Key Details
- Read by: Jayne Entwistle is the only name on the file, so every child, thief and djinni in a crowded cast comes out of one voice.
- At its heart: 1897 girlhood, wishes that cost something, friendship, and women forcing their way into science and sports.
- Vibe: Bright, quick, and quietly serious about ambition.
- Short version: A series finale the listing never labels as one, and a good use of an evening if the earlier books are already in the house.
Maeve Merritt found a djinni in a sardine tin, and by the time this audiobook opens she is weighing whether to give the djinni back. Julie Berry sets the story in 1897, in an England where most of the daring things Maeve wants to do are closed to girls, and then sends her to Cambridge University to meet young women already prying those doors open in science, in education, and in sports. Nine hours and twenty-nine minutes of it, one name in the reader's slot, and an Audible Originals release dated August 2022.
Julie Berry has written this one with a clear beginning, middle and end, which is more than the listing manages. No series name appears on the record, no installment number, and the description never says where in a sequence a buyer is landing. The entries underneath suffer no such doubt. Ben, who admits to rationing the books at a chapter or two a night, calls this the final volume and measures it against the first two. Libby Bergstrom describes a trio of young people winding up with no loose ends. Come to it expecting a farewell, whatever the metadata declines to say.
Five written entries sit beneath a badge of 4.9, and every one of them carries five stars, so the column is not where dissent lives here. What it does expose is the spread of listeners: a household that put the first book on while traveling with two children aged eleven and seven, a handle that reads Teacher Man, an adult rationing chapters after work and school. Sarah's entire verdict runs four words about a thoughtfully constructed exciting story. That range of ages tells you more about the book than the grade does.
Why It Works in Audio
The Cambridge sequence is the reason to give this the time. Berry hands Maeve a wish-granting djinni and then makes the point that magic cannot buy the one thing she actually wants, which is permission. What moves her is not a spell but a visit: ambitious young women at a university, breaking down barriers in science, in education, and in sports, at a moment when that was the genuinely improbable part of the story. Middle grade fantasy does not often let its lead discover that the interesting adults are the real ones, and Berry gives that discovery room to breathe rather than treating it as a stop on the way to the burglary plot.
Audible Originals put it out with a single reader credited, which means Maeve, Alice, Tom, the burglars, the Cambridge scientists and Mermeros the djinni all arrive in the same voice. Jayne Entwistle carries that entire cast across the better part of nine and a half hours. Worth knowing before you press play: a children's adventure with this many speaking parts is exactly where a second reader or a small ensemble tends to appear, and this file offers neither. Whatever the production spent, it did not spend it on a roster.
Libby Bergstrom's entry gets closest to why the ending lands: Maeve grows, and then makes a decision that looks out for others more than her own desires. That turn is the spine of the last stretch, and it keeps the wish premise from collapsing into a list of things a girl might order. Magic mirrors and a djinni blend smoothly into a very real 1897 England, as the same entry puts it, instead of replacing it. Berry has built a fantasy in which the fantastical element is the least interesting thing on the table, and the book knows it.
Weak Spots in Burglars and Bluestockings
Three gaps on this record deserve a warning. The first is the missing series information: a conclusion sold without a number attached to it. The second is that two entries out of the five are not describing this file at all. Teacher Man awards five stars in one sentence about excellent condition, which is a verdict on a parcel, and Jfrank's granddaughters screamed with delight when the second book arrived from Amazon, which is a verdict on delivery. Both grades feed the same badge a listener is invited to read as a judgment of the recording.
One more caution about that column: Ben's entry, by a wide margin the most detailed of the five, stops mid-sentence. It breaks off inside a comparison with the earlier books, so whatever qualification was coming never arrives and the five stars stand in its place. Two of the four remaining entries are a single sentence each, which leaves this column carrying roughly one paragraph of usable opinion in total. Nineteen people rated the thing; five wrote something; one of those five wrote at length and was clipped. If your habit is to read the long review and skim the short ones, be aware that the long one has been cut off before it reached its point.
What the listing withholds is any guidance on age, which for a children's title is the first question a buyer asks. The description offers 1897, a djinni, a burglary and a university visit; the badge offers 4.9; the tag row and the badge row are both empty. The only usable signals come from the column. Jfrank names granddaughters aged eleven and seven who had already finished the opening book. Libby Bergstrom calls the series middle grade outright. Between those two you get a floor and a ceiling that the seller never posted.
Who Will Get the Most From It
Kids who already know Maeve and Mermeros are the people this was built for, and the column suggests the series rewards them: one family listened together in transit, one adult drew the books out deliberately. Newcomers will not drown, since the description recaps the sardine tin and the wishes in its opening lines, though they will miss the weight of a goodbye that every entry underneath is reacting to. Adults sitting through it alongside a seven-year-old will find the 1897 material and the moral turn worth their own attention rather than merely tolerable.
Jfrank's eleven and seven make a fair bracket, and below that the burglary plot and the period detail will outrun a listener. Pass if you want a straightforward fairy tale, because Berry spends real time on what girls in 1897 were kept out of, and pass if you need a documented production, because the record gives you one name, one runtime and nothing else about how this was made. The series ends here, and on the evidence of the people who got there first, Berry lands it.
How long is the Burglars and Bluestockings audiobook and who reads it?
The file runs nine hours and twenty-nine minutes, and Jayne Entwistle is the only reader credited on it. No second narrator, no cast list and no director appear anywhere on the record, so a story with children, thieves, a djinni and a set of Cambridge scientists in it is delivered by one voice throughout.
Is this a standalone or the end of a series?
The listing carries no series name and no volume number, but the people who wrote in leave no doubt about it. Ben calls it the final book and compares it with the first two, while Libby Bergstrom describes the trio winding up with no loose ends. Treat it as a conclusion that was sold without a label.
What age is this audiobook aimed at?
Nothing official is posted: the tag row sits empty and the description names no reading level. The usable evidence comes from the people who bought it, one of whom lists granddaughters of eleven and seven already familiar with the opening volume, while another calls the series middle grade without qualification.
Why do some of the ratings talk about condition and delivery?
Because grades written for the printed edition end up feeding the same badge as grades for the recording. One five-star entry consists of a single line about a book arriving in excellent condition, and another celebrates a second volume showing up from Amazon. Neither writer is describing anything a listener would hear.
