L. A. Dead: A Stone Barrington Novel

I grabbed this as a lark on one of the sales. I couldn't even finish. The plot struck me as very contrived and the reader's voice didn't have a lot of elasticity to me.

It takes a lot for me to give an audiobook a single star, but I really found this one awful in nearly every sense.

Probably most glaringly terrible is the narration. The narrator's style reminded me of 40s noir films, which was very out of place for a book set in the last couple of decades. It was positively grating.

On a positive note, I did finish the book, which says a good thing about the story. It was interesting enough for me to keep reading. That's about the only good thing I can say about it.

I found it misogynistic, as all of the female characters seemed to exist only to to please or obsess over the protagonist. And the "love" scenes, to use a common phrase, were cringe-worthy. The story ended quite abruptly, and not only do none of the characters experience any growth, the protagonist's behavior was so outrageous that I found myself having no sympathy for him at all.

And I guess that's what it boils down to. After the time I invested, I cared to know who the culprit was, but ended up not caring one whit for any of the characters in the story.

I made it through, but I'm not proud of the fact. I have enjoyed a couple of Woods' other books and found them to be mildly diverting and pleasant. This one was a major departure.
Stone Barrington has suddenly come to resemble a fatuous fraternity boy. We understand that he is remarkably attractive to women, but the witless and inane path he follows through this book manages to make him entirely unattractive as a leading character. I think the author decided that it would be amusing to have his hero serially ambushed and seduced by as many naked women as possible as he deals with the "mystery" at the heart of the book. Unfortunately, that was all there was to the story, and even the sexual escapades which form the bulk of the action were boring and juvenile.
You should avoid this book not because there is too much sex in it but because there is too little invention, adventure or suspense. In short, it is dreck.

I'm not certain what was worse in this audiobook. The story or the narrator! big mistake!

I really hate to say this, but this was a very poor written book and the narrator was the worst I have heard. You want to listen to the end only to find out what happened but getting there was torture. Sorry

I had previously listened to three of Stuart Woods' books, "Chiefs", "Deep Lies", and "Capital Crimes", and they were all terrific (all of them 5-Star ratings).

Soooo, I was excited when I downloaded three more of Woods' books.

Unfortunately, this lot definitely took a little of the wind out of my Stuart Woods sail.

With respect to L.A. Dead, the story was good enough to keep my attention, but it was not a gripping novel - certainly not to the level of the three I listed above.

With respect to narration, it was pretty bad in this one. Robert Lawrence has a pleasant voice, but he read all of the actual dialogue in the book like a bad B-Actor. His character voices were delivered awkwardly and simply aggravating at times.

Overall, recommended, but not enthusiastically.

I almost give it a 3 for the poor narration, but will round up to 4-stars.

No, the character was so unrealistic...so unbelievable I would hate to waste my time trying another book with the same character.

No, I love a GOOD mystery. I also like repeat characters, have even come to know and love them. But Stone is not believable...every woman he meets is trying to get him into bed!!!! He is like a very immature teen.

The reader was alright but lacked depth. He could have read with more excitement in his voice.

No. I kept waiting and hoping it would get better. Much to my disappointment it did not.

No

We really enjoyed L. A. Dead by Stuart Woods. He is one of our favorite authors, and we enjoy the predicaments that Stone Barrington gets into and out of. We have listened to most of Stuart's books. We prefer audio books, as we travel a lot. The books make the drive time fly by, and the operation of the Kindle audio book, played over the vehicle radio was flawless.

Not the best from this author. It came off like a not so great movie.

I can usually figure out a book or show in no time which usually makes the books less exciting but I cannot with the Barrington books. There are other series that are pretty good but right now I'm hooked.