Give it a Listen

The Empty Chair - Author Jeffery Deavers - Read by Joe Mantegna - 2000

There are certain things that make listening to a book appealing to me; 1) An interesting plot, 2) A reader that has pre-read the story and understands the inflection and, if a reader given to changing voices for the characters, a spareness to the accent or gender of the character, 3) A good flow to the dialog and story line. This book had none of that. None I tell you.

Joe Mantegna had the worst voice for this reading! He was flat where he should have been animated, he used accents that were heavy and so thick as to be completely unintelligible, he slogged through dialog that should have been snappy and a bit pithy, and his sarcasm was non-existent, I was never sure if it was meant to be sarcastic or not!

The premise sounded great! It is about a NY City criminalist that goes to South Carolina for surgery only to be pulled into a murder investigation pitting him against someone he trained.

I was one chapter in before I thought I about turning it off. One more chapter and I was running a 12 minute mile because I was trying hard to understand his accented dialog. And on chapter 4 when I decided I couldn't listen to one more minute. I think that took up about 25 minutes of a 10 mile run. 25 minutes of my life that I won't ever get back.

I have read one other Jeffery Deaver book, The Sleeping Doll (2007), and enjoyed it. But this one lacked a reader that could be listened to for any length of time. Maybe give the book a try but give it a miss on the listen list!