Blackbirds

Miriam Black, Book 1

By: Chuck Wendig

Narrated by: Emily Beresford

Length: 8 hrs and 7 mins

Publisher's summary

Miriam Black knows when you will die.

Still in her early twenties, she’s foreseen hundreds of car crashes, heart attacks, strokes, suicides, and slow deaths by cancer. But when Miriam hitches a ride with truck driver Louis Darling and shakes his hand, she sees that in thirty days he will be gruesomely murdered while he calls her name.

Miriam has given up trying to save people; that only makes their deaths happen. No matter what she does, she can’t save Louis. But if she wants to stay alive, she’ll have to try.

©2012 Brilliance Audio, Inc.; 2012 Chuck Wendig

Critic reviews

"Blackbirds is a story of loss and what it takes to make things right. It’s a story about fate and how sometimes, if we wrestle with it hard enough, maybe we can change it. It’s the kind of book that doesn’t let go even after you’ve put it down.” ( Stephen Blackmoore)

Listen at 1.2X speed

It will make the narrator sound like a human. Story was pretty good. more words

Bad beginning

The beginning was rough. It’s like the writer is trying too hard to make the leading female character badass. I feel like I’m vulgar but her language made me nauseous. I read a review on here that said to give the book some time and I’m glad I did because after she got all of her disgustingness out, it got so much better.

Chuck Wendig's World is a Strange Place

I imagine this book as a glimpse into Chuck Wendig's mind. It's a strange world. I imagine it like an apothecary table -- where each tiny drawer can have any random number of things in it, just like the chapters in this book. In one, some old thread; in another, a live shark; in the third, some bizarre horror that no one anticipated. It's a rough ride, filled with hard left turns, but I enjoyed the journey, once I settled in and realized that I, like the protagonist, had no idea where the ride was going.

great performance great story

voice actor and author pulled together a great story. I enjoyed the characters the twists and turns...except the Virginia slims hurt my ex smoker's soul lololol

I loved

Listened to it in 2 days. Chuck writes an engaging story. If swearing offends you take a pass for everyone else it’s definitely entertaining and I have to say I actually kinda like the main character despite her many flaws. I enjoyed the ending greatly.

Too much Palahniuk and Larsson for his own good

I imagine Chuck Wendig's pre-writing chats with himself went something like this, "How can I create the hottest, most bad-ass chick and put her into a story? I want to write a lead character that I'd totally want to be with."

So, with a healthy dose of Chuck Palahniuk's overwritten gross-out style and a basic template for a main character that is essentially nothing more than a potty-mouthed Stieg Larsson protagonist, we get Blackbirds. And with it, Chuck Wendig's dullard dream date, Miriam Black.

Not that this is only frat boy fiction--Wendig knows the word "macadam," after all, and uses it three times. Yes, this novel has aspirations beyond just giving us a hollow shell of a female lead who does very little other than rob people and talk tough. It courageously takes us into a world of stereotypical secondary characters (nearly all of whom are mawkish and cut-and-pasted from someone's tired rogue's gallery) and even ventures into the taboo territory of sexual violence against women and short, stocky lesbians.

Blackbirds has it all--including a massive plot gaffe towards the end of the book where Miriam is touched by an assailant and should be able to read his/her death but does not.

Not For Everyone

This series gets good reviews from many, so I gave it a shot. I'll give the author credit for being a good story teller, but it was too raw and grotesque for my taste.

Contrived Attempt at Shock and Awe

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

If this was a better story. The performance I thought was great; the content, not so much.

Would you ever listen to anything by Chuck Wendig again?

No.

Have you listened to any of Emily Beresford’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

I haven't, but I'll check her out now that I realize how good she is.

What character would you cut from Blackbirds?

Maybe the main one. :O

Any additional comments?

I wanted a gritty, thrilling, modern urban novel. Wendig's writing makes it apparent that he's trying incredibly hard to fit into a genre that doesn't come naturally to him. As you recognized the effort it just felt fake. The story is pretty interesting, inventive even, but the writing leaves a lot to be desired. Bravo to Beresford's performance, though, as it saved the experience.

violence deception horrid women

I wouldn't have finished except I wanted to give an honest review. This had no fun for me. All horrid characters. 6 women in whole book, 5 at least semi psychopathic. About the same for the men though I didn't count.
If you like horror and a lot of violence with no humor but with a suspenseful plot, you might like it. Not at all for me.

Meh...

Beyond the stunning beautiful cover art...the story started out great, but has a major flaw in the main character. Without giving too much away, would Miriam REALLY stay with such an absolute jerk? Even when threatened with what he did? I doubt it. If Miriam is really this femme-fatale-road-weary-general-badass, I seriously doubt she'd let anybody push her around. It felt like a cop-out on behalf of the author...like he couldn't figure out a more plausible motivation. Beyond that, I found Wendig's writing style enjoyable and the narrator was wonderful.