DWD's Reviews

Good, simple story about a law case (in which the defendant says he didn't do it because he was being abducted and probed by aliens at the time). Published in 1997. Read by Alexa Bauer Approximately 3 hours. Abridged, I'm reviewing Star Witness as an audiobook - more on that below. Part of my positive reaction to this book, I am sure is a negative reaction I've recently had to several books on tape that I've listened to lately. Some have tried too hard to be overly-complicated. Some have injected way too much romance, so much that you forget it was supposed to be a legal thriller with a bit of romance, not a romance with a bit of legal thriller. However, this story is a no-frills, just-the-facts-ma'am legal story - thank goodness! Now, this is not to say that it is not entertaining and the facts are not truly bizarre. Lia Matera 's book is set in California and involves a man who is arrested for vehicular manslaughter, but he claims he can't have ...

12 discs 14 hours read by Dick Hill* Edgar Award winner - 1993. First, let me say that Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch stories are the best series currently being published. I've read and heard books throughout the series and let me heartily recommend hearing the Harry Bosch books rather than reading them. Why? First of all, narrator Dick Hill has an amazing voice and he captures Harry Bosch perfectly. There is no one better. Secondly, Connelly's books really are well-written. I listen to a lot of audiobooks while I commute. Most are fine, but you can always tell the so-so authors. Their prose does not do well when read aloud while Connelly's shines. Combine it with Hill's voice and you have an experience, not just a book. (I'm not kidding, try it - I get two weeks of enjoyment by listening on the way to and from work rather than just two days in the traditional book format). So, is The Black Echo a good book? Not just good, it's great. Mic...

Published in 2008 by Brilliance. Unabridged audiobook. Duration: 7 hours, 19 minutes. Read by James Daniels. In my mind, Robert Crais has the second best series in fiction going right now, just after Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch series. Solid, quirky, oftentimes funny, good detective stories throughout. Elvis Cole and his enigmatic partner Joe Pike are on a dark, depressing case in Chasing Darkness . Three years earlier Cole had proven that a man could not have committed a horrific murder. Now, that man is found dead with evidence that he committed not only that murder but 6 others. Cole is sure that his work in the original case is correct and this man is being set up after his death and the real murderer is still wandering the streets. Cole and Pike start to pull on some loose threads and soon they have more trouble than they bargained for. Chasing Darkness is not as good as other Cole novels such as The Last Detective . This one starts out rather slowly but it buil...

Good story - not terribly original, but fun nonetheless. Published by Random House Audio in 1998. Read by Boyd Gaines Approximately 3 hours Abridged. I heard Vespers as an abridged audiobook and I will talk about that aspect at the end. If you saw any of Hollywood's animal disaster B movies (Giant ants, snakes, bugs, etc. that attack humanity) than you get the idea behind this book. Normally placid bats are attacking people and gathering in a murderous swarm above New York City. Meanwhile, something else - something very large - is killing people in the subway tunnels. Will the animal expert and the rough cop be able to save the day? Even though the plot is formulaic, I still found myself wanting to know what happened next. I couldn't wait to pop the tape in the player as soon as I got in the car! The audiobook is read by Boyd Gaines who does a phenomenal job. Every character has a unique and distinct voice in accent. 5 stars for him, if I could. I rate this audi...

An excellent, gripping, morally challenging novel. Published by HarperAudio in 2000. Read by Campbell Scott. Duration: Approximately 3 hours. Abridged. I am reviewing Rising Phoenix as an abridged audiobook and will make specific comments on that aspect of it at the end of this review. I have drudged and slogged my way through a number of books and books on tape lately and this one was like a bolt of lightning - it came out of nowhere and really was a welcome surprise for me. I won't go into many of the plot details - however, this is a great bit of writing.  The premise is thought-provoking, to say the least. The main idea is that someone decides to poison the supply of illegal drugs in order to truly scare everyone straight. The idea of drugs killing you are no longer just an abstract possibility, it is an immediate reality. In a nice twist, the antagonist is well-developed and the protagonists are not. The story is plot-driven and by that I mean we don't get bogge...

A lot of soap opera, a little legal thriller Published by Brilliance Audio in 2003. Duration: Approximately 3 hours. Read by Laurel Merlington Abridged I listened to Acts of Malice as an abridged audiobook and I'm hoping some of the problems I have with the book were really due to the abridgment. Problems: 1. her son Bob - he never speaks. He never does anything but be the perfect son who never, ever does anything wrong while mom sometimes spends outrageous hours out of the home. Watch out for this kid - he's going to be trouble! 2. Her son Bob says nothing, nothing at all about mom getting married to a man she just started re-dating while he's off on a trip to Germany (apparently unplanned since the tapes bring it up as he's packing the day before). 3. I don't know about you, but I think it would be pretty unethical to start dating the prosecutor during your defendant's murder trial. 4. The book spent much more time on the character's conf...

Great twists. Good book. Abridged version leaves some things out. Published by Brilliance Audio Read by Dale Hull Duration: About 3 hours Abridged Just to let you know, I heard The Pied Piper as an abridged audiobook. I will discuss specific issues about the audiobook aspect of it later. This was a scary, sad thriller. Children are being abducted from their bedrooms across Seattle and, in reality, all across the country and Seattle's finest are out to stop the kidnappings. Obstacles in their path include very poor teamwork with the FBI and there's another kidnapping very close to home...but I won't spoil it for you by telling you who. Good police work ensues and it is satisfying to go along with the police as they slowly amass their clues and get closer and closer. Once the reader finds out the truth, there's still quite a bit of work to do to wrap it all up - including a cross-country chase. Its a good, good thriller and I would have given it 5 stars but ...

Good thriller plot overcomes other issues Originally published in 1999. Read by Benjamin L. Darcie Duration: 14 hours, 44 minutes Unabridged Just so you'll know, I am reviewing Cuba as an audiobook - I listened to it as an audiobook and as an audiobook it was pretty good, meaning that I never really wondered if there was something else on the radio that was better. As to the plot - I found it to be especially interesting to have the book focus on the presence of Weapons of Mass Destruction in Cuba, considering our situations in Iran and North Korea and the famed search for WMD in Iraq. The descriptions of the power of these weapons and the reasons that tin-pot dictators and superpowers possess them was informative. As always, Coonts writes wonderful action sequences. His characters are sometimes a bit stiff, especially with his American cabinet officials. Quibbles I have with the book: -Sometimes there's so much tech-speak that it bogs the story down. At times, ...

My first foray into P.J. O'Rourke's books Published by Brilliance Audio Duration: 5 hours, 48 minutes Read by Dick Hill Unabridged I've read some of P.J. O'Rourke's columns and have heard an interview or two so I knew that I would most likely find one of his books to be most interesting. To begin with, I found Peace Kills: America's Fun New Imperialism mostly dead-on accurate and depressing. Observations about the War in Bosnia, human nature in general and Israel were factually interesting but mostly deflating. Not that I am overly optimistic about human nature (being both a history major and a Lutheran has given me a fairly low opinion about the character of humanity) but P.J.'s account was even getting to me. But, in the middle it picks up - ironically with his description of 9/11 and the days that followed in Washington, D.C. I found his observations to be keen, interesting and, in an odd way, hopeful. His descriptions of the pro-Palestinian/a...

It had to happen eventually... Published by Hachette Audio in 2007 Read by Len Cariou Duration: 6 hours, 37 minutes Unabridged I've read and reviewed almost all of the Harry Bosch books and they've all been enthusiastic 5 star reviews. Connelly falls out of the stratosphere with The Overlook . Note, he doesn't crash and burn but this is simply not as good as the rest. Brian Doyle-Murray To begin with, the plot is fairly simple and straightforward compared to the usual brooding, complex story lines. I heard this as an audiobook and it was just flubbed my veteran narrator Len Cariou. All of the male characters sounded like a bad impersonation of character actor Brian Doyle-Murray. It was not a pretty scene. So, I can now confirm that Connelly is now a mortal among writers - he has written a merely pedestrian, run-of-the-mill police procedural. I rate this book 3 out of 5 stars. This audiobook can be found on Amazon.com here: The Overlook by Michael Connel...

Published by HighBridge Audio. Originally broadcast in 1993. Multicast performance. Duration: approximately 5 hours. Star Wars, Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (The Original Radio Drama) was created for National Public Radio and originally broadcast in 1993. It features several members of the original movie cast including Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker), Anthony Daniels (C3PO) and Billy Dee Williams (Lando Calrissian). John Lithgow steps in and does a strong job with Yoda. Vader suffers with Brock Peters as the voice - not because he did anything wrong, but because he is just not James Earl Jones. George Lucas opened up the Star Wars vault and let NPR use the original soundtrack and original special effects - and they use them well. The soundtrack punches up the story and the special effects are used to move the story along as often as they are used to add a little detail to the experience. The story is well told and has the added bonus of being able to take a little more tim...

I laughed my way through this audiobook! Published by Eastmoor Media in 2005. Performed by Bruce Campbell and his actor friends. Duration: 6 hours, 17 minutes. Unabridged. I picked up and looked at the book version of Make Love the Bruce Campbell Way several times and never quite decided to pick it up. But, I quickly snapped up the audiobook version because of this quote from the back cover from Bruce Campbell: "...the prospects of doing a 'regular" audio adaptation weren't very appealing. But then a few things dawned on me: 1. I'm the lead character of the book. 2. As an actor by trade, I could play the part. 3. I'm knee deep in actor pals, why not record the book like a radio play?"  At that point I was sold. The story revolves around Bruce Campbell's attempt to move from being a B movie legend to a real A-list movie star. He gets his chance in "Let's Make Love", a Richard Gere/Rene Zelwegger romantic comedy directed by Mik...

Up and down - the ups are solid, the downs are low, so low I nearly quit listening Published in 2008 by Audible Studios. Performed by  Michael Hogan, Scott Brick, Kandyse McClure, Alessandro Juliani, Stefan Rudnicki, John Scalzi Duration: 9 hours, 7 minutes. Unabridged METAtropolis: The Dawn of Uncivilization  is a collection of short stories about a fictional future world in which the United States government is much weaker and local governments have had to shoulder most of the responsibility for governing. We get to see 4 future settings in this anthology - Cascadia in the American Northwest, Detroit, New St. Louis and Scandinavia. While the U.S. government is much weaker, the role of technology has grown much stronger. There are virtual on-line worlds and cellphones are everywhere and even more plugged in than they are now. The five authors sat down and mapped out the ground rules of this future world and than separated to write their stories. John Scalzi edited the colle...

Published in 2007. Read by Alfred Molina. Duration: 7 hours, 30 minutes. Unabridged. The Chopin Manuscript is not really a great story but an interesting premise and veteran actor Alfred Molina does a fantastic job performing this audiobook. This book was given an "Audie Award" (2008 Audiobook of the Year) and that is entirely due to the masterful ability of Molina to mimic accents and create voices for literally dozens of characters. His performance was much better than the material he was given to perform. The idea behind the story is pretty simple - Jeffery Deaver ( The Lesson of Her Death ), a well-known writer of action thrillers started out an international thriller by writing the first chapter. Then the story was handed off to another author and a chapter was added (15 authors in total) until it got back Deaver who wrote the concluding chapter. The story is a thrill-a-minute ride that has a herky-jerky nature. Every author seemed to be out to move the story alon...

Much like the last one in the series, the experiment in making the story is better than the story. Published in 2009 by Audible Originals. Read by Alfred Molina. Duration: 8 hours, 31 minutes. Unabridged. The Copper Bracelet is the second installment in the Harry Middleton story. Harry is former military officer, former music teacher, current hunter of war criminals. Along with his compatriots, the Volunteers, Harry Middleton is after war criminals from Kashmir. The story behind the book is pretty simple - Jeffery Deaver ( Garden of Beasts: A Novel of Berlin 1936 ), a well-known writer of action thrillers started out an international thriller by writing the first chapter. Then the story was handed off to another author and a chapter was added (16 authors in total) until it got back Deaver who wrote the concluding chapter. This is a slightly different group of writers than in the first novel, The Chopin Manuscript: A Serial Thriller . The Copper Bracelet is a bit smoother than ...

Published in 2007 by Zondervan Read by the author, Lee Strobel Duration: 10 hours, 45 minutes Unabridged Lee Strobel has written several "The Case for..." books. The Case for the Real Jesus: A Journalist Investigates Current Attacks on the Identity of Christ explicitly counters the arguments from many different sources that question Jesus, the teachings about him and the integrity of the New Testament. Critics argue that Strobel is not an expert on the things he writes about. I believe he would agree with that - at most he is a well-informed layman. But, Strobel did the best thing that one can do to create a rebuttal these arguments - he went out to the experts and questioned them (because, really, who is a qualified expert in all of these fields?). Strobel asks them the questions that the "anti-" crowd would ask (really a wide range, from Muslim teachers to Hollywood directors to college professors to former Christian clergy to internet bloggers). Lee S...

Published by Brilliance Audio Read by Patrick G. Lawlor Duration: 6 hours, 52 minutes Unabridged Synopsis:  Elvis Cole and his partner Joe Pike are hired by a Los Angeles businessman to find a missing ancient copy of the Hagakure , a book that details Bushido, or the way of the Samurai. Along the way, they discover hidden family secrets, connection to the Yakuza (Japan's ultra-violent mafia) and deal with a kidnapping and modern followers of the Bushido. My review: Written in 1989, Stalking the Angel is an early Elvis Cole book. Crais is still doing a bit of casting about to find his rhythm with the characters of Joe Pike, Elvis and even his irascible cat. The plot doesn't flow as well as later books but it still a very nice listen. It is narrated by Patrick G. Lawlor who does a solid job of catching Cole's wisecracking side but overall does not catch on to Elvis as well as the narrators of his later books do. I rate this book 4 stars out of 5. This book can be...

Beautifully told - in all of its splendor and horror 5 CDs Approximately 5 Hours Abridged. Also includes a tiny 6 panel map of the war zones . Cotter Smith masterfully narrates a wonderful re-telling of Ambrose's favorite topic - the Western European theater of World War II. Citizen Soldiers would serve as a fantastic introduction to this topic, but also is told well enough that someone who has read it all before, like me, found it interesting, informative and entertaining. Ambrose spices up the story with a lot of stories about regular soldiers at the front. We learn about the challenges, the humor, and the horrors of the fight. Some are soldiers you've never heard of, others are more famous such as Kurt Vonnegut ( Slaughterhouse-five ) and Jimmy Stewart ( Mr. Smith Goes to Washington Stephen Ambrose ). Some stories make you laugh out loud, the Vonnegut Christmas story was so sad that I turned off the CD player and drove the rest of the way home in silence becau...

A tedious listen. Published by Tantor Audio in 2008. Duration: 10 hours, 25 minutes. Read by Alan Sklar. Unabridged. I am an avid reader of history. I also enjoy listening to histories as part of my daily commute. I thought Patriot Pirates would be a fantastic diversion since I knew relatively little about the naval history of the Revolutionary War besides the story of Bonhomme Richard and the fact that the Continental Congress authorized the use of privateers. Unfortunately, Patton's dry, overly wordy text coupled with Alan Sklar's (the narrator) ironic, almost mocking tone made me both both bored and irritated at the same time. If it can be said in 50 words, Patton uses 500. He tells the same stories over and over again. After listening to 5 of 9 discs I refused to force myself to slog through another chapter - partially because it was so poorly narrated, partially because I was becoming a public safety hazard - I was literally nodding off. I listen to CDs to make m...

An amazing tale, fascinating to this non-Catholic Christian (a review of the audiobook) Published by Random House Audio in 2008. Read by Kirsten Potter Running time: 7 hours, 7 minutes Unabridged Let me start this review of Called Out of Darkness by saying three things: 1) I am not a Catholic (I am a Lutheran); 2) I have never left the faith in any meaningful way; 3) This is my first Anne Rice book - I've never even seen more than a tiny bit the Tom Cruise movie. I have never had much interest in the topic of Vampires and Vampire LeStat series was literally of no interest to me. When I noticed that Rice was writing the Christ the Lord series I had the same thought that she expressed in this book - what is she going to do to mess with Jesus? So, I ignored that as well. But, when I ran across this audiobook I suddenly grew interested and I was not disappointed. The book is broken into three general sections: her childhood in New Orleans, her college/career/atheism and ...