A word in your ear: The Count of Monte Cristo, Samuel Pepys

Purists always prefer complete books on tape, but there is room for abridgements too. They may be swift cribs of books we feel we really ought to know the gist of, teasers for the real thing, or even quite as much as we want to hear, thank you. Definitely in the swift crib class is a two-tape set of Alexandre Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo (CSA Telltapes, 2 hrs, £8.99), which tells of the escape and revenge of a sailor immured for 15 years in the Château D'If because he is a threat to a secret partisan of Bonaparte. What's left of the story is not just skeletal but missing several ribs, and clues that were presumably well-sunk into the flesh of the narrative now stick out, sore thumbs pointing to foregone conclusions. What makes it all worthwhile is that it's read by Tim Pigott-Smith, a man who could probably hold me riveted to a phone book. The trend to four- or even six-tape abridgements is a good halfway house between the swift crib and the real thing, and just the right format for Claire Tomalin's Samuel Pepys: the unequalled self (Penguin, 6hrs 30 mins, £12.99). Pepys is a wonderful subject, and Tomalin does him and his age full justice, furnishing the spaces around him and imagining his acquaintance with her usual skill in selecting the telling detail. My only reservation is the choice of Jill Balcon as reader, selected perhaps as an authorial voice. Accomplished as she is, her measured modern vowels clash with Pepys's turbulent, intimate world.