B.J. Harrison
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Every week, join award-winning narrator B.J. Harrison as he narrates the greatest stories the world has ever known. From the jungles of South America to the Mississippi Delta, from Victorian England to the sands of the Arabian desert, join us on a fantastic journey through the words of the world's greatest authors. Critically-acclaimed and highly recommended for anyone who loves a good story with plenty of substance.
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
B.J. Harrison turns classic novels and stories into sustained listening, preserving their suspense, atmosphere, and serialized momentum.
The Classic Tales Podcast gives classic fiction room to work at its original scale. B.J. Harrison introduces the author and installment, then turns the episode over to sustained narration rather than summary or commentary.
B.J. Harrison can take you from a green sun to a fugitive's dusty disguise.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A broken life record turns missing memories and moral dread into slow unease.
Ambrose Bierce's "The Moonlit Road" opens with a document that denies the comfort of a full life story. A man looks back across twenty years of poverty, pain, wandering, and a consuming sense of crime and punishment, yet what remains is mostly fragments: waking mature and hungry…
Bertie's romantic panic turns a sick-room deception into a cruise plan, while Jeeves stays calmly ahead.
Bertie's infatuation turns ordinary damage control into a neat comic emergency. With his brother injured in two places, Mrs. Slingsby expected in London, and Miss Pendlebury asking questions, he sends Jeeves to Mr. Pym for the story behind the sick-room deception.
A princess turns courtly wine service into the decisive move against the African magician.
Aladdin's danger resolves over wine, with Princess Badrulbudur using courtesy and the custom of exchanged goblets to draw the African magician into full confidence.
Jeeves's poise turns Bertie's terrier duty into elegant comic trouble.
Aunt Agatha's terrier Macintosh gives this Jeeves story its neatly comic center. Bertie is put in charge of the dog, and the task soon brushes up against Miss Wickham, a child, a play, and a contract.
Aladdin's rise looks secure until the magician he escaped reads his fate in the stars.
The Classic Tales Podcast's vintage reading of Aladdin treats success as something that has to be proven in public. A revolt breaks out on the edge of the kingdom, and Aladdin asks to lead the sultan's expedition.
A stately Aladdin episode that builds wonder through wealth, order, and steady escalation.
Aladdin's bargain with power gives this episode its shape: a lamp, a genie who answers at once, and a hunger for riches that keeps widening the scene.
A tennis match tests Bingo's vigilance as Jeeves turns a looming scandal into cool logistics.
Bertie's effort to save Bingo Little from the fallout of his own negligence gives this country-house comedy a neat tension: someone has to keep young Thomas close, and Bingo is not always built for vigilance.
Verne makes the Yenisei crossing feel like a wartime problem with no easy way across.
Verne shifts the chapter into hard-edged wartime pressure. The Yenisei is not just a river here but a mile-wide obstacle, and with no boat, raft, or ferry in sight, the crossing feels urgent rather than theoretical.
Multi-part dramatized retellings of scandals like OceanGate's Titan and the Lehman Brothers collapse.
The Classic Tales Podcast presents Ambrose Bierce's “The Moonlit Road,” a three-part gothic story built from conflicting statements about one murder.
The Classic Tales Podcast presents P.G.
This episode features a brief ad for T-Mobile followed by the host introducing the audiobook library card and the conclusion of Aladdin's adventures.
The Classic Tales Podcast presents B.J.
This episode features a narration of Aladdin from the Arabian Nights, part of a series that presents classic literature in audiobook format.
In part three of Aladdin from the Arabian Nights, Aladdin uses his magical lamp to disrupt the princess's marriage, fulfill the Sultan's extravagant demands with a genie's help, and ultimately secure her hand by building a palace overnight.
Bertie Wooster visits his aunt's country house, where he encounters his friend Bingo Little secretly tutoring Bertie's cousin.
Arthur Conan Doyle's short story The New Catacomb is performed in full.
In part 8 of Jules Verne's 'Michael Strogoff,' the protagonist and his companions struggle to cross the Yenisei River using a makeshift raft, face superstitions and Tartar threats, and ultimately escape to continue their perilous journey toward Irkutsk amidst the ongoing invasion.
In this vintage horror story by M.R.
In part 7 of Jules Verne's 'Michael Strogoff', the courier is captured and marched with prisoners including his mother and Nadia.
Michael Strogoff, horseless in Siberia, evades capture in Koivan amid battle, but is later taken prisoner to a Tartar camp.
Alice continues her adventures in the Looking Glass world, encountering Tweedledum and Tweedledee, the White Queen, and Humpty Dumpty, engaging in surreal conversations about logic, dreams, and language.
In part 5 of Jules Verne's 'Michael Strogoff', the courier faces escalating dangers in Siberia, including a heartbreaking public denial of his mother to protect his mission from the traitor Ivan Ogarev.
In this vintage narration, Alice steps through a looking-glass into a fantastical world where she encounters living chess pieces, reads the Jabberwocky poem, talks with critical flowers, meets the Red Queen on a chessboard landscape, and grapples with identity in a nameless wood.
In the small town of Mariposa, the Knights of Pythias embark on a steamboat excursion that turns comically disastrous when the boat sinks onto a reed bank, leading to a chaotic rescue and eventual safe return, satirizing small-town life and human folly.
Michael Strogoff and Nadia continue their journey to Irkutsk, facing a spy plot from Tsiganes and a violent storm in the Ural Mountains, while revealing their personal missions and enduring treacherous travel conditions.
In an alternate 1920s America, narrator Hildred Castaigne descends into madness after reading the cursed book 'The King in Yellow,' believing himself heir to a secret imperial dynasty.
In Tsarist Russia, the Grand Duke's life is threatened by a Tartar rebellion, leading the Tsar to dispatch courier Michael Strogoff on a dangerous mission across Siberia to deliver a critical warning, while political intrigue and traitorous plots unfold.
A Princeton prodigy, Horace Tarbox, falls for Marcia Meadow, a vibrant actress, leading to a marriage that blends intellectual and artistic worlds.
A young New England boy named Tommy experiences his first Christmas by hanging a stocking, only to have his family play a cruel prank by filling it with pig parts and vegetables.
In the final part of A Christmas Carol, Scrooge is haunted by the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, witnessing his lonely death and the callous reactions of others.
In a small town, elderly Granny Simmers secretly buys herself Christmas gifts, fearing she'll be forgotten, but when the community showers her with presents, she's overwhelmed with guilt and confesses her deception during the church celebration, leading to a touching moment of forgiveness and love.
In this vintage narration of A Christmas Carol Part 3, Scrooge is visited by the Ghost of Christmas Present, who shows him festive scenes including the Cratchit family's dinner and his nephew's party, while confronting him with the consequences of his miserly ways, including Tiny Tim's fate and societal ignorance.
Two boys from Blackburn Hill secretly decorate the Enderly Road school and play Santa Claus to surprise the children, mending the long-standing feud between their communities through a heartfelt Christmas act.
In Part 2 of A Christmas Carol, the Ghost of Christmas Past shows Ebenezer Scrooge key moments from his youth, including his lonely childhood, joyful times with his sister Fan and employer Fezziwig, and the heartbreaking end of his engagement to Belle.
Effie, a discontented girl tired of Christmas, dreams of a Christmas spirit who shows her a magical world where gifts are prepared for the poor.
B.J.
In this vintage Sherlock Holmes story, Dr.
In a Louisiana bayou village terrorized by a mysterious plague, Dr.
A coffin maker named Yakov reflects on his life of prejudice, regret, and missed opportunities as his wife dies, leading to an emotional awakening and a transformative connection with a Jewish fiddler named Rothschild.
The episode concludes James Joyce's 'The Dead,' following Gabriel Conroy at a Dublin holiday party where he delivers a toast on Irish hospitality, then grapples with his wife Greta's revelation of a past love, Michael Fury, leading to a profound meditation on memory, death, and marital distance amidst a snowy landscape.
A vintage narration of Guy de Maupassant's short story 'A Meeting,' where Baron d'Etraillet discovers his wife's infidelity and separates from her, only to encounter her six years later on a train journey, leading to a tense reunion and unexpected revelations about change and social maneuvering.
This episode narrates Part 1 of James Joyce's 'The Dead', set at a holiday dance in Dublin hosted by the Morkan sisters.
The Classic Tales Podcast delivers the final installment of John Buchan's 1915 spy thriller The Thirty-Nine Steps, in which Richard Hannay's desperate journey reaches its resolution.
The Classic Tales Podcast presents the fifth and final part of William Hope Hodgson's 1908 cosmic horror novel The House on the Borderland, in which the narrator watches millions of years pass from his seat at the edge of the universe, witnessing the death of the sun, the freezing of the earth, and the eventual extinction of all recognisable matter.
In Part 3 of 'The 39 Steps,' protagonist Richard Hannay, on the run and injured, finds refuge with Sir Walter Bullivant.
In this horror narrative, the narrator experiences supernatural visions, including encountering his lost love in a mystical sea and witnessing time accelerate rapidly, leading to the decay of his surroundings and his own aging over millennia as the world approaches its end.
Richard Hannay continues his flight across Scotland, uncovering a spy plot to start World War I.
In Part 3 of 'The House on the Borderland,' the narrator explores the cellars, discovering a trapdoor that leads to eerie sounds.
Richard Hannay, bored in London, meets freelance spy Franklin Scudder, who reveals a conspiracy to assassinate Greek premier Constantine Karolides.
In Part 2 of 'The House on the Borderland', the narrator investigates strange occurrences in the pit near his house, encountering grotesque swine-like creatures that attack him and his dog.
Narrator B.J.
A narrator introduces and performs a classic short story about a plantation owner facing a swarm of soldier ants.
Award-winning narrator B.J.
The episode features a P.G.
A narrator introduces and reads Agatha Christie's short story 'The Wife of the Kenite,' set in South Africa after World War I.
A narrator introduces and begins reading Arthur Conan Doyle's story 'The Horror of the Heights' about a pilot encountering a monster at high altitude.