Audiobook Review: Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie, narrated by David Suchet + Just Desserts reminder

Death on the Nile
by Agatha Christie, audiobook narrated by David Suchet (Compact Disc Christie – also available in Hoopla eAudiobook)

In the past couple of years, I made it a goal for myself to listen to all of the Hercule Poirot novels and short story collections by Agatha Christie, as audiobooks. The actor Hugh Fraser (who placed Captain Hastings in the long-running series of Poirot adaptations to television) narrates many of them, but for certain key titles, actor David Suchet (who played Poirot on television from 1989 to 2013) does the audio narration. That is the case with Death on the Nile.

 

Of all of Poirot’s famed cases, the two which are probably most recognizable to casual readers are Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile. Death on the Nile is a twisty tale, with a group of characters all trapped on a luxury excursion boat on a tour of Egypt’s Nile river. When a wealthy young American heiress is murdered (following various threats against her), and her newlywed husband is badly injured, fellow passenger Hercule Poirot is called upon to solve the case. The suspects and motives are plenty. One of Christie’s other recurring sleuths, Col. Race, is also present to partner with Poirot. And the exotic location is put to good use.

Suchet’s voice as Poirot very effectively pulls you into the story, but it is his deftness at creating distinctive vocal personalities for every other character in the story that is truly amazing. I know that Kenneth Branagh narrated a new audiobook version in conjunction with his recent movie version of the story, but Suchet really inhabits Poirot much more successfully than Branagh, and I highly recommend his version of Death on the Nile. It is truly one of the “crown jewels” of Christie’s works.

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try Suchet’s audiobook version of Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie. There have been multiple film/tv adaptations of this story, starring actors such as Peter Ustinov, David Suchet and Kenneth Branagh in the role of Poirot.)

 

( official Agatha Christie web site )

 

Read Kristen A.'s review of Death on the Nile in the February 2017 Staff Recommendations here on BookGuide!

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

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If you're a mystery fan, you're invited to join us for this month's Just Desserts meeting tonight, March 28th, at 6:30 p.m. in the 4th floor auditorium of the Bennett Martin Public Library downtown at 14th & "N" St. -- this mystery-themed discussion group meets on the last Thursday of each month, January through October.

Tonight, we'll be discussing the the first six entries in the Flavia de Luce series by British author Alan Bradley.

 

Even if you haven't read any of the Flavia de Luce entries for this specific discussion, you can still participate, and learn about other great new mysteries to try! For more information, check out the Just Desserts schedule at https://lincolnlibraries.org/bookguide/book-groups/#justdesserts

Audiobook Review: Misery by Stephen King, narrated by Lindsay Crouse

Misery
by Stephen King (Compact Disc King)

Misery was best-selling author Stephen King’s 20th book (approximately), originally released in 1987. King, to that point, was known primarily as a horror writer who often featured supernatural elements in his stories — ‘Salem’s Lot, Carrie, The Shining, Cujo, Christine, The Stand, Firestarter, Pet Sematary — he wrote Misery in part as a reaction to being pigeonholed by his fans as a particular type of writer. His ardent fans did not gracefully appreciate his classical fantasy novel, Eyes of the Dragon, and insisted he return to what he was best known for. Also, and King has been clear about this in his own non-fiction writings, he had been dealing with drug addictions and abuse, and Misery was a chance to anthropomorphize those addictions as a destructive human character.

 

In Misery, Paul Sheldon is the author of a best-selling series of Victorian romantic suspense novels featuring plucky heroine Misery Chastain — a series he has grown to despise. Sheldon has just finished a personal writing retreat at a lodge in the Rocky Mountains, having completed what he believes to be his first “serious novel”, and after too much to drink, he drives off a mountain road, overturning his car and doing himself grave bodily harm. When he next awakens, he finds himself in the remote mountain home of ex-nurse Annie Wilkes, who identifies herself as “his #1 fan” and tells Paul she pulled him from the wreckage of his car and has been treating his two broken legs. Unfortunately, Annie has more than a few screws loose, and has a hair-trigger temper. When she discovers in the latest Misery Chastain novel that Sheldon has killed off her beloved literary hero, Annie goes off the deep end. Reliant on Annie for illicit pain meds and help surviving his injuries, and aware that no-one knows where he is, Paul Sheldon has no recourse but to agree, when Annie buys him a second-hand typewriter and demands that he write a new Misery novel, resurrecting the doomed character. What follows is a terrifying game of cat-and-mouse and psychological terror. But Paul has yet to realize just how demented Annie Wilkes truly is…and how many people may have died at her hands already.

As the tagline for the novel Misery says, “Paul Sheldon used to write for a living. Now he’s writing to save his own life!”

 

I’ve seen the 1990 feature film adapted from King’s novel by Oscar-winning screenwriter William Goldman. That film starred James Caan as author Paul Sheldon and Kathy Bates as “his #1 fan”, the psychotically obsessive Annie Wilkes. Bates won the Best Actress Oscar as Wilkes, and most fans of King agree that the film Misery is probably one of the best adaptations of a King novel to film or TV. Screenwriter Goldman later also adapted his own film screenplay into a stage play, which premiered in a limited theatrical engagement in 2015, starring Bruce Willis as Paul Sheldon and Laurie Metcalfe as Annie Wilkes. The news that a local community theatre production of Misery is being mounted for early 2024 excited the actor in me, and made me realize I’d never actually read the original novel…so I fixed that by listening to the audiobook, narrated very effectively by actress Lindsay Crouse.

 

(The novel Misery is much like many of King’s early works from the late 1970s to the mid-1990s, though in this case there is no supernatural element, only an all-too-human psychopath. Considering that there's only two primary characters, and one of those is left by himself a lot of the time -- there's a LOT of internal monologues, frequently peppered with "adult language". It was intended to be released under King’s pseudonym Richard Bachman, but King was "outed" as Bachman before that could happen, so it came out under his own name. I do recommend seeing the Misery film, directed by Rob Reiner. You’ll never look at a sledgehammer the same way again, much like you’ll never look at an axe the same way after reading or listening to the novel.)

 

( official Misery page on the official Stephen King web site )

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Audiobook Review: The River We Remember by William Kent Krueger, read by C.W. Wilson

The River We Remember
by William Kent Krueger (Compact Disc Krueger)

The River We Remember is Minnesota author William Kent Krueger’s third “stand-alone” novel in the past 10 years, outside of his Cork O’Connor series (which is at 19 volumes as of 2023). It follows in the wake of Ordinary Grace and This Tender Land. Set in 1958, The River We Remember is set in the fictional community of Jewel, Minnesota, in Black Earth County, along the banks of the Alabaster River. When Memorial Day celebrations are interrupted by the discovery of the body of one of Jewel’s most powerful men, half-eaten by catfish, in an eddy of the river, it is up to Sheriff Brody Dern to investigate. When a spot is discovered where Jimmy Quinn might have ended up in the river, with a large amount of blood, the question becomes: was this a suicide, a fatal accident, or was Jimmy Quinn murdered?

 

The narrative is told from several key characters’ points-of-view — Sheriff Dern, crusading female attorney Charlie Bauer, retired former sheriff and now part-time deputy Connie Graff, 14-year-old Scott Madison (with a hole in his heart, and a mother with secrets), and Scott’s mother Angie. When Sheriff Dern’s attempts to pass off the death as an accident aren’t successful, the ensuing investigation stirs up deep resentments and racial and ethic bigotry among the small, rural community’s citizens. Native American war hero Noah Bluestone is soon jailed for the crime, based on circumstantial evidence, and his Japanese wife Kayoko suffers harrassment. But there’s a long list of people who might wish hateful landowner Jimmy Quinn harm, and some of those people have really good reasons for their feelings.

 

Krueger is a master at creating real flesh-and-blood believable characters, with realistic dialog. His heroes and villains always have multiple layers and are never purely good or purely evil. Spreading out this story over several narrators allows a variety of different viewpoints on a complex issue, and it is sometimes the supporting cast whose experiences tug at the heartstrings the most. Krueger is also excellent at creating a “sense of place” in his novels, and The River We Remember is no exception. The streets of Jewel, the nearby farmsteads, and the various bends and eddies in the Alabaster River are brought into breathtaking life.

 

While nominally a mystery, The River We Remember is really a slice-of-life story — a character study. No matter what you may feel about some of the motives and actions of some of these characters, their lives will remain with you once you’re done with this novel. I listened to this as an audiobook-on-CD, narrated by Broadway actor C.W. Wilson, and have to commend him on doing a particularly excellent job. He creates distinctive voices for over 20 different characters, with only minor changes of accent or inflection. This was a superb “listen”…one of the most powerful books I’ve read in 2023.

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try Ordinary Grace and This Tender Land, also by William Kent Krueger.)

 

( official The River We Remember page on the official William Kent Krueger web site )

 

Read Scott C.’s review of William Kent Krueger’s first Cork O’Connor novel Iron Lake, in the June 2010 Staff Recommendations here on BookGuide!
Read Scott C.’s review of William Kent Krueger’s novel Ordinary Grace in the April 2015 Staff Recommendations here on BookGuide!
Read Jodi R.’s review of William Kent Krueger’s novel This Tender Land in the January 2020 Staff Recommendations here on BookGuide!
Read Scott C.’s review of William Kent Krueger’s novel This Tender Land in the June 2020 Staff Recommendations here on BookGuide!
Read Scott C.’s review of William Kent Krueger’s audio-only novella The Levee, in the June 2023 Staff Recommendations here on BookGuide!

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Audiobook Review: Tallowwood by N.R. Walker

Tallowwood
by N.R. Walker with audio narration by Anthony Ferguson (Hoopla Audio)

This is a well-done mystery with a decade’s long serial killer, and a slow romance between the main characters that takes place in New South Wales, Australia.

 

Sydney Detective August Shaw works the cold cases for his police department and has had some success in closing a few. But he has not been able to resolve a string of apparent suicides that he believes could be Australia’s worst serial killer. Then Senior Constable Jacob Porter, from (fictional) Tallowwood, calls with a death similar to those suicides, and the victim is a police officer. Porter is an indigenous officer who grew up in Tallowwood and loves his job, but this death has initially shaken him. This provides Shaw with the excuse he needs to continue his search for the serial killer.

 

The author weaves us a good tale as we follow clues and dead-ends, and perhaps obstruction, along the way. The slow-burn, quiet romance between Shaw and Porter is a given, though you wonder with Shaw’s roots in Sydney and Porter’s ties to Tallowwood how this will all work out. I love an epilogue and everything is sewn up there very nicely.

 

Antony Ferguson, the reader, does an excellent job with each character, and gives us Australian accents that are understandable to U.S. English-speakers. If you intend to binge this book, give yourself 10 hours and 13 minutes to do so.

 

( official N.R. Walker web site )

 

Recommended by Charlotte M.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Audiobook Review: Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt

Remarkably Bright Creatures

by Shelby Van Pelt, with audio narration by Marin Ireland and Michael Uhry (Compact Disc Van Pelt) (a 2023 One Book – One Lincoln finalist)

 

Seeing that it was one of the three finalists for One Book – One Lincoln in 2023, I managed to grab Remarkably Bright Creatures as an audiobook-on-cd, and am incredibly grateful that I did. I loved this book, but especially as an audiobook!

 

This shares the intersecting stories of three individuals (and the people in their immediate periphery) at a pivotal point in all their lives. Tova Sullivan is an active senior, who has been working at the Sowell Bay Aquarium, cleaning up after closing hours, since her husband passed away. The biggest mystery in her life is the question of what happened to her son, many years ago, who disappeared after his part-time job one night and was never seen again, though circumstantial evidence seems to indicate that he took a small boat out on the ocean and committed suicide. The second main character is Cameron, a young man who’s drifting through life without any real purpose, who ends up in Tova’s town in search of the man he thinks is his father, based on an old photo of his absent mother from her high school years. The third main character is Marcellus McSquiddles. That’s right. He’s a Giant Pacific Octopus, nearing the end of his 4-year lifespan, who’s on exhibit in the aquarium.

Each of these three characters narrates their own story. Tova’s and Marcellus’ stories intersect one night when Marcellus who’s a bit of an escape artist, is found outside his tank, tangled up and unable to save himself, by Tova, who rescues the arthropod. After circumstances force Tova to take a partial leave of absence from her aquarium job, Cameron (temporarily in town) ends up filling in for her.

 

Each of these characters is suffering grief, lonelieness and uncertainty about their futures. And each of them ultimately discovers that the other two characters fill a void in their life. To tell you more would be to spoil the joy of seeing the story unfold.

 

The one thing I was say is that the audiobook of Remarkably Bright Creatures features TWO narrators. Actress Marin Ireland does the bulk of the story, but actor Michael Uhry narrates the segments told in the voice of Marcellus, and he makes that octopus come to life. By the end of this novel, I was emotionally moved and 100% invested in the fates of everyone in the story. This isn’t a truly “deep” novel, but it is an incredible character study and left me fully satisfied in the end. Hopefully you will be too! And definitely give the audiobook a try!

 

( official Shelby Van Pelt web site )

 

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Audiobook Review: The Weight of It All by N.R. Walker

The Weight of It All
by N.R. Walker (Downloadable Audio from Overdrive)

Henry Beckett is a successful actuary who has just been dumped by his long-time boyfriend. Graham complains that Henry has put on a lot of weight and isn’t accompanying him to hiking and biking events any more, and moves out. Henry is devastated, and recognizes that he much preferred the wine tasting and food activities, that he wasn’t as active as he had been eight years earlier, and he’s horrified at the amount of weight he’s put on. So he joins a gym with the goal of winning back Graham.

 

Enter Reed Henske. His new personal trainer.

 

Gee, how is this story going to end?

 

Henry and Reed hit it off right away. Both are quick-witted with terrific senses of humor. They initially bond over the new recipes Henry is trying. We spend the book watching Henry get over Graham and progress through his health and exercise routines, while he and Reed find more common ground as their friendship builds into a romantic relationship.

 

This is a low-heat, low angst story with likeable side characters that takes place in Australia. I enjoyed being able to simply follow the main characters and their friends as their stories unfolded without worrying how this was going to end. Much of the humor was laugh-out-loud and I liked the main characters and their friends, and appropriately disliked Graham (then later felt sorry for him) and his buddies. I was in the mood for a simple, easy tale that kept me involved and this fit the bill.

 

The narrator, Joel Leslie, does an excellent job of distinguishing between the main characters, and giving a sense of their emotions. Also, his Australian accent was not heavy enough to be unintelligible to a US reader.

 

( official N.R. Walker web site )

 

Recommended by Charlotte M.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Audiobook Review: Twist of a Knife by Anthony Horowitz, narrated by Rory Kinnear

The Twist of a Knife
by Anthony Horowitz, with audio narration by Rory Kinnear (Compact Disc Horowitz)

After disappointing me a bit with his previous entry in the Hawthorne & Horowitz series, A Line to Kill, Anthony Horowitz returned in terrific form with this fourth installment, The Twist of a Knife. As usual, I listened to this as an audiobook-on-CD, which is narrated by British actor Rory Kinner, and he does a spectacular job.

 

Once again, this series is one of the most "meta" fiction series being published. Anthony Horowitz is not only the author of the novel, but he is also the central character and narrator. In the first three books in the series, Horowitz was contacted by abrasive private investigator (and ex-cop) Daniel Hawthorne, who wants to hire Horowitz to accompany him on a case and write a book about him. This eventually leads to more of the same, and in the third book, the two men attend a book festival to promote the release of their first joint adventure.

 

In this fourth book, Anthony Horowitz would like to make a break from the taciturn Horowitz, and is happily participating in the production process of bringing his play, Mind Game, to the stage. After some successful tryouts in outlying communities, Mind Game is finally opening in London. But, after a seemingly bravura opening night, Sunday Times reviewer Harriet Throsby gives it a savage review. Then, the next morning, she's found dead in her home, with a cheap costume dagger sticking out of her chest — the dagger Horowitz and all the cast members received as opening night gifts — and Anthony's fingerprints are all over it. When the local police seem intent on railroading him for the crime, Horowitz' only option is to ask Hawthorne for helping in proving his innocence.

 

This was a funny, suspenseful tale, filled with quirky theatrical characters, and the relationship between Horowitz and Hawthorne adds some new layers. The mystery itself is clever — I didn't see the end coming until just before it was revealed. I would absolutely love to see this series of novels turned into a series of occasional TV-movies for British TV and PBS in the U.S. Though I'm sure Anthony Horowitz has no desire to portray Anthony Horowitz!

 

The Twist of a Knife is an absolutely terrific entry in this series...and I'm happy to know that there are more forthcoming!

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try the first three entries in this series — The Word is Murder, The Sentence is Death, and A Line to Kill by Anthony Horowitz, as well as his other current series featuring Magpie Murders and Moonflower Murders.)

 

( official Hawthorne & Horowitz page on the official Anthony Horowitz web site )

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

 

The print version of Magpie Murders was used as the book for discussion at a Just Desserts meeting in 2021.

 

If you're a mystery fan, you're invited to join us for this month's Just Desserts meeting tonight, March 30th, at 6:30 p.m. in the 4th floor auditorium of the Bennett Martin Public Library downtown at 14th & "N" St. -- this mystery-themed discussion group meets on the last Thursday of each month, January through October. This month's book assigned topic of discussion is: Science Fiction & Fantasy Murder Mysteries (check that link for a list of potential reads).

 

Even if you haven't read anything for this specific discussion, you can still participate, and learn about great new mysteries to try! For more information, check out the Just Desserts schedule at https://lincolnlibraries.org/bookguide/book-groups/#justdesserts

Audiobook Review: The Geek Who Saved Christmas by Annabeth Albert

The Geek Who Saved Christmas
by Annabeth Albert (Hoopla Audiobook)

A cozy, gay holiday romance, between two men in their early 40’s, that should be on the Hallmark Christmas Romance channel. A favorite trope of mine with Neighbor #1, Gideon, who’s totally into all the holidays and decorates his house accordingly. Next door to him is Neighbor #2, Paul, who’s the grumpy guy who doesn’t decorate.

 

During one of their few interactions, Gideon learns that Paul’s brother is arriving for Christmas with his girlfriend, and he hopes to propose to her on Christmas Eve in front of the Christmas tree. Gideon offers to help Paul decorate and provide the perfect backdrop. They are together nearly every day as Gideon transforms Paul’s barebones house into a homey, comfy, wonderland as they get to know each other.

 

Of course this has a Happy Ever After and we get an epilogue for the following year (I love epilogues). You end up liking both fellows and wish you had next door neighbors just like them. Not to mention, I also approved of a lot of Gideon’s decorating ideas.

 

The reader of this audiobook, Tim Paige, does an excellent job of voicing each character and you have no trouble discerning who’s speaking in the story.

 

A fun, easy listen at only seven hours.

 

( official Annabeth Albert web site )

 

Recommended by Charlotte M.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Audiobook Review: The Ocean at the End of the Lane written and narrated by Neil Gaiman

The Ocean at the End of the Lane

by Neil Gaiman (Compact Disc Gaiman)

 

The narrator of this story is a middle-aged man who’d returned to his childhood home in Sussex, England for a funeral, and suddenly recalls events of one summer when he was seven. A man committed suicide in a stolen vehicle, and began a series of magical, scary events. Living in a rundown farm at the end of the lane is 11-year-old Lettie Hempstock, her mother, and her grandmother.

 

A lot is going on in this quiet, little story — suicide, how to be a friend, sacrifice, and Other creatures. And Lettie, who has promised to protect that little boy no matter what.

 

Read by the author, Gaiman is one of the few authors who is capable of reading his own material. His soft, British voice knows his own work to add emphasis and pause in just the right manner in just the right places. If given the choice, always select a Gaiman-read story.

 

And he gives us a tale that slowly unfolds including witches, magic, paranormal, other universes, horror, and an epic battle near the end.

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains: A Tale of Travel and Darkness also by Neil Gaiman, also available as an audiobook-on-cd.)

 

( official The Ocean at the End of the Lane page on the official Neil Gaiman web site )

 

See Wyatt P’s earlier review of the print edition of The Ocean at the End of the Lane in the August 2013 Staff Recommendations here on BookGuide.

 

Recommended by Charlotte M.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Services

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Audiobook Review: The Dark Hours by Michael Connelly

The Dark Hours
by Michael Connelly, narrated by Christine Lakin and Titus Welliver (Compact Disc Connelly)

This is the fourth entry in Connelly’s Renee Ballard series, but it is also the 23rd entry in his Harry Bosch series. Unlike the previous volume, The Night Fire (2019), in which Renee and Harry took turns narrating the story, in The Dark Hours, Renee is the only point-of-view character. However, since this is an audiobook, in addition to Christine Lakin as the primary narrator, they did bring back Titus Welliver (the actor portraying Bosch in the recently-concluded Amazon Prime streaming series Bosch) to provide the voice of Harry Bosch any time his character speaks.

 

The Dark Hours follows Renee’s work on two simultaneous cases — first, she is reluctantly partnered up with a fellow female detective on the “Midnight Men” case — a pair of men working together to commit serial rape crimes against specifically targeted single women. And then, when a hispanic man, a former gang member who got out of that life, is killed by a gunshot during the chaos of midnight gunfire citywide as Angelinos go into the streets to fire their guns in the air at the toll of midnight on December 31st, 2020, Renee intuits that the death was not accidental but instead an intentional murder. Ballistics matches the gun used in the New Years Eve killing to an old, unsolved case from Bosch’s era — the retired detective and the young late shift detective combine notes and efforts to research that case. Meanwhile, Renee also follows a few promising leads on identifying a pattern to the tag-team rapists to try to predict their next move and prevent another woman from being victimized — while dealing with a burned-out colleague and lack of support from her supervisors.

 

Connelly is superb at creating realistic police procedurals, with compelling characters and tense plots. Renee Ballard has been a fascinating character to see evolve in her first four books, and her “unofficial” partnership with the older, retired Bosch as a mentor figure has been an interesting way for Connelly to keep his most-renowned character still active in recent years. I definitely appreciated the fact that in this book, we get to see how the L.A.P.D. is coping during the pandemic years — the bulk of the events take place in the first two weeks of January 2021, as even first responders in Los Angeles are mostly still awaiting COVID-19 vaccinations. With most contemporary series writers casting a blind eye towards the pandemic, it has been refreshing to see Connelly integrate the true reality of our world into his storytelling.

 

The Dark Hours is another superb Connelly title — he rarely disappoints!

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try the first three Renee Ballard novels by Connelly, particularly in audiobook format, all read by Christine Lakin and Titus Welliver.)

 

( official The Dark Hours page on the official Michael Connelly web site )

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

 

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!