobooks for the
> Chronicles of Amber series. However the fact that they are abridged is
> driving me crazy. I have re-read the series so many times that each
> time they skip something it makes me twitch. Don't ge me wrong, I am
> very happy to have what I do, but a complete reading would be so much
> nicer.
>
> Was there ever a recording made of the series in unabridged format?
>
> Thank you in advance.

The first eight books were *recorded* in unabridged format. The first
six, and the eighth, were *released* in unabridged format. For some
strange reason, the seventh, BLOOD OF AMBER, was apparently not
released in unabridged format. I think that the reason may relate to
the takeover of Sunset Productions by Americana Audiobooks, because
the unabridged eighth book (SIGN OF CHAOS) was released around that
time (possibly even after) under a different brand name (Audio USA). I
later contacted Americana and they admitted to owning the master tapes
of unabridged BLOOD OF AMBER, but they had no plans to release it and
did not want to sell it; they did not own the unabridged version of
the eighth book! Americana then went into bankruptcy protection and
has supposedly restructured, no longer selling audiobooks. It is
unclear where the master tapes now are.

The unabridged and abridged versions circulate for free on bittorrent
sites, and occasionally on ebay with sellers claiming to have
unabridged versions of all 10 books. It simply isn't true; what you
can find are books 1-6 and 8 unabridged, and books 7, 9 and 10
abridged. Or all 10 books abridged. The sound quality on the torrents
is not all good. The unabridged tapes (which is the only format that
the unabridged versions were released in) surface occasionally on
ebay, which is about the only place to find them now.

Zelazny died before doing the rest of the recordings, which is why
book 10 is read entirely by someone else (Bruce Watson).

The unabridged versions have no music or sound effects, they consist
entirely of Zelazny reading the story (except for THE HAND OF OBERON,
in which the last part is completed by Bruce Watson). They are each
about twice the length of the abridged versions.

The history of the recordings is confusing, and I have tried to relate
it as simply as possible. To add to the confusion, Zelazny supposedly
only recorded unabridged versions of the novels, and his recording was
then edited to make the abridged versions. If that is true, then an
unabridged version of the ninth book (KNIGHT OF SHADOWS) should have
existed too. But the tapes were obviously not well looked after, since
Sunset was able to produce a complete abridged version of THE HAND OF
OBERON with Zelazny reading it, but later had to have Watson read the
last part of the unabridged version.

Chris

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