Hunting the Unabomber

The FBI, Ted Kaczynski, and the Capture of America’s Most Notorious Domestic Terrorist

By: Lis Wiehl, Lisa Pulitzer

Narrated by: Lis Wiehl

Length: 8 hrs and 46 mins

Publisher's summary

The spellbinding account of the most complex and captivating manhunt in American history.

On April 3, 1996, a team of FBI agents closed in on an isolated cabin in remote Montana, marking the end of the longest and most expensive investigation in FBI history. The cabin's lone inhabitant was a former mathematics prodigy and professor who had abandoned society decades earlier. Few people knew his name, Theodore Kaczynski, but everyone knew the mayhem and death associated with his nickname: the Unabomber.

For two decades, Kaczynski had masterminded a campaign of random terror, killing and maiming innocent people through bombs sent in untraceable packages. The FBI task force charged with finding the perpetrator of these horrifying crimes grew to 150 people, yet his identity remained a maddening mystery. Then, in 1995, a "manifesto" from the Unabomber was published in the New York Times and Washington Post, resulting in a cascade of tips - including the one that cracked the case.

Hunting the Unabomber includes:

• Exclusive interviews with key law enforcement agents who attempted to track down Kaczynski, correcting the history distorted by earlier films and streaming series
• Never-before-told stories of inter-agency law enforcement conflicts that changed the course of the investigation
• An in-depth, behind-the-scenes look at why the hunt for the Unabomber was almost shut down by the FBI

New York Times best-selling author and former federal prosecutor Lis Wiehl meticulously reconstructs the white-knuckle, tension-filled hunt to identify and capture the mysterious killer. This is a can't-miss, true crime thriller of the years-long battle of wits between the FBI and the brilliant-but-criminally insane Ted Kaczynski.

"A powerful dual narrative of the unfolding investigation and the life story of Ted Kaczynski.... The action progresses with drama and nail-biting intensity, the conclusion foregone yet nonetheless compelling. A true-crime masterpiece." (Booklist, starred review)

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2020 Lis Wiehl and Lisa Pulitzer (P)2020 Thomas Nelson

Basic mistakes, many mispronunciations

I won't recap the horrible narration, that's covered. Other problems:

** States, 1994 Email was virtually unknown. LOL, I'd been sending email since 1984. **
** Hundreds of FBI agents want to further their career. Make that tens of thousands. **
* The bomb evidence was sent to Washington DC. They don't sent FBI evidence to DC.
* She pronounces Helena Montana as Hell-een-uh, not the correct, Hell-uh-nuh.
* Unforgiveable ambiguity in the FBI interviewing all 16 living victims of the unabombers attacks. I'm sure she means "intended targets'. Several of those injured by the bombs were not the intended recipient. She says this several times.
* Incorrectly spells out the SUN S-P-A-R-C, latter on correctly pronounces it spark. It's alway called a spark.
* Skips interesting details. It's the same number of words to change 'in a suburb of SLC" to 'xyx, a sub of SLC".
The Suspect, An Olympic Bombing, the FBI, the Media, and Richard Jewell, the Man Caught in the Middle By: Kent Alexander, Kevin Salwen, is much better. It tells a great story. This book just reads off facts, some incomplete/incorrect, and doesn't tell a story.

Poor narration

The narration is the worst I've heard out of >150 audiobooks. I couldn't finish it.

Really interesting story let down by the narration

The Netflix series was good but I wanted to hear the full story without made-up characters. The audio book was well written, but the narration was very disappointing and spoiled the book for me.

Great Book, narration too quick.

Loved the content and research; however, the quick talking and run on sentences the narrator performed, almost made me stop listening. Glad, I made it through.

Good story, but poor narration

This was a good story but as have others have commented, the narration makes it very difficult to listen to. I did find that speeding the play to 1.5x made it bearable (and the narrator no longer sounded under the influence.)

Narrator no goid

Narrator stumbled over passages like she had no idea what the words meant. Inappropriate inflections. Impossible to listen to

Great Book

The authors have created the history of the Unabomber. They then explained the investigation's parts and pieces. They include actual words of investigators and victims. The narration was well done.

Unfortunate; I wanted to love this-

Been deeply interested in Ted and his case for many years, I preordered this as soon as I saw it was coming out.

Unfortunately, I have to concur with the other reviewers; the narration is awful, and ruins the experience. As soon as I pushed play and heard her go through the first few sentences, I knew it was going to be a problem.

I tried a few times to ignore it, and focus on the story- I got through chapter four and just couldn’t do it anymore. Going to return the book.

Pretty bummed, because there isn’t much on the case in audiobook form, but bad narration kills the audiobook experience, and this is really bad.

Good book

This is a good book. It's a thorough and fairly comprehensive summary of the search for the Unabomber. It also includes a few chapters dedicated to a small biography of Kaczynski's life. I was disappointed that there wasn't more information about why he chose his targets. It's just sort of glossed over in the book. Also, it would have been nice to hear more from his victims. Ge got very little of that.

My only real problem is with the narration. The author clearly isn't a trained narrator. She has a strange way of talking that makes me think she's on the verge of laughter at certain times. It was very out of place in a book about a serial bomber. She should have someone else read her next true crime book.

Narrator/author almost ruins her own great work!

Wiehl shouldn't narrate her own work! I kept wondering what she was excited about? She creates a great story with well done research but her narration made me almost not care about turning Audible back on.