DWD's Reviews

Published in October of 2014 by Simon and Schuster Read by the author, Gillian Anderson Duration: 9 hours, 34 minutes Unabridged A Vision of Fire is a mix of political thriller with sci-fi and a heavy dose of the occult thrown in as well. The book starts out with top-level negotiations taking place at the United Nations between India and Pakistan over the disputed region of Kashmir. Both countries are nuclear powers and both countries are sending troops to the border. An Indian ambassador is trusted by both sides and he is trying to broker a peace between them before a nuclear war starts. But, after dropping off his daughter Maanik at her school mysterious assassins make an unsuccessful attempt on his life. He reassures his daughter that he is fine and proceeds to the negotiating table. But, his daughter starts to have some sort of break down and starts clawing at her arms.  She is rushed home and heavily sedated because she is hurting herself. The translator for the ambas

Published in 2015 by Michael Putzel. Michael Putzel has written a sort of unit history of C Troop 2/17th Cavalry 101st Airborne Division in Vietnam, also known as the Condors. The tales of combat in Vietnam and Laos are exceedingly well-told, riveting and harrowing. They tell of bravery, loyalty and loss and gave me a picture of a part of the war that I really knew very little about before. But, as good as those stories are, the real strength of the story is the story about what comes after the war. The title, The Price They Paid , is more than just story of who was injured and who died in the war. Certainly, they paid the highest price. But, the men who were injured, the men who lost their friends, even the men who went through unscathed - those men who survived to go home also paid a price and that is what I found most compelling. The book focuses on Jim Newman, a  man who started as a private in the army, worked his way to becoming an officer. In Vietnam he led his men in the A

Published in 2015 by HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books in May of 2015. Multicast performance Duration: 2 hours, 20 minutes Unabridged In a lot of ways the first story in this 30 story collection typifies the entire collection. It is called "Grizzly Encounters" and is an almost 6 minute long recounting of three different encounters with Grizzly Bears. We were on a long family trip and you could almost sense the family settling in for what was sure to be an interesting story. But, after we had listened to each of them sort of peter out to a "that's it?" moment I stopped the CD and asked if I was the only one that was disappointed in that story. Everyone, even the nine year old, thought the story was a disappointment. So, on to the next story - a story about bats in a mine that I remember most for telling me this was the sound of the bats that they had been hunting (and me thinking that this would sound great in the awesome speakers of the rental S

Published by Random House in 2009 Read by Titus Welliver Duration: 5 hours, 7 minutes Unabridged In the third book in this series, Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch do a lot, but at the same time I felt like this book went nowhere and made a lot of noise doing it. In short, Cole and Hitch begin the story looking for Cole's ex-girlfriend Allie French. You have to have read the first two books to even begin to wonder why Cole wants to find this woman again. They find her in the worst brothel in the worst part of town and rescue her and a fight ensues. They all leave town and eventually find a town that needs two deputies and they take the jobs. In the town there are multiple saloons, including one led by a former army officer who was cashiered from the service because he led his men on an attack on an Indian village and killed old people, women and children but no warriors.  There is also a church in town with a curious brand of Christianity led by a megalomaniac who believ

Published in October of 2014 by Random House Audio Read by the author, Jim Gaffigan Duration: 7 hours, 17 minutes Unabridged My wife and two kids and I listened to Food: A Love Story as we drove on our family trip this summer. We are fans of Jim Gaffigan (I really appreciate the fact that our children can listen and he rarely uses an inappropriate word, let alone vulgar commentary or topics.) The book is obviously about food and Jim rarely deviates from it. He is not a "foodie". He is not driving out of his way to get something new. He is not traveling with the intent to try exotic twists on old flavors. Nope, he is an every man talking about regular every day food - burgers, fries, hot dogs, ice cream, cupcakes, pancakes, etc. He gets his tips on where to go by tweeting to his followers that he is in a certain city and where should he go. He rarely gets a bad recommendation. He includes an overview of the country with regional specialties, including a long and hil

Published by Marvel Press and Blackstone Audio on April 10 of 2015. Read by Tom Taylorson Duration: 1 hour, 34 minutes. Unabridged. Marvel's Avengers: The Age of Ultron: The Junior Novelization  is my third audiobook of a junior novelization of a movie from the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  They adhere closely to the movies, have all been well-read, easy to listen to and, on the whole, quite enjoyable.  But, this one is troubling because it only covers half of the movie. Literally, this audiobook is about half of the length of the other audiobooks as well. If you have seen the movie, it only goes to the fight scene in the ship that is being harvested for scrap metal and it alludes to the Iron Man/Hulk fight scene. That's it.  Ultron Up to that point, it's an enjoyable audiobook. Reader Tom Taylorson does a very good job with the different voices of the Avengers, especially Thor. He also does an especially good job with the voice of Ultron - sometimes he sounds exa

Published in 2015 by Blackstone Audio Read by Jim Meskimen Duration: 2 hours, 52 minutes Unabridged Marvel Press has released a series of junior novelizations of their Avenger and Avenger-related movies. The term "Phase One" in the title means that this is a pre-Avengers book that serves to introduce an Avenger. The publisher recommends them for ages 8-12 but my wife and I listened along with the kids in the car and we enjoyed it as well. My wife was really got into it. I was the only one in the car that had actually seen the The Incredible Hulk  movie. Marvel's Avengers Phase One: The Incredible Hulk is a faithful re-telling of the movie. Unlike some novelizations, this one does not really expand past what the movie reviewer would have seen in the movie. No new secrets revealed or anything. The book starts with Bruce Banner already having been exposed to gamma radiation and having already changed into the Incredible Hulk. In fact, the real plot gets going five